Did the January transfer window make any difference to the league table?

By Tony Attwood

Since  the transfer window closed clubs in the Premier League have played between eight and 11 games. Fulham for example have played eight, Arsenal and Leeds United have played 11.

So I thought it might be interesting to see how clubs have been doing since the transfer window closed – with access to their new players – and whether that gives us a further insight into how the season will end.  (You might recall we’ve already had one go at this).

Of particular interest this time around is whether the transfer window made any difference to the situation.  So we’ve looked at the number of deals done in January, including deals that were concluded after the closure of last summer’s window but before 1 January, since players signed in that period were obviously not able to play until 1 January.

And the aim is to see how this might affect the league table.   We’ve included the actual league position at the end of 31 January but this turns out to be a bit misleading because some clubs have played more games than others.  So really this very first column is just a reference point back to how the table looked at the end of the window.

Of more interest is the number of players brought into each club (column three), the points per game since the window closed on 31 January (column 4), and how the league would look if we just took games after 31 January, and sorted out league positions on a points per game basis.