The two tables below show how last season’s top five Premier League teams fared against one another and how they fared against the other 15 teams.

Despite amassing fewer points against top five opposition than Manchester City or Chelsea, Manchester United cruised to the title 11 points clear of their nearest competitor thanks to consistent form against the bottom 15 teams. Likewise, Arsenal managed just one win over top five opposition, amassing 6 points fewer than Spurs, yet were able edge their North London rivals to the final Champions League spot because of their ability to beat teams they were expected to beat. In fact, only United had a better record against teams outside the top 5.

Arsenal’s failure to collect points against top sides is interesting. A critique of Arsene Wenger is that he plays the same style against every opponent and doesn’t alter tactics based on the opposition (this isn’t entirely fair but Wenger pays far less attention to tactics than Rafa Benitez at Chelsea, AVB at Spurs, Sir Alex at Man United and Roberto Mancini at City did). Arsenal’s strong record against weaker opponents and poor record against top five opponents suggests they’re able to win games when they have superior talent but struggle when the opposition is equally gifted or better. Tactics employed are often the difference when top sides with similar levels of talent match up with one another so Wenger’s less than fastidious approach to preparing for the unique strengths of each individual opponent could be costing Arsenal valuable points. Wenger is undoubtedly a great man manager and one of the best developers of players the game has known but it would be interesting to see how Arsenal would fare for a season with a more astute tactician in charge (Wenger’s transfer dealings are a subject for another blog post).

The table below ranks Premier League teams by points gained from losing positions. In other words, if a team was losing at any point in a given match and went on to tie that match, they'd earn one point from a losing position. If they won the match they'd earn 3 points from a losing position. Liverpool and Swansea have played 27 games. The other 18 teams have played 26.

The following table ranks teams by the number of points dropped from winning positions. In other words if a team was winning at any given point in a match and went on to draw, they'd drop 2 points from that match. If they lost the match they'd obviously drop all 3 points. Note that individual matches can show up both as points won from losing positions and points dropped from winning positions. For instance, in their recent match with Manchester City, Liverpool went down to an early goal, rallied back to take a 2-1 lead, then conceded a late goal to draw 2-2. Therefore they earned 1 point from a losing position and dropped 2 points from a winning position.