The Premier League has become one of the best leagues in world football since 1992. The game has seemingly evolved with every passing season, and with it, the teams have only improved.
However, occasionally, there are sides that are so woefully underequipped for the competition that it makes you wonder how they even got there to begin with.
In the 2023/24 and 2024/25 seasons, all six promoted clubs – Luton Town, Burnley, Sheffield United, Ipswich Town, Leicester City and Southampton went straight back down, with some of those clubs recording some of the worst points totals in Premier League history.
With that in mind, Football FanCast has looked back at the worst points tallies since the formation of the Premier League to see which teams were truly out of their depth in the top flight. However, we have not included the 2009/10 Portsmouth side, as without their nine-point deduction, they would have finished with a relatively respectable 28 points.
Derby County
11
2007/08
Southampton
12
2024/25
Sunderland
15
2005/06
Sheffield United
16
2023/24
Huddersfield Town
16
2018/19
Aston Villa
17
2015/16
Sunderland
19
2002/03
Norwich City
21
2019/20
Norwich City
22
2021/22
Ipswich Town
22
2024/25
Sheffield United
23
2020/21
Burnley
24
2023/24
Sunderland
24
2016/17
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Sunderland make their first (spoiler alert: not last) appearance on the list at number nine thanks to a particularly dreadful campaign in the 2016/17 season that saw them rack up a measly points total of just 24.
The Black Cats had been in relegation fights for the previous three seasons before this one and even finished in 17th place the year before on 39 points, just two above relegated Newcastle United – we’re sure they loved that, though.
So, when they finally went down, nobody could say they didn’t see it coming.
And let’s be honest: when your great idea of how to avoid relegation is signing David Moyes and loaning in a 21-year-old Adnan Januzaj, you can’t really blame anyone else.
12 Burnley 2023/24 24 points
In truth, Vincent Kompany’s Burnley never gave themselves a fighting chance. That said, the fact they were able to take their survival bid to the penultimate weekend is something of a minor miracle. But with the Clarets being in the relegation zone for the entire season, they can have no complaints.
By December, they had mustered up just four points, and only beat two teams (Fulham and Brentford) besides their Championship rivals from the previous year. Their only solace was that they were not the worst team in the Premier League that season.
11 Sheffield United 2020/21 23 points
Now, from a relegation that everyone saw coming from a mile off to one that really was quite a surprise, especially the manner in which it happened.
Sheffield United were promoted from the Championship in the 2018/19 season, and there was a general expectation that they would seriously struggle in the Premier League, but that couldn’t be further from the truth.
The Blades took the 2019/20 Premier League season by storm, racking up win after win and at one point looking like serious contenders for a Champions League spot – and then the pandemic happened.
Whether it was other teams working out their tactics, a lack of fans in the stadiums, or something else entirely, the team just weren’t the same after the restart and ultimately finished in ninth, which for a promoted side is still an extremely impressive feat.
So when the 2020/21 season started, people expected the Blades to maintain their mid-table position and maybe even push for a Europa League spot, but instead, the team totally fell apart.
The architect behind their impressive form, Chris Wilder, was sacked in March, and the team limped home to a 20th-place finish and a points total of just 23 – talk about a drop-off.
10 Ipswich Town 2024/25 22 points
Ipswich Town’s rise to the Premier League under Kieran McKenna was remarkable, winning back-to-back promotions from League One to seal their place back in the top flight for the first time since 2002.
However, their return back in the Premier League was short-lived, as the Tractor Boys, despite drawing plenty of games early on, picked up just 22 points.
Ipswich recorded just four league wins all year, two of which came against Chelsea and Tottenham. However, they shipped 82 goals in 38 games and were relegated in April.
9 Norwich City 2021/22 22 points
When people think of Premier League yo-yo clubs, there’s a very good chance that one of the first teams that come to mind is Norwich City.
The Canaries made a habit of dominating the Championship, coming up to the top flight for a season, and then going back down to do the whole thing over again – which is precisely what they did between 2020 and 2022.
After being relegated in 2020 (see below), the Canaries went on to rack up 97 points in the 2020/21 Championship season before registering less than a quarter of that total in the 2021/22 Premier League season.
They haven’t returned to the big time since, but you can be sure that they will be there soon enough to start the whole process over again.
8 Norwich City 2019/20 21 points
Norwich have the unwanted accolade of being the only team to feature on this list with back-to-back top-flight campaigns, as their 2019/20 season was somehow even worse than their 2021/22 effort.
In all, they managed to win just five games, draw ten and lose 20, ending up with a points total of 21 and a goal difference of -49. They were so poor that they would have needed another 15 points just to survive.
That said, they did pull off one of the shocks of the season, though, beating reigning champions Manchester City 3-2 at Carrow Road in mid-September.
We reckon they’d rather have stayed up, though.
7 Sunderland 2002/03 19 points
The Black Cats make their second unwanted appearance on this list, and we’re afraid they aren’t done there.
In the space of five seasons, Sunderland won promotion to the Premier League, secured back-to-back seventh-place finishes, survived a relegation battle by the skin of their teeth and then, finally, after a miserable season that saw them accumulate just 19 points, they were sent back down to the second tier.
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It was an absolute whirlwind of emotions for the fans, and while the board had hoped that the appointment of Howard Wilkinson in October 2002 would be enough to see them maintain their place among England’s top 20 teams, the writing was on the wall.
The good news was that it would only take two years in Division One to come back up, although the bad news was, well, it wouldn’t take them two seasons to go back down again.
6 Aston Villa 2015/16 17 points
When it comes to English football’s biggest clubs, few come greater than Aston Villa.
Boasting a European Cup success in 1982, seven First Division titles and seven FA Cups, the Claret and Blue are among the many giants that call English football home.
So, when they were relegated from the Premier League for the first time in almost three decades in 2016, it was a worrying indictment of how the club had been run in recent years, especially as they went down with such an embarrassingly low points total of just 17.
While it was shocking to see such a prestigious side drop into the second tier, it was hardly a surprise for those watching them week-in-week-out as they had only just survived the previous season – three points, to be exact.
Really, the club’s biggest mistake came in the March before the season started, as for some reason, unbeknownst to the rest of us, they decided to offer Tim Sherwood a three-and-a-half-year deal to become manager. Madness.
5 Huddersfield Town 2018/19 16 points
We’re into the podium positions now, although it’s not exactly the most prestigious of podiums. The team to register the joint-third-worst points tally in Premier League history is Huddersfield Town, who did so in their disastrous 2018/19 season.
Now, while it’s always going to be embarrassing to be on a list such as this, the fact that the Terriers managed to survive in the top flight for two seasons is an achievement to be recognised and while it certainly went wrong in their second year, that first season has to be viewed as a success.
Unfortunately, you can’t call their second year anything but a miserable failure, as they finished the campaign 20 points from safety and registered just three wins all season.
4 Sheffield United 2023/24 16 points
Sheffield United’s most recent return to the Premier League certainly didn’t go to plan. Seemingly doomed from the beginning of the campaign, the Blades never looked like escaping relegation trouble before their demise was confirmed in April after a heavy defeat at Newcastle.
That particular 5-1 reverse wasn’t atypical of their results this past term, with the South Yorkshire side also on the receiving end of four 5-0 thumpings, a 6-0 thrashing and a woefully embarrassing 8-0 disaster – with four of those six games in front of the Bramall Lane faithful.
They also set the record for the most goals conceded in a Premier League season, reaching triple figures with two games to spare as they broke Swindon Town’s record of 100 (in a 42-game season) before the campaign’s end.