Premier League Table

Premier League

The Premier League is a professional football league for English football clubs (some clubs from Wales can also play in it). It is the top division in the England football league system. It hosts 20 clubs. The championship runs from August to May, each team plays 38 matches. Until 2016, the tournament was officially called the Barclays Premier League; since 2016, the tournament has no main sponsor. Outside England, the tournament is often referred to as the "English Premier League".

The tournament was founded on February 20, 1992 under the name of the FA Premier League after the clubs of the First Division decided to withdraw from the Football League, founded in 1888, in order to obtain greater financial benefits. primarily due to the receipt of more profit from the sale of rights to television broadcasts. Since then, the Premier League has become the most popular sports championship in the world. It is also the most profitable football league in the world, with consolidated club revenues in the 2007/08 season of £ 1.93 billion ($ 3.15 billion).

At the moment, judging by the UEFA coefficient table, the Premier League is the best national championship in Europe. 45 different clubs played in the Premier League, but only 7 of them won the title: Manchester United (13 times), Manchester City (5 times), Chelsea (5 times), Arsenal (3 times), Blackburn Rovers (1 time), Leicester City (1 time), Liverpool (1 time).

Origins

Despite significant success for English clubs in European competition in the 1970s, there was a marked decline in English football in the late 1980s. The stadiums were in poor condition, football hooliganism became commonplace, in addition to this, all English clubs were disqualified from participating in European competitions after the Eisel tragedy of 1985.

The Football League First Division, which has been the top division in English football since 1888, lagged far behind Italy's Serie A and Spanish La Liga in stadium attendance and income, prompting some of England's top soccer players to play abroad. However, in the early 1990s, the situation began to change for the better: the England national team performed well at the 1990 World Cup, reaching the semifinals; UEFA lifted a five-year ban on English clubs playing in European cups in 1990.

After the Hillsborough tragedy, the Taylor Report was published, which provides for a number of measures to improve the safety of stadiums - first of all, the reconstruction of all stadium stands in full seating.

Income from television broadcasts became more and more significant: in 1986, the Football League received 6.3 million pounds for a two-year agreement to sell the rights to television broadcasting, and already in 1988 the amount of a new four-year contract was 44 million pounds. Negotiations in 1988 were the first harbinger of a future split in the League: ten clubs threatened to withdraw from the tournament and form a "super league", but in the end they were persuaded to stay. But the stadiums were modernized and their attendance and ticket revenues grew, so the country's top clubs re-considered the possibility of withdrawing from the Football League in order to benefit more from the increasingly impressive influx of money into football.

Foundation (1991)

At the end of the 1990/91 season, there was a proposal to establish a new league in order to attract more money. On July 17, 1991, the clubs in the First Division of the Football League signed the Founding Agreement establishing the basic principles of the new organization, which it was decided to call the FA Premier League. The newly formed top division received commercial independence from the Football Association and the Football League and could independently negotiate the sale of television rights, as well as conclude sponsorship agreements.

It was believed that this would raise the level of English clubs and allow them to again successfully play in European competitions and defeat the best teams in Europe, as well as attract the best football players in the world to the championship - in 1991 it seemed fantastic. In 1992, all 22 clubs of the First Division officially withdrew from the Football League, and on May 27 of the same year, the Premier League of the Football Association was founded.

This meant a split in the Football League, which had existed for 104 years and included four divisions up to this point. After the formation of the EPL, there are three divisions left in the Football League. The format of the championship has not changed: the same number of teams took part in the tournament as before in the First Division (22 teams); the teams' exit and relegation rules between the Premier League and the new First Division remain the same as between the old First and Second Divisions.

The Premier League was founded by 22 clubs: Arsenal, Aston Villa, Blackburn Rovers, Chelsea, Coventry City, Crystal Palace, Everton, Ipswich Town, Leeds United, Liverpool, Manchester City, Manchester United, Middlesbrough, Norwich City, Nottingham Forest, Oldham Athletic, QPR, Sheffield United, Sheffield Wednesday, Southampton, Tottenham Hotspur and Wimbledon.