Football League & Premier League 1888 to 2009
Chart showing the respective League positions season by season for every club in the four flights
of English football from 1888-89 to 2009-10
Chart arranged A to Z with all 134 clubs who have participated in the Football League from 1888 to 2010 with their League positions
Table showing years spent in each of the four
flights of League football, together with the
amount of time spent in the top flight,
arranged club by club
Table showing the total number of seasons
spent in the top flight of English football
from 1888-89 to 2009-10
The League ladders season by season also showing the total points won
Chart detailing the points amassed season by season for every club in the Premier League from 1992-93 to 2008-09
Chart detailing the points amassed by season for every club in the top flight from 1888-89 to 1938-39
Chart detailing the points amassed by season for every club in the old First Division from 1946-47 to 1991-92
Table listing every League Championship won in all four flights
Table showing the Premier League's top five clubs for every season from 1992-93 to 2008-09
Table showing the last Top Flight
Championships won in chronological order
Chart showing the top 100 Premier League goalscorers until the end of 2008-09
Table showing all the Premier League's goalscorers for 2007-08
Table showing the credited assists in the Premier League for season 2007-08
Unique table showing the combined goals scored and assists in the Premier League 2007-08
Table showing every player to have made 18 or more Premier League appearances for 2007-08
PREMIER LEAGUE
Despite significant European success during the 1970s, the 1980s had marked a low point for English football. Stadiums were crumbling, supporters endured poor facilities, hooliganism was rife, and English clubs were banned from European competition following the events at Heysel in 1985.
The Football League First Division, which had been the top level of English football since 1888, was well behind leagues such as Italy's Serie A and Spain's La Liga in attendances and revenues, and several top English players had moved abroad.
However, by the turn of the 1990s the downward trend was starting to reverse; England had been successful in the 1990 FIFA World Cup, reaching the semi-finals. UEFA, European football's governing body, lifted the five-year ban on English clubs playing in European competitions in 1990 and the Taylor Report on stadium safety standards, which proposed expensive upgrades to create all-seater stadiums in the aftermath of the Hillsborough disaster, was published in January of that year.
Television money had also become much more important; the Football League received £6.3 million for a two-year agreement in 1986, but when that deal was renewed in 1988, the price rose to £44m over four years.
The 1988 negotiations were the first signs of a breakaway league; ten clubs threatened to leave and form a "super league", but were eventually persuaded to stay. As stadiums improved and match attendance and revenues rose, the country's top teams again considered leaving the Football League in order to capitalise on the growing influx of money being pumped into the sport.
At the close of the 1991 season, a proposal for the establishment of a new league was tabled that would bring more money into the game overall. The Founder Members Agreement, signed on 17 July 1991 by the game's top-flight clubs, established the basic principles for setting up the FA Premier League.
The newly formed top division would have commercial independence from the Football Association and the Football League, giving the FA Premier League license to negotiate its own broadcast and sponsorship agreements. This was considered necessary so that English clubs could once again compete with and beat the best of Europe, while attracting the best talent in the world, something which in 1991 seemed practically unthinkable.
In 1992 the First Division clubs resigned from the Football League en masse and on 27 May 1992 the FA Premier League was formed as a limited company working out of an office at the Football Association's then headquarters in Lancaster Gate. This meant a break-up of the 104-year-old Football League that had operated until then with four divisions; the Premier League would operate with a single division and the Football League with three.
There was no change in competition format; the same number of teams competed in the top flight, and promotion and relegation between the Premier League and the new First Division remained on the same terms as between the old First and Second Divisions. The number of clubs in the Premier League decreased from 22 in 1992-93 to just 20 three seasons later. It has remained at 20 clubs since season 1995-96.
There has been a total of 40 different clubs in the Premier League from 1992-93 to 2007-08 with seven clubs (Arsenal, Aston Villa, Chelsea, Everton, Liverpool, Manchester United and Tottenham Hotspur) being ever-present.Only four of those 40 clubs have won the Premier League title - Manchester United, Chelsea, Arsenal and Blackburn Rovers.New boys Stoke City and Hull City appear for the first time in season 2008-09 and become clubs 41 & 42 to participate.
Stoke have guaranteed their Premier League place for 2009-10 along with Hull City. West Bromwich Albion became the first Premier League club to be relegated in 2008-09 and were followed on the last day of the season by Middlesbrough and Newcastle United.
Manchester United won their third consecutive Premier League title and 11th overall to draw level with Liverpool on 18 League titles.
Wolverhapton Wanderers became the first team to gain automatic promotion to the Premier League for season 2009-10. They were followed by Birmingham City, who return to the Top Flight after one season away and who clinched the second automatic promotion slot.
The remaining promotion place was contested in a Wembley play-off between Burnley and Sheffield United on Monday 25th May 2009 which Burnley (who were one of the 12 Founder Members of the Football League back in 1888) won and thus became the 43rd club to participate in the Premier League since its inception in 1992.
General information about every Premier League club participating in season 2008-09, including how many seasons spent in the top flight
All 1,126 foreign player who have participated in the Premier League for the last 17 seasons are included in this table
Table listing the 309 Premier League Winners Medals awarded to 145 different players from
1992-93 to 2008-09
Full details of every League Club in the Top Four Flights of English Football for 2009-10. Includes links to every club's official web site & Wikipedia.
Table listing the 1,126 foreign Premier League players according to the clubs they played for
1992-93 to 2008-09
Unique table showing the combined goals scored
and assists in the Premier League 2008-09
Table listing every highest goalscoer in the Top Flight of English Football from 1888-89 to 2008-09
Results & table of all the matches played between the London Premier League clubs in 2008-09
Table showing the Top 5 League finishes for
every season from 1888-89 to 2008-09
All 530 players who have participated in a Premier League match during Season 2008-09
The 105 teams who have participated in the
League from 1992-93 arranged alphabetically
with their League positions
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Cumulative record of all match results, points and goals of every team that has played in the Premier League from 1992-93 to 2008-09
Chart detailing the points amassed by
season for every club in the Top Flight
from 1888-89 to 2008-09
Financial information on all 20 Premier League clubs including overall turnover, net debt, players wages and ratio of wages to turnover.
A batch of railway locomotives were built and named after famous football clubs in the 1930s
by the London & North-East Railway
Unique table showing the combined goals scored
and assists in the Premier League 2009-10
Results & table of all the matches played between the London Premier League clubs in 2009-10
All the player transfer deals concerning the 20 Premier League clubs during the Summer 2009 transfer window.
History of every red & yellow card issued to clubs
in the Premier League from 1992-93 to 2009-10
History of every red & yellow card issued to players in the Premier League from 1992-93 to 2009-10
All 383 players who have participated in a Premier League match so far during Season 2009-10
FOOTBALL LEAGUE
The Football League is a league competition featuring professional football clubs from England and Wales. Founded in 1888, it is the oldest such competition in world football.
It was the top level football league in England from its foundation in the 19th century until 1992, when the top 22 clubs split away to form the FA Premier League. Since 1992 it has had 72 clubs evenly divided into three divisions, which are currently known as The Championship, League One, and League Two.
After four years of debate, The Football Association finally legalised professionalism on 20 July 1885. Before that date many clubs made illegal payments to "professional" players to boost the competitiveness of their teams, arousing the contempt of those clubs abiding by the laws of the amateur Football Association code.
As more and more clubs became professional the ad-hoc fixture list of FA Cup, inter-county, and 'friendly' matches was seen by many as an unreliable stream of revenue, and ways were considered of ensuring a consistent income.
A Scottish draper and director of Aston Villa, William McGregor, was the first to set out to bring some order to a chaotic world where clubs arranged their own fixtures.
On 2 March 1888, he wrote to the Blackburn Rovers, Bolton Wanderers, Preston North End, West Bromwich Albion and to the secretary of Aston Villa about the formation of a Football League.
The first meeting was held at Anderson's Hotel in London on 23 March 1888 on the eve of the FA Cup Final with the name of the Football League being settled at a further meeting on 17 April at Manchester's Royal Hotel. The first season of the Football League began a few months later on 8 September with 12 member clubs.
Each club played the other twice, once at home and once away, and two points were awarded for a win and one for a draw. This points system was not agreed upon until after the season had started; the alternative proposal was one point for a win only.
Preston won the first league title without losing a game, and completed the first league & cup double by also taking the FA Cup.
Every one of the original 12 Football League club has at least one relegation in their history, unlike some European leagues such as Spain, Portugal, Scotland or the Republic of Ireland.
Everton currently hold the record for the most seasons spent in the Top Flight of English football - 107 seasons out of a maximum possible 111 up to and including season 2009-10.
Aston Villa are currently on 99 seasons in the Top Flight while Liverpool are on 95 and Arsenal are on 93 seasons.
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All the Premier League results and current league table for season 2009-10
All the Premier League results and final league table for season 2008-09
All the Premier League results and final league table for season 2007-08
All the Premier League results and final league table for season 2006-07
All the Premier League results and final league table for season 2005-06
