Cartilage Free Captain predicts the 2024-25 Premier League

Last week, we asked you, the gentle readers of Cartilage Free Captain, to predict the 2024-25 Premier League. You sure did that! Nearly 500 of you replied to the poll to rank the 20 Premier League teams in order, and to predict a couple of other fun questions. That’s less than in a lot of years, but also we’re off of Twitter so there’s fewer randos reading this, I guess? Doesn’t matter. There’s a bunch of y’all and you responded.

Let’s get right to it. First, here are the predictions from the masthead.

I think the biggest shift from last year to this year is that the masthead is higher on Arsenal’s chances. But we’re not here to blow smoke up your ass, we’re here to tell you that Arsenal probably has the best chance of keeping Manchester City from winning the Premier League… again. Which SUCKS. But opinions are opinions.

Interestingly, none of us really considered the elephant in the room — that there’s a decent chance Manchester City get a huge point deduction for financial malfeasance and are either relegated or removed entirely from the league by the end of the season. The same goes for Leicester, or Nottingham Forest, or Everton. It’s gonna be a really weird season, y’all, but since we can’t predict what the Premier League will do we (mostly) ranked teams based purely on footballing merit. That means, practically speaking, fifth place for Tottenham and all three promoted teams going straight back down.

Also nterestingly, Brentford has the highest variance among any of the teams ranked by the masthead, which is… interesting? I’m using “interesting” a lot. But it’s interesting! Or maybe we’re just chucking darts at the wall, that’s for you to decide.

Let’s move to the Commentariat!

Honestly… it’s not THAT different. Spurs fans are more bullish on Ange-Ball Season 2 than Spurs bloggers, apparently. You’re higher on Villa and lower on Newcastle than we are. You have no idea what to do with West Ham or Bournemouth. Seems appropriate! I also feel like the threat of point deductions is much more a factor in the community rankings, which makes sense since we didn’t say one way or another whether we wanted you to consider these factors when voting. And we once again appreciate the brave souls who skewed the numbers by ranking Arsenal 20th. Thank you for your service.

Just for fun, here are a few team breakdowns.

Tottenham Hotspur

Yeah, okay. Fine. You’ve got your EXTREME OPTIMISTS, your regular average optimists, the pragmatic we’re-gonna-finish-fourth-and-it’s-fine-ists, and the one (1) troll who voted Spurs 20th. Well done you!

Arsenal

This is a Tottenham Hotspur blog and y’all still voted them mostly 1st-2nd, plus the usual raft of 20th. Not sure if I should be proud of you for this or not.

Southampton

Y’all really really really REALLY don’t think Soton is gonna do much this season, huh?

Brentford

The most enigmatic team in this year’s poll. Nobody has any idea how good they’re going to be, and fair enough I suppose?

Manchester City

[deep resigned sigh]

Now, onto the other questions!

Q2: Which team OUTSIDE the top 6 is most likely to finish INSIDE the top 6?

Not particularly surprising, except for maaaaaybe how high some of you are on Manchester United suddenly becoming good after an offseason of chaos where they somehow still managed to keep Erik ten Haag and didn’t make many consequential additions to the squad. Newcastle is the winner here, but not by much.

Q3: Which team INSIDE the top 6 is most likely to finish OUTSIDE the top 6?

This is a Tottenham Hotspur blog. F**k Chelsea. Take that out of consideration and y’all really don’t think Villa are going to handle the transition from no European football to a full season of two matches a week. Same! Also, 3.2% Tottenham Hotspur? For shame.

Q4: Who will win the Golden Boot?

Once again the Norwegian Manchester City viking takes this question by a landslide. It’s not a surprise. Maybe a little depressing, but not a surprise. But also a clear second is Dominic Solanke, and this is a Tottenham Hotspur blog.

I also gave people the option to select OTHER and choose someone outside of the list. There were three people who selected it, and two of them chose “Dominic Solanke,” a name already on the list. Jesus Christ, people! Here were the additions, verbatim.

• Solanke
• will Lankshear
• He’s already on here, but wanted to type SOLANKE in caps for emphasis.

Q5: Who will get the sack first?

Nuno? Really? I’m honestly surprised by this, since Nuno came in and actually did fairly decently with a pretty garbage Nottingham Forest team last season and saved them from relegation! Enzo Maresco and Erik ten Haag I’m less surprised by — first, this is a Tottenham Hotspur blog, second Maresco is set up to fail by the batshit processes in place at Chelsea (along with unreasonable expectations and a possible points deduction), and third I have no idea how or why Ten Haag managed to survive last season (but I’m kinda glad he did). Good to see Big Ange so far down the list, but also hold that thought until after he loses a few matches in a row, amirite?

There we go — our fearless predictions for 2024-25. Thanks for voting, and COYS!