Data story · Soccer
The greatest Premier League title races, matchday by matchday.
Nine of the last 31 Premier League titles were won by two points or fewer, and the longest lead ever thrown away lasted 30 matchdays. Drawn as strips, where gold means top of the table, you can see exactly when a race turned.
Every strip on this page is a real Soccer strip from the Huezle app, drawn by the app’s own code. More about Soccer.
How to read the strips
Each strip is one club’s Premier League season, one band per matchday from Matchday 1 on the left to Matchday 38 on the right, coloured by league position: gold at the top of the table, lilac for mid-table, deep aubergine at the bottom of the table. A champion’s strip ends gold; the story is how early the gold starts and whether it ever breaks.
A band is the table after every club has played that many games, ranked on points, goal difference and goals scored, so games in hand never distort it. It can differ slightly from a newspaper table printed that weekend.
Decided on goals: Manchester City, 2011-12
- Bottom of the table
- Mid-table
- Top of the table
The closest race in the data was not won on points at all. Manchester City and Manchester United both finished on 89 points, and City’s goal difference of +64 beat United’s +56. City’s strip shows the whole swing: top for twenty straight matchdays, a run of second-place bands while United led, then gold for the final three. Five other titles were won by a single point.
The leads that disappeared
- Bottom of the table
- Mid-table
- Top of the table
Newcastle in 1995-96 is the clearest picture of a lead slipping away: a solid gold run across four-fifths of the strip, then second for the last eight bands. They finished on 78 points to Manchester United’s 82. No club in 31 seasons has led for longer and not won.
- Bottom of the table
- Mid-table
- Top of the table
Arsenal in 2022-23 came closest to matching it: 29 matchdays on top, then second for the last seven as Manchester City went past and finished five points clear.
- Bottom of the table
- Mid-table
- Top of the table
Liverpool in 2018-19 never fell below third and finished on 97 points, more than the champions managed in 28 of the 31 seasons here. Manchester City had 98.
The other extreme: no race at all
- Bottom of the table
- Mid-table
- Top of the table
A year later the same club drew the opposite strip: gold from Matchday 2 to the end, 37 of 38 bands, and 99 points. Leicester City’s 2015-16 title, the most famous of the era, sits between the two: never lower than 8th, top for the first time after Matchday 13, and top after every matchday from 23 onward. The season before, the same club was bottom for 17 straight matchdays, a story in the Premier League’s great escapes.
- Bottom of the table
- Mid-table
- Top of the table
Where the data comes from. Every strip is built from match results, recalculating the table after each club’s first, second, third game and so on. The table is worked out from results alone, so a points deduction, which has happened to a handful of clubs over the years, is not applied; none of the title races on this page involved one.
Every other title race, and every club that finished nowhere near one, is left for you to find in the Premier League category. For a different sport’s late drama, see the biggest NFL comebacks.
Huezle shows you one club’s season as a strip and asks you to name the club. Try a title race.
Download on the App StoreFree on iPhoneQuestions
Which Premier League title race was the closest?
In 2011-12 Manchester City and Manchester United both finished on 89 points, and City won on goal difference, +64 to +56. Five more titles since 1995-96 were won by a single point.
Which team led the Premier League longest without winning it?
In the 31 seasons from 1995-96, Newcastle United in 1995-96 were top after each of the first 30 matchdays and finished second. Arsenal in 2022-23 were top for 29 matchdays and also finished second.
How long were Leicester top of the league in 2015-16?
Leicester were top after 21 of the 38 matchdays, and after every one from Matchday 23 to the end of the season. They were never lower than 8th.
More guides
- Premier League great escapes, matchday by matchday.Clubs that sat bottom of the Premier League late in the season and stayed up, and two that fell from the top half to relegation, drawn matchday by matchday.
- The biggest NFL comebacks of the last ten seasons.The biggest deficits overcome in NFL regular-season games from 2016 to 2025, drawn as strips of colour, from the Vikings’ 33-point comeback to the 21-point ones.
- How to read a century of presidential elections in colour.US presidential elections since 1900 drawn as strips of colour, one band per state from west to east. Learn to read the eras from four real strips.
- When did the South flip from Democrat to Republican?The Solid South in colour: how Southern states went from voting Democratic by 90 points to reliably Republican, told in four election strips from 1920 to 2024.
Now try naming one yourself.
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