The Harsh Truth: Are Some Premier League Clubs Just Making Up The Numbers?

The Harsh Truth: Are Some Premier League Clubs Just Making Up The Numbers?

Ok, the title may appear harsh - every club in the Premier League is there on merit, and so no one is in fact “making up the numbers”.

But how about we pose the question differently? Something along the lines of “Why are some smaller clubs taking part in the top flight over bigger clubs with better facilities, funding and history?”

Na only promoted teams in the Premier League be small clubs now o.

— Sporting King (@sportingking365) August 15, 2025

Well, that is where things become interesting. Because recently, the Premier League has become saturated with small, relatively low-key clubs with small followings, even smaller grounds, and thrifty management, who, despite these potentially limiting factors, are being run so well that bigger teams in divisions below are having to look elsewhere for a potential promotion opening.

We are talking about Brentford, Burnley, Sunderland, and until recently the likes of Crystal Palace (prior to their double trophy haul over the summer), Brighton (who are now regular continental contenders), and Fulham (who pose as a menacing mid-table opponent) - all of these clubs are run on small budgets, and yet look convincing enough for fans to believe that all of them will comfortably stay up season after season, with some even pushing the limit by challenging and occasionally qualifying for Europe.

Moreover, there are a host of clubs in the Championship vying for a spot in the top flight that could objectively be considered as “bigger” clubs - so why are these sides dwelling in the second tier, and why are the minnow adversaries hanging with the English big boys?

How Are These Small Clubs Surviving?

Come the end of the 2025/26 season, Brighton, Brentford, Crystal Palace and Fulham will have been in the Premier League for four years in a row or more, an outstanding achievement when one considers the relative lack of resources the clubs' operators are running on.

Take Brentford, for example - known across various social media platforms as “a bus stop in Hounslow”, that description pretty much sums up the Bees. Jokingly known as a bus stop over the football team, it gives you an idea of the size of the club and how significantly they are punching above their weight.

Sky Sports calling Brentford a bus stop in Hounslow 😭😭 pic.twitter.com/vQ70fFVH7W

— Sandy (@sandy_ffc) November 5, 2024

So how are they maintaining their Premier League status despite having a lower following across X and Instagram than Championship bottom-feeders Sheffield United, as well as boasting a capacity of 15,000 less than the struggling Blades?

Well, for such small fish to survive in such a big pond, they need to be thrifty. Transfer business has been key for every example - Palace have invested smartly using the funds gained from selling Michael Olise and Ebere Eze, Brighton have become a world-renowned selling club, making hundreds of millions per window, and even Brentford have upped their income from player sales in recent years, with Ivan Toney and Bryan Mbeumo prime examples.

And selling is only half of the financial story - the money made from these sales must then be used wisely, and thus far, all of the aforementioned clubs have passed the test with flying colours.

Brighton continue to invest in unheard-of gems to develop them into superstars, Crystal Palace look for high-quality bargain buys, and Brentford are all about bringing in team players in order to maintain the hard-working ethic instilled by recently departed manager Thomas Frank.

Some of these profits must also be subtracted from the transfer budget in order to facilitate improvements elsewhere - these can be put towards anything from upgraded training facilities to stadium refurbishment, and new staff appointments to community outreach projects.

Last week, Burnley FC in the Community proudly hosted a Macmillan Coffee Afternoon at The Leisure Box, supporting the World’s Biggest Coffee Morning campaign💚

@FortVale_ | @PLCommunities | @PFA | @macmillancancer | @ELHT_NHS pic.twitter.com/A8KVgB3me4

— Burnley FC in the Community (@BurnleyFC_Com) October 7, 2025

So, not only do these clubs need to spend funds wisely, but they must also budget down to the minutest detail - one misstep could see everything turned upside down, and the club may then have no funds left when they truly need them later down the line - just like at what has happened to the likes of Bury FC, and more recently, Derby County.

Derby are facing a potential 21-point deduction & collapse of proposed takeover after being charged by EFL for making excess losses under FFP regulations.

Not good news to wake up to if you're a Derby fan!

😬😬😬#DCFC pic.twitter.com/lK4hmXNdCY

— 🎯 Tommy's Darts Tips (@TommysDartsTips) January 17, 2020

However, more important than money is good ownership, an individual or group at the helm that repeatedly makes the right decision in spite of heavy pressure to do something else. Brighton embodies this perfectly.

Sure, some Seagulls fans don’t like the fact that every season, chairman Tony Bloom gives the green light to sell a host of star players, raking in multiple hundreds of millions in the process. It means that over the course of a summer, the club must effectively rebuild part of their squad from the ground up, an approach that never guarantees success.

However, what Tony Bloom lacks in big club mentality, he makes up for in superb recruitment and training infrastructure. Since the start of summer 2022, Brighton have received a total of £454.6 million for their assets - just from the sales of Moises Caicedo, Joao Pedro, Marc Cucurella and Alexis Mac Allister, the club have recouped over half of that number.

Moreover, the quartet only cost a shade over £50 million to buy in the first place. Brighton made over 400% of what they paid for, and as a result, their recruitment team deserves heaps of praise. To identify stars in the making is hard enough - to identify four in the space of half a decade and then to sell them all on for eye-watering profit was virtually unheard of before the Seagulls effectively broke the transfer market.

But these are the lengths that small teams have had to go to in order to cement their place amongst England’s elites. Crystal Palace owner Steve Parish is another who can be placed into this bracket.

Brentford’s model is a blueprint to make it into & stay in the Premier League whilst having clear success (top half finishes).

Brighton’s model is a blueprint to break into the ‘top 6’.

Both clubs have paved the way for other clubs by making ‘unrealistic’ targets achievable ✍️ pic.twitter.com/SalEVh74Du

— EBL (@EBL2017) May 29, 2023

Often criticised for his lack of ambition, Parish rarely splashed the cash, and much less showed any short-term hunger for silverware and success. However, many Palace fans fell into the trap of believing that their club was perpetually stuck in mid-table, when the reality was that Parish was building towards a much longer-term end goal.

That came to full fruition last season when, against the odds, Crystal Palace lifted the FA Cup, beating Manchester City in the final, for the first piece of major silverware in the club's history. This was shortly followed by their second, as they then beat champions of England Liverpool in the Community Shield season curtain-raiser.

Speaking in 2015, Steve Parish said Crystal Palace could lift the Premier League title in "10 to 15 years" 👀🏆 pic.twitter.com/83kCM9Zdk5

— Sky Sports Premier League (@SkySportsPL) September 29, 2025

Their recent run of 19 games unbeaten in all competitions underlined how Crystal Palace have progressed in the decade or so since they returned to the top flight, and their silverware success has hauled them out of the conversation of clubs that are potentially “too small” for the Premier League.

Where Are The Bigger Clubs?

So, what is it that the “bigger” clubs down in the Championship are getting wrong? Leicester City, Sheffield United, Southampton, Derby County, and even the likes of Norwich and Stoke could claim that going off pure reputation, stadium size, and history, they should be England’s top tier.

However, you don’t end up in the second division for no reason - the above sides have all had one or multiple shots of cementing their place in the Premier League, and bar Leicester, whose stunning 2015/16 triumph will never be forgotten, they all failed to capitalise on their opportunity.

Sheffield United and Leicester, both of whom have featured in the PL within the last three years, have made a series of poor decisions across multiple facets, including poor recruitment, unnecessary managerial hirings and firings, and an overall lack of communication and connection with their fans that has seen them become somewhat alienated from the club they love.

Sheffield United must learn the lesson from Luton Town after their start to the Championship season says BBC Radio Sheffield's Adam Oxley.

Read more: https://t.co/n4TuIhrXI5#SUFC | #twitterblades | @FootballHeaven pic.twitter.com/wZJTurw8jk

— BBC Sheffield (@BBCSheffield) October 7, 2025

These rookie errors can easily make fans lose faith with any number of people – the owners, the manager, the coaching staff, and even the players - all because the club wasn’t being given enough oversight by the higher-ups. This is something that the smaller, established Premier League sides have clearly been actively avoiding.

Leicester in particular had a torrid time of things last season - across the second half of the season, there was a period where the club picked up just four points from 14 league games, while during the same spell they also failed to score at all in nine consecutive home league fixtures.

The fans were not afraid to let their feelings be known, and the ownership took the brunt of it. They failed to back new manager Ruud van Nistelrooy in the January transfer window and were rewarded with a well-earned relegation and a drawn-out telling-off from the fans. No wonder he left in June.

Following a miserable spell that culminated in Premier League relegation, Ruud van Nistelrooy has departed Leicester City. 👋

His 27-game tenure was marked by a big drop in form, including nine straight home defeats without scoring. pic.twitter.com/S5eiN1JUNy

— Betmaster 🇬🇧 UK (@betmaster_uk) June 27, 2025

Of course, there is a perfectly valid argument that the bigger sides down in the Championship are there thanks to poor decisions and a general impatience over establishing themselves in the Premier League.

However, there is also an equally legitimate counter-argument which sees the tables turn - what if the clubs of a smaller size benefit from just that - their size?

Too Big to Fail, Too Small to Succeed?

It is an interesting concept; it is a pool of thought that certainly has weight to it. For the likes of Leicester, Southampton, Derby and Sheffield United, their reputation is large enough for critics, and more broadly the media, to minutely analyse every move the club makes, whether it be a dodgy summer signing, shady manager sacking, or all-round poor performance.

It is here where the less heralded outfits thrive - able to go about their business under the radar, the likes of Brentford, Burnley and Sunderland all gradually built a unit capable of going up relatively unnoticed, and this was to their benefit. With everyone’s attention focused on the story of the day at one of the bigger clubs, these smaller sides could outsmart their rivals behind the scenes through savvy investment and bargain signings.

The same logic applies to the Premier League; unless a smaller side is on the brink of breaking an unwanted record - I’m looking at you, 2024/25 Southampton - most of the media focus on those in the top half, or more specifically on the peaks and troughs of the big six.

With so little attention directed at these so-called “tin pot clubs”, there is infinitely less pressure on these outfits to get it right every time. Did a new signing flop? No big deal. Is the manager at risk of losing his job? He may be, but it’s definitely not the big talking point.

The lack of a magnifying glass allows these clubs to build toward a long-term goal outside of the spotlight, and in the last couple of seasons, we have seen these goals realised, more so than with any period in recent memory.

Daily reminder Crystal Palace won the FA Cup AND Community Shield pic.twitter.com/4Z3LwQfV95

— Jonty (@JontyCPFC) October 7, 2025

Now, with these clubs ingrained in the modern Premier League culture, they will be immensely hard to displace - not because they are now no longer considered small clubs, but because their process and vision are proven. The “bigger” clubs could take a leaf or two out of these clubs’ playbooks, because some of them are quite blatantly using the wrong formula.

To displace a correct formula with one that is wrong is to verge on the insane.