Newly Promoted Teams Analysis

This article considers the chances of success in the Premier League next season for Hull, Burnley and Middlesbrough, who secured promotion from the Championship in 2015/16. A key way of doing this is to look back at the records of those teams promoted from the Championship to the Premier League since 2010. This reveals how most struggled to make a successful transition from second tier to top flight, with clean sheets and goals far tougher to come by. I will also look at some notable and rare successful players and teams who bucked the trend to become a great source of Fantasy points.

A Difficult Transition

To put that rough ride into perspective here’s a recap of some analysis I carried out last year looking at the averages for goals scored, goals conceded and clean sheets for the 18 teams promoted in 2010-2015.  While they scored 78 goals on average as Championship teams, that figure dropped to just 44 in the Premier League.

For goals conceded their defences also struggled in the top flight. While in the Championship they let in 46 goals on average, that tally rose to 62 among England’s elite. This made clean sheets harder to come by with their average dropping from 17 to only eight post-promotion.

This means that for those expecting goals galore and plenty of clean sheets from the trio of 2016 promoted sides, Burnley, Middlesbrough and Hull, could be in for a shock.

Promotion Success Stories

Players

But it’s not all bad news. There have been some notable high performers from the promoted sides, particularly among the budget picks, so it does pay to invest in a good sprinkling of players from those coming up to the Premier League.

Here’s some notable players who did well in the season after securing promotion and secured a points per game (ppg) of at least 4.0 in Fantasy Premier League.

2010-11: Charlie Adam (Blackpool) 192 at 5.5 ppg; Andy Carroll (Newcastle -> Liverpool) 135 at 5.2 ppg; Kevin Nolan (Newcastle) 140 at 4.7 ppg; Joey Barton (Newcastle) 131 at 4.1 ppg; DJ Campbell (Blackpool) 138 at 4.1 ppg.

2011-12: Michel Vorm (Swansea) 158 at 4.3 ppg; Bobby Zamora (QPR) 119 at 4.1 ppg; Scott Sinclair (Swansea) 151 at 4.0 ppg.

2012-13: Ricky Lambert (Southampton) 187 at 4.9 ppg; Kevin Nolan (West Ham) 149 at 4.3 ppg.

2014-15: Charlie Austin (QPR) 176 at 5.0 ppg; Danny Ings (Burnley) 139 at 4.0 ppg.

2015-16: Odion Ighalo (Watford) 175 at 4.7 ppg; Troy Deeney (Watford) 166 at 4.4 ppg; Heurlho Gomes (Watford) 157 at 4.1 ppg.

Securing more than 5.0 ppg is rare though, with only Austin in 2014/15 and Adam and Carroll in 2010/11 achieving this. Of these, Austin actually improved his goalscoring tally from 17 to 18. Adam scored 16 in the Championship promotion season and an impressive 12 in the Premier League, while Carroll notched 11 in 19 matches, before injury and an ill-fated transfer to Liverpool scuppered his season. This measures up well compared to his 17 goals for Newcastle in the Championship the season before.

Teams

Last year I took a detailed look at the most successful promotion teams for Fantasy managers since 2010. Here I’ll highlight some key success stories. For more detail please revisit last year’s article here.

The 2010/11 season proved an excellent time for promoted sides in terms of goals. Newcastle and West Brom both scored an impressive 56 goals in their first season back in the top flight. Blackpool too did well, scoring in all but one of their home matches.

Swansea proved the stars of the new Premier League class of 2011/12. They were promoted with an impressive defensive record at home, keeping 14 home clean sheets and only conceding 11 home goals. They also maintained their defensive form in the Premier League, keeping 14 clean sheets (nine of which were at home) and only conceding 18 home goals. Michel Vorm proved a shrewd purchase that year.

Southampton‘s strong attack on the road in the Championship was also maintained in the Premier League, where they scored in all but five of their away matches in 2012/13.

A change of manager proved pivotal to Crystal Palace who were back in the Premier League in 2013/14. After switching from Ian Holloway to Tony Pulis they ended the season conceding fewer goals in the Premier League (47) than in the Championship (62). They remain the only promoted side to achieve this feat since 2010. They also managed to keep one more clean sheet in the Premier League than the 11 they managed in the Championship.

Promotion Failures

Players

While Carroll and Austin succeeded in both the Championship and Premier League, the road to promotion is littered with poorly performing casualties. Here’s my pick of the biggest flops.

Adel Taarabt (QPR 2011): 19 goals  in Championship, just 2 in Premier League.

Glenn Murray (Crystal Palace 2013): 30 goals in Championship, only 1 in Premier League.

David Nugent (Leicester 2014): 20 goals in Championship,  a mere 5 in Premier League.

Cameron Jerome (Norwich 2015): 18 goals in Championship, an embarrassing 3 in Premier League.

Teams

The list of failures is far longer as last year’s article shows. Here are some of the poorest performers since 2010:

The slide in defensive statistics was particularly potent for QPR in 2010/11, as their goals conceded tally more than doubled after promotion and the number of clean sheets fell from 22 in the Championship to just seven. In the same season Norwich failed to keep a single clean sheet on the road, as did Reading in 2012/13.

Scoring on the road also proved tricky for West Ham, who saw their away goal tally drop from 40 to just 11 after securing promotion in 2011/12. Whether home or away Cardiff still struggled to score in the 2013/14 season, where they failed to find the net on a staggering 19 occasions. Burnley in 2014/15 also proved poor in attack, scoring a mere 28 times and just 14 times in front of their home fans.

The promoted trio of 2015/16 also struggled at times. Despite strong, intermittent bursts of good form, overall it was a poor in terms of attack. Watford failed to score on 14 occasions, Bournemouth couldn’t find the net 11 times and Norwich were the worst of the bunch with 16 failures to score as they tumbled back into the Championship.

The Class of 2016/17

Here I’ll take a look at the three promoted teams of 2015/16. As we have seen, Championship statistics can often be a poor indicator of Premier League success. Nevertheless let’s have a look at how they fared on their road to promotion.

Burnley won the 2015-16 Championship with an excellent defensive record, conceding only 35 goals (14 at home and 21 away) and keeping 20 clean sheets (12 at home and 8 away). Their attack however was below average, scoring only 38 goals at home and failing to score on 7 occasions in away matches. Star striker: Andre Gray – 25 goals

Middlesbrough were runners-up with an outstanding defensive record, conceding only 31 goals (8 at home and 23 away) and keeping 22 clean sheets (15 at home and 7 away). Their attack though was very weak, scoring only 63 goals (34 at home and 29 away) and failing to score on 14 occasions (6 at home and 8 away). Star striker: Jordan Rhodes – 16 goals.

Hull were also promoted, with a similar defensive record to Burnley’s – 35 goals conceded (12 at home and 23 away) and 20 clean sheets (13 at home and 7 away). Their attack was above average at home (48 home goals scored) but very poor away (only 20 goals). Star striker: Abel Hernandez – 20 goals.

Conclusion

A comparison of the average promoted team’s performances in the Championship and Premier League should act as a wake-up call for those expecting players to be as successful in the Premier League as they were in the Championship.

This means that investment in successful Championship strikers should be treated with caution. For every success like Austin there are also failures such as Nugent and Jerome. Another worth noting is Sylvan Ebanks Blake.  The Wolverhampton Wanderers striker scored 25 goals in the Midlands side’s 2008/9 promotion-winning season to score just two goals the next season in the Premier League. The deterioration in their individual performance may be far greater than that of their team, or it may be a cause of their team’s deterioration.

Clean sheets are also harder to come by, however good goalkeepers for promoted sides can expect to see a significant increase in save points. Burnley’s Tom Heaton is one to watch out for in this regard. Along with team-mates Michael Keane. Joey Barton (now of Rangers) and Gray, Heaton secured a place in the 2015/16 Championship Team of the Season. Michael Dawson was Hull’s only player in this end-of-season team, with Middlesbrough represented by Adam Clayton, George Friend and Daniel Ayala. History suggests very few of these names will succeed in the Premier League in 2016/17.