The dust has settled on the domestic season and thoughts now turn to the summer transfer window. Clubs will already be planning for the 2025/26 campaign and it won’t be long before the fixtures are announced. But how will the top two divisions of English football shape up for the season ahead?
In this article, we take a look at the three sides that will be moving up into both the Premier League and the Championship. On the less pleasant side of football, we also take a look at the three clubs that will be dropping out of each of the top two tiers.
Promoted to the Premier League
Let’s start with the positive, and the three clubs that earned promotion to the Premier League. It was a fascinating tussle at the top of the Championship throughout much of the 2024/25 season. For a long time Sheffield United, Burnley, Leeds and Sunderland led the way and a four-horse battle for the title seemed likely.
Sunderland
Sunderland slipped away and then we were left with three. After gameweeks 39, 40 and 41 we saw each of the three remaining contenders take turns to top the table. The Blades, despite a two-point penalty, were top of the league after 39 games, a week later the Clarets led the way – the first time they did so since the second clash of the campaign – before Leeds went to the summit.
Each of the three had slips of varying degrees at different times during the season but the Blades endured theirs at the wrong time and it was particularly painful. They took just seven points from their final seven games, losing four out of five after they ascended to first place in the league. That left them third and meant they would face the play-offs, not great considering they had failed to earn promotion in all nine previous times they had entered them!
Leeds
Leeds put their blip, when they drew four out of six games to drop from first to third, behind them and went on to win their final six games to win the title. They were worthy champions, having occupied first place in the league after 24 of 46 matches.
Burnley
In contrast, Burnley managed to top the table for just two gameweeks but their incredible defence made them so hard to beat and in the end, despite drawing 16 times, they did enough to claim second place. Both they and Leeds registered 100 points, the latter claiming the title on goal difference. They will be joined in the Premier League by Sunderland, who beat Coventry then Sheffield United in the play-offs. Sunderland finished in fourth spot, 14 points below third-placed Sheffield United, and they lost their last five league matches of the campaign, so the play-off result was a surprise to say the least!
And the Three Going Down…
The performance of their promotion predecessors will chasten fans of Leeds, Burnley and Sunderland. 12 months ago, Leicester were high-scoring champions of the second tier, Ipswich did magnificently to finish second, and Southampton came through the play-offs. Now all three will be returning to the Championship, collectively having endured the worst Premier League season by three clubs.
The Saints narrowly avoided matching Derby’s worst-ever points tally, but 12 points from 38 games was an embarrassment. Ipswich managed just 22 points, with Leicester not much better on 25. That combined points aggregate of just 59 was easily the worst in history, and with the three promoted clubs being instantly relegated for the second time in a row, Leeds, Burnley and Sunderland will know what a huge task they face.
Birmingham, Wrexham and Charlton Championship Bound
In the 2024/25 Championship campaign, there were two new teams with a major US flavour. Dropping down from the Championship were Birmingham, part-owned by NFL legend Tom Brady, whilst coming up from League 2 were Wrexham, famously owned by Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney. Neither would stick around long, with both earning instant and automatic promotion to the second tier for the 2025/26 season.
Birmingham romped to glory, amassing a record 111 points – having a £15m striker (Jay Stansfield) in the third tier will help with that. Wrexham finished second by five points in the end but it was far from easy and for much of the campaign it seemed like the play-offs might be their destiny. They lost just one of their final 15 games though, winning 10, and with others faltering, notably Wycombe who lost their final three games, it was yet another promotion for the Red Dragons.
That was Wrexham’s third consecutive promotion, a feat never before managed in the top five tiers of English football. But who would battle through the play-offs to join them and Birmingham in the Championship next term? Stockport finished third, ahead of Charlton, Wycombe and Leyton Orient and it was the Addicks who held their nerve.
Charlton, managed by former Luton boss Nathan Jones, saw off Wycombe 10 in the semis, over two legs, before winning by that same score at Wembley against Leyton Orient. Over 76,000 watched the decider at the national stadium and Charlton will be a welcome addition to the second tier.
Luton Suffer Double Drop
The three teams to be relegated from the Championship to make way for Birmingham, Wrexham and Charlton, were Cardiff City, Plymouth Argyle and Luton Town. If Wrexham seem on an inexorable rise, Luton are very much going the other way. A Premier League outfit in May 2024, they will be in the third tier in August 2025.
The Hatters went down on goal difference in 22nd place, losing 5-3 on the final day. They finished on 49 points, level with Hull but 14 goals worse on goal difference. The Tigers got a draw at Portsmouth in their last clash of the campaign and it was just enough to keep them up.
Cardiff City were rock bottom and relegated well before the last-day drama, amassing just 44 points from 46 games, winning only nine of those. Plymouth were in between the two with 46 points and could have survived on the last day with a win against champions Leeds… if that win had come by a margin of 26 goals or more! They didn’t quite make it and now return to the third tier, a division they won in 2022/23.