Premier League team guides

In a survivor league you don't need a team to win — you need them not to lose. Every club below is rated on exactly that: three seasons of league results, this season's home and away record, and current form. Click a club for its full profile, squad and fixture list.

Which Premier League clubs are actually safe picks?

The established elite. The clubs who regularly finish in the top four or five lose fewer than a fifth of their league games, and at home that number falls further. They are the backbone of any survivor run, which is exactly why they should be spent carefully — burn all of them on comfortable early fixtures and you will be picking from the bottom half by November.

The stubborn mid-table. The most underrated survivor picks are the well-drilled sides in seventh to twelfth who rarely get beaten at home. They will not win you a league table, but a win or a draw counts the same as a 4-0 thrashing here, and their prices in the pool are far softer because most players ignore them.

The relegation scrap. Clubs fighting at the bottom lose roughly half their matches. Occasionally one of them is a tempting home pick against another struggler, but the variance is brutal and the gameweek where you need them is usually the gameweek they collapse.

The newly promoted. Promoted sides carry a deliberate penalty in our ratings. Championship form does not translate cleanly: recent promoted clubs have averaged well under a point per game in their first top-flight season, and a bright opening month rarely holds. A promoted team can look statistically respectable after five games and still be one of the three worst sides in the division.

Each club page below carries its own write-up: current manager and how long they have been in charge, playing style, three seasons of league results, home and away splits, squad and upcoming fixtures. Use the ratings as a starting shortlist, then check the actual fixture on who to pick.

Keep reading

How the rating works

The safety rating blends four data points: the last five results, this season's record, the last three Premier League seasons and — for promoted clubs — their Championship seasons, converted to a top-flight equivalent because second-tier form flatters a side. Small samples are pulled back towards the league average, and clubs with little or no recent top-flight evidence carry a promotion penalty, so a good start cannot turn a newly promoted team into a banker. It is a guide, not a guarantee — check the fixture too on our who to pick page.

Safety Rating methodology

Time period: Four windows: the last five matches, the current season to date, the last three Premier League seasons and, for promoted clubs, their most recent Championship seasons.
Weighting of recent results: Recent form carries a weight of 3, the current season 2.5, three seasons of Premier League history 3, and second-tier history 1. Every input is a not-losing rate — wins and draws both count as survival, because that is what keeps you in the game.
Home and away: The club rating itself is venue-neutral; home and away splits are shown separately on each club page, and venue is applied to the specific fixture on the who to pick page rather than to the season-long rating.
Opponent strength: Not adjusted at club level — over three seasons every side faces a broadly similar schedule. Opponent-specific adjustment happens in the weekly pick model, which uses match odds for the actual fixture.
Promoted clubs: Championship not-losing rates are converted to a top-flight equivalent, then a penalty is applied: 20 points with no Premier League seasons in the record and 8 points with only one. This stops a strong second-tier record or a good opening month from making a newly promoted side look like a banker.
Small samples: Every input is regressed toward the league average, more strongly the fewer matches it is based on, so three games never carry the weight of three seasons.
Update frequency: Ratings recalculate from stored results every time the page loads, so they change as soon as a gameweek's scores are in.