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By the Numbers: How This Might Be the Weakest Bottom Three in Premier League History 

Football - Premier League - Tottenham Hotspur v Southampton - Tottenham Hotspur Stadium, London, Britain - April 6, 2025 Southampton manager Ivan Juric looks on after the match. (Action Images via Reuters)
Football - Premier League - Tottenham Hotspur v Southampton - Tottenham Hotspur Stadium, London, Britain - April 6, 2025 Southampton manager Ivan Juric looks on after the match. (Action Images via Reuters)
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By the Numbers: How This Might Be the Weakest Bottom Three in Premier League History 

Football - Premier League - Tottenham Hotspur v Southampton - Tottenham Hotspur Stadium, London, Britain - April 6, 2025 Southampton manager Ivan Juric looks on after the match. (Action Images via Reuters)
Football - Premier League - Tottenham Hotspur v Southampton - Tottenham Hotspur Stadium, London, Britain - April 6, 2025 Southampton manager Ivan Juric looks on after the match. (Action Images via Reuters)

It seems like it’s never been harder for promoted teams to stay in the Premier League.

It looks fairly certain that the three promoted teams will be relegated to the Championship after just one season for the second straight year. That's never previously happened in the Premier League era (since 1992).

Last season, it was Sheffield United, Burnley and Luton.

This season, Southampton’s relegation has already been confirmed — in record fashion — while Leicester and Ipswich are so far adrift of safety that they have little chance of surviving. Ipswich, in third-to-last place, is 12 points behind fourth-to-last Wolverhampton with seven games remaining.

The combined points tally of Southampton (10), Leicester (17) and Ipswich (20) would barely get them into mid-table, backing up a growing argument that this might be the weakest crop of promoted teams the Premier League has ever seen.

Here’s a by-the-numbers look at how bad their seasons have been:

Southampton

3 Southampton is already on its third manager of the season, after Ivan Juric was fired on Monday and replaced by Simon Rusk on an interim basis. It started the season with Russell Martin in charge but he was replaced by Juric in December.

7 The Saints were relegated with seven games remaining, and that’s a record. No team has ever been confirmed to go down with seven or more games to play, according to stats supplier Opta.

10 The number of points Southampton has. The race is on to beat the lowest points tally ever by a team in the Premier League era: Derby County’s 11 from the 2007-08 season.

25 The number of losses by Southampton, in 31 games played.

Leicester

8 Leicester’s 3-0 defeat to Newcastle on Monday meant the team has lost eight straight home games in the league without scoring. That’s never happened before in the top four divisions of English soccer.

11 Leicester has lost 11 homes games in a single league campaign for the first time.

72 It is now 72 days since Leicester scored — home or away — in the Premier League. The last player to hit the back of the net was Bilal El Khannouss against Tottenham on Jan. 26.

Ipswich

6 Ipswich has been beaten in each of its last six homes game, the team's longest losing run at home since 1963. The latest was against Wolves, 2-1, on Saturday.

11 The number of home losses for Ipswich this season, from 16 games.

140 Ipswich spent about 109 million pounds ($140 million) to bring in 10 players in the summer transfer window. Only Brighton spent more in the Premier League.

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Sports

Pope Francis Was a Card-Carrying Football Fan and Promoter of Values in Sports

Francis met his fellow Argentine Maradona twice as pope. (AFP via Getty Images)
Francis met his fellow Argentine Maradona twice as pope. (AFP via Getty Images)
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Pope Francis Was a Card-Carrying Football Fan and Promoter of Values in Sports

Francis met his fellow Argentine Maradona twice as pope. (AFP via Getty Images)
Francis met his fellow Argentine Maradona twice as pope. (AFP via Getty Images)

From meetings with Diego Maradona to the passion for his beloved Buenos Aires club, San Lorenzo, Pope Francis was an avid football fan. And a promoter of sports in general.

Francis died Monday at 88 and the football and sports world immediately paid homage.

All sports events scheduled for Monday in Italy were postponed to mourn Francis, including four top-flight football matches. A minute of silence will be observed before all sports events this week, the Italian Olympic Committee said.

“Italian football joins in the mourning of millions of people following the death of Pope Francis. He was a great example of Christian caring and dignity in the face of suffering and he was always attentive to the sports world and particularly football, of which he was a fan,” said Italian football federation president Gabriele Gravina. “He will always remain in the hearts of the faithful and lovers of football.”

Francis’ passion for football became known almost immediately after he was elected pope in 2013 when San Lorenzo tweeted a photo of him holding up the club’s crest. He was even a card-carrying member of the club, with San Lorenzo ID No. 88,235.

San Lorenzo is nicknamed “the Saints.”

In Italy, there were also suggestions that Francis supported Juventus since his family came from the Piedmont region where the Turin club is based. Francis' father, Mario Bergoglio, was a basketball player.

San Lorenzo, one of the oldest teams in the Argentine Football Association, performed well after Francis was elected as the 266th pope in March 2013. The team won a national title in 2013 and then claimed the South American Copa Libertadores for the first time a year later. Club officials traveled twice to the Vatican carrying trophies to thank Francis for his support.

A planned new San Lorenzo stadium is to be named for Francis.

During a meeting with the Argentina and Italy national teams shortly after he was elected, Francis noted the influence of athletes, especially on youth, and told the players to remember that “for better or worse” they are role models. “Dear players, you are very popular. People follow you, and not just on the field but also off it,” he said. “That’s a social responsibility.”

Francis met his fellow Argentine Maradona twice as pope. There was a special audience in connection with a charity football match in 2014 when Maradona presented the pontiff with a football jersey, emblazoned with the name “Francisco” — Spanish for Francis — and Maradona’s No. 10.

“I think we all now realize he’s a (star),” Maradona said after another meeting in 2015. “I’m Francis’ top fan.”

When Maradona died in 2020, Francis remembered the football great in his prayers.

Francis often hailed sports as a way to promote solidarity and inclusion, especially for young people.

During a global conference on faith and sport in 2016, Francis implored leaders to do a better job of keeping corruption off the playing field and said sports must be protected from manipulations and commercial abuse.

“Francis was a special pope, able to illuminate in his time like only the greatest can,” Gianluigi Buffon, the former captain of Italy’s national football team who met the pope on multiple occasions, said on Instagram. “He showed us the way with great courage and moved our souls. I will carry his example forever in my heart.”