The Premier League is the top division of English football and the most commercially successful sports league on earth outside the American majors. It was formed in 1992 when the leading First Division clubs broke away to negotiate their own television rights, and the money has never stopped growing since.
How it works
Twenty clubs play each other twice, home and away — 38 matches each between August and May. Three points for a win, one for a draw. The club with the most points is champion; there are no play-offs and no post-season.
The bottom three are relegated to the Championship, and three come up to replace them. Below that the pyramid continues down through the Football League and the non-league divisions, all connected by promotion and relegation. In principle a village club could climb the whole way.
Why relegation matters
It is the structural feature that most distinguishes British from American sport. Failure has consequences: relegation costs a club well over a hundred million pounds in lost broadcast revenue, and several have never recovered from it.
The effect is that the final weeks of the season are tense at both ends of the table, and there is no incentive to lose deliberately for a better draft pick, because there is no draft.
The money
Domestic and international broadcast deals are worth billions per cycle, distributed far more evenly between clubs than in most European leagues, which is why the Premier League is competitive well beyond its top few teams. Even a relegated club receives more television income than the champions of most European leagues.
The consequence is that it attracts the best players from everywhere, and that ownership has become a geopolitical matter — several clubs are owned by foreign states or state-linked funds, which is the subject of sustained and legitimate criticism.
The clubs
Manchester United, Liverpool, Arsenal, Chelsea, Manchester City and Tottenham are the traditional and current heavyweights, though the composition shifts. What does not shift is that clubs are tied to places — Everton and Liverpool share a city, the two Manchester clubs share another, and the derbies between them are the most charged fixtures in the calendar.
The Super League
In April 2021 twelve leading European clubs, including six from England, announced a closed breakaway competition with no relegation. The reaction in England was immediate and ferocious — supporters protested outside grounds, pundits and players condemned it, and the government threatened legislation.
All six English clubs withdrew within 48 hours. It was the clearest possible demonstration that English football supporters regard the open pyramid as non-negotiable, and that they can still, occasionally, win.