Reality Index: Who Is Really Performing Best After Nine Games?

All the goings-on in the Premier League often feel like fiction; it is now time for another dose of reality, and after releasing our Reality Index after the fourth week of this new season, it is time to take stock of matters five weeks further down the line.

For those who missed the opening entry in our series, the Reality Index measures how teams are faring by not only measuring the number of points that they have recorded but also their goal difference at that moment in time.

In doing so, we can get a better idea of the teams who are not playing well but perhaps playing better than their performances have rewarded them in terms of points and more importantly, we can also get a greater idea of which teams are truly underperforming.

Therefore, a simple calculation of a team’s current number of league points added to their current goal difference will create their score in the Reality Index and with the calculations carried out after Week Nine of the season is in the history books, here is how things stand:

Although Arsenal now find themselves top of the Premier League table, they cannot say the same when it comes to the Reality Index, and this is where Brighton take centre stage. Fabian Hurzeler’s men have had an incredible start to the campaign; now the aim is to continue it until next May.

The Seagulls have already got the better of both the top two sides in the league and after their win over Manchester City last weekend, talk of Brighton generating a genuine title tilt has perhaps got a little louder.

Whether that comes to fruition, we will have to wait and see, but there is no denying their goalscoring prowess since the start of the campaign. A goal difference of +17 has been the underlying component to just how good Brighton have been; they have scored 24 goals this season.

The highest number of goals in the division at an average of 2.67 per game, and when you look at the winning scorelines that Brighton have generated under manager Hurzeler since August, they are far from a flash in the pan.

The East Sussex outfit have 36 Index points, three more than Arsenal, who after their impressive 1-0 win at Liverpool last weekend now have a three-point gap over potential league rivals Manchester City – that is of course before any punishments are handed out to the Etihad outfit.

City have the second-best goal difference at the time of writing at +10, but successive defeats have seen Enzo Maresca’s men go off the boil as of late, and in a normal season where all things were fair and equal, we would be making far more of their recent reverses to both Aston Villa and Brighton.

The Etihad side may have scored 20 goals, but they have also conceded 10, and when you compare that to the Gunners’ defensive capabilities that were on show at Anfield, the fact the defending champions have only conceded five perhaps speaks volumes already.

The Chasing Pack

Everyone is talking about a statement win for the Gunners on the Merseyside, but nobody is really talking about Brentford and with the Bees having lost just one of their first nine league outings, they currently find themselves sitting sixth in the table.

However, the West London side are two places better off when it comes to the Reality Index, and whereas the current top three in our metric are seemingly a cut above the rest, it is Keith Andrews’ men who are then leading the best of the rest.

Perhaps it is consistency and the ability to avoid defeat that has boded well for Brentford thus far, and although their only defeat was at the hands of Liverpool, five draws from their opening nine games would suggest they may need just a little more attacking ingenuity from time to time.

Still, the reality of our metric sees them sit fourth with 21 points, one better off than their West London rivals Chelsea, and although there is no doubt that they have become rather easy on the eye under manager Xabi Alonso, there is still an element of chaos attached to them.

Maybe that in itself is what is making them easier on the eye, but for all their attacking ability, there are still defensive issues that loom large at Stamford Bridge. Admittedly, they were not an issue last weekend, but that is more a measure of their recent opponents, Manchester United.

A side that wishes that reality was a fantasy instead, and although their comeback win over Roma in the Champions League will have undoubtedly been celebrated on Tuesday, there has been little celebration as far as the Red Devils have been concerned.

Michael Carrick’s men find themselves sitting 17^th in the Premier League table, and they are only one place better off in our Reality Index. The team that calls the Theatre of Dreams home is currently having a nightmare campaign with seven points from the first 27 on offer.

That in itself would not generate a strong score at this stage in our Reality Index, but things get even worse for United when you consider their goal difference of -5, and with that accounted for, their overall score of just 2 makes for rather difficult reading.

It is not all doom and gloom for those who found themselves struggling earlier in the campaign, though, with Tottenham and Aston Villa providing rather more encouraging stories. Under Roberto De Zerbi, Spurs have climbed from -3 to 12 points in our Reality Index – a 15-point gain in five weeks.

Unai Emery has also overseen a revival at Aston Villa, whose score has risen from -5 to nine over the same period. Their victory over Manchester City in Week Eight was a particular highlight, although the subsequent draw with Fulham suggests there is still more work to be done.

United possess the same number of Index points as that of promoted side Coventry, and both these two are two points better off than that of fellow early strugglers Nottingham Forest. Oliver Glasner reading out the riot act at the weekend, will this galvanise the team or will it simply backfire?

At The Bottom

At present, the points that Forest have earned in the Premier League have been fully cancelled out by their negative goal difference, and when you add the two metrics together, it gives them a score of exactly zero.

Six league points to their name, Forest have scored the same number of goals. Unfortunately, the twice winners of the European Cup have conceded twice as many, and it is the constant leaks at the back which manager Glasner now has to address more than anything else.

Forest’s break-even score sees them relegated in 18^th if the Reality Index table were the absolute arbiter of who goes down; they would subsequently be joined by the pair of Sunderland and Crystal Palace who occupy the bottom two places.

Both these teams are in the Europa League league phase, and you could argue that the additional strains on the squads at both the Stadium of Light and Selhurst Park are having a detrimental effect on their domestic performances.

Coincidentally, both Sunderland and Palace find themselves on -5 points in our Reality Index. A low number of points to their names, being followed up by a large frequency of goals conceded at the same time.

Palace boss Pierre Sage will be wondering what he has to do to turn things around in South London. Then again, having already seen his side concede 21 goals in their first nine games of the season, the Frenchman may not be in charge when we next take a look at the Reality Index’s latest measure.