The Going Rate: 2025/26 Premier League Table Ranked By Value

With the summer transfer window now open, each of the 20 clubs competing in next season’s Premier League will be working on deals to sign their transfer targets and attempting to complete business as soon as possible.

Those attempts may be disrupted by the FIFA World Cup, which is currently in full swing, but even with a major international tournament taking place, that has not stopped a handful of deals from already being finalised.

Players on the move, the teams who have signed them hoping they will be of considerable value across the course of next season. That value may come through goals, assists or clean sheets, but it is not all about new signings making a difference; it is also about the ability of the squad as a whole.

This takes us back to May and the end of the 2025/26 Premier League campaign. With the final standings in place for a few weeks now, we can map out which teams generated the best value from their squad when comparing total points earned versus their wage bill.

To calculate our value rank, we divided each club’s 2025/26 Premier League points total by its latest available wage bill, as reported in their most recent filed accounts.

Applying the same methodology across all clubs provides us with a measure of points earned per £1m spent on wages.

Note: Sunderland and Leeds have been excluded from this ranking as their latest publicly available wage data relates to previous Championship campaigns and is therefore not directly comparable with the Premier League wage figures used elsewhere in this analysis.

With this methodology, the analysis positions Brentford as the value-for-money champions of 2025/26.

The West London outfit picked up 53 points under Keith Andrews, and with a declared wage bill of £118m, it meant that the Bees earned 0.45 points for every million they subsequently paid out in first-team player salaries.

The Bees may have just missed out on European football, but their 0.45 value rank reinforces what a strong campaign they had, and although there will be short-term disappointment after running out of steam in the final few weeks, the club’s long-term future looks promising.

While the new wave of data-driven Premier League clubs is strongly represented when showing value and efficiency in the transfer market. In addition to Brentford, Bournemouth and Brighton are also in the top three when it comes to value rank.

The Cherries and the Seagulls generated value ranks of 0.36 and 0.33, respectively and with neither team spending more than £165m in terms of their wage bill, their reward for such astute financial hygiene will be their upcoming forays into Europe.

Arsenal’s spending pays off as other Big Six clubs struggle

They may be the success stories in terms of outright value, but what about the team with the biggest success story of the season? Arsenal collected their first Premier League trophy in 24 years and needed a wage bill of £327m to do so.

Money well spent from an Arsenal perspective, and with 85 points being collected in their successful pursuit of an elusive league crown, their 0.26 value rank sees them finish eighth in the standings, level with fellow Champions League qualifiers Aston Villa, who sit ninth in the table.

While there are success stories in terms of outright glory and financial management, there are also several examples of where money was spent badly, and when this metric is also measured against a level of expectation, it was largely a season to forget for Liverpool.

Roughly £400m was spent by the 2024/25 champions in their bid to retain the Premier League title, their £429m expenditure in terms of salaries proving to be the highest wage bill in the division.

Despite this investment, it did not translate to a championship-winning points return. Arne Slot led Liverpool to only a fifth-place finish at the end of last season, one that would eventually see him ushered out of the Anfield exit doors.

The Merseyside men earned just 60 points in 25/26, 25 fewer than that of champions Arsenal, and when fused together with their expensive wage bill, it only generated a value rank of 0.14. A value that sees them sit second bottom in the standings.

No value for the Anfield outfit, but not a great deal of value across the Big Six clubs either. Liverpool are joined by Chelsea, Tottenham and Manchester City in the bottom half dozen. The correlation between big wage bills and value for money is proving to be rather weak.

Mixed bag for relegated clubs

Then again, the three weakest teams in the division showed a varied picture when it comes to mapping their value. Burnley may have finished seventh in the value table with a rank of 0.27, but it was not of great use to them when finishing second bottom in the final league standings.

One Premier League place better off than Wolves, who not only propped up 19 other teams in the division but were also the worst-ranked team when it came to value. Just 20 points to their name, not a great return when their wage bill was £167m.

Which leaves us with West Ham. With the Hammers spending £177m on wages, that expenditure was not enough to see them avoid relegation. 39 points earned, a value rank of 0.22 generated.

Only 12th when it comes to value; what they would have given for that position on the final day of the season, as Nuno Espirito Santo is now tasked with returning the Hammers to the Premier League at the first time of asking.