The north west is taking over !

Arsenal - London
Chelsea - London
West Ham - London
Spurs - London
Fulham - London
Portsmouth - South
Villa - Midlands
Wolves - Midlands
Brum - Midlands
Stoke Midlands
City - North West
Everton - North West
Liverpool - North West
Burnley - North West
Bolton - North West
Wigan - North West
Blackburn - North West
Scum - North West
Sunderland - North East
Hull - Yorkshire

8 north west clubs in the EPL now, we are taking over
Together the midlands and North west make up over half of the prem.

Only 1 decent team in the North?

All the biggest clubs in England seem to be based in about 5 locations. London, Birmingham area, north west, north east and Southampton-Portsmouth.

You forgot Bolton...so actually 8.

Closeness is good for rivalries, but the derbies between likes of Bolton, Blackburn, Wigan hardly stick in my mind as being anything. Not sure Burnley will add much there, either..

Wolves + Brum add in some interesting Midlands derbies.

i love how the north is divided into east and west, but with the south its just yeh, south. deeeeeeep south.

Six wrote:All the biggest clubs in England seem to be based in about 5 locations. London, Birmingham area, north west, north east and Southampton-Portsmouth.

Not sure the last one really counts! Football league started with basically Midlands + NW, so no surprise many of the biggest are there.

Shame in a way that there isn't more spread, e.g. SW, East Anglia don't tend to have any representation. Nor Wales, but that's probably for the best

Six wrote:All the biggest clubs in England seem to be based in about 5 locations. London, Birmingham area, north west, north east and Southampton-Portsmouth.

So, broadly, the south east, the midlands, north west, north east and south west...?

Not all that revelatory, this comment, if you'll excuse me for saying so.

Stimulus Package wrote:

Six wrote:All the biggest clubs in England seem to be based in about 5 locations. London, Birmingham area, north west, north east and Southampton-Portsmouth.

So, broadly, the south east, the midlands, north west, north east and south west...?

Not all that revelatory, this comment, if you'll excuse me for saying so.

Well, apart from the North West all those areas are very small in comparison to the size of England. And I was not claiming it to be revelatory, just saying!

debaser wrote:

Six wrote:All the biggest clubs in England seem to be based in about 5 locations. London, Birmingham area, north west, north east and Southampton-Portsmouth.

Not sure the last one really counts! Football league started with basically Midlands + NW, so no surprise many of the biggest are there.

Shame in a way that there isn't more spread, e.g. SW, East Anglia don't tend to have any representation. Nor Wales, but that's probably for the best

South West is basically Plymouth and Exeter. East Anglia used to have Norwich in the prem, and Ipswich? they are close right..

The Easter Bunny wrote:Only 1 decent team in the North?

I thank you

I only really brought it up because I saw a map of the bundesligha teams and they are spread out very evenly. Whilst ours are in clumps.

Very small in comparison to the size of England?

Your list is effectively 6 of the 9:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regions_of_England

Stimulus Package wrote:Very small in comparison to the size of England?

Your list is effectively 6 of the 9:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regions_of_England

if you restrict the area to where the clubs are based, its a lot smaller.

debaser wrote:You forgot Bolton...so actually 8.

Closeness is good for rivalries, but the derbies between likes of Bolton, Blackburn, Wigan hardly stick in my mind as being anything. Not sure Burnley will add much there, either..

Wolves + Brum add in some interesting Midlands derbies.

Blackburn v Burnley will be a great derby next season, they really hate eachother.

I thinks its great to see the Villa v Brum derby back as well.

This is old, so take out Reading and co. But you still can see what i mean.

London still rules though. Every side in the top half

Id like to see were all the EPL clubs were this time 10 years ago, i bet quite a lot were quite a distance from the league.

http://www.albionroad.com/images/stories/photos/english-premier-league-map-2009.gif

this season

Six wrote:

debaser wrote:

Six wrote:All the biggest clubs in England seem to be based in about 5 locations. London, Birmingham area, north west, north east and Southampton-Portsmouth.

Not sure the last one really counts! Football league started with basically Midlands + NW, so no surprise many of the biggest are there.

Shame in a way that there isn't more spread, e.g. SW, East Anglia don't tend to have any representation. Nor Wales, but that's probably for the best

South West is basically Plymouth and Exeter. East Anglia used to have Norwich in the prem, and Ipswich? they are close right..

I was thinking Bristol for SW - big place not to have a top flight team.

I guess Yorkshire's also kinda lacking at the moment too, without Leeds or any Sheffield teams.

Dragões azuis e brancos wrote:London still rules though. Every side in the top half

Heh, come back when you got a European Cup/CL.

Six wrote:

Stimulus Package wrote:Very small in comparison to the size of England?

Your list is effectively 6 of the 9:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regions_of_England

if you restrict the area to where the clubs are based, its a lot smaller.

surely its just related to where the big cities are.

You could do it related to the number of people in a region, and then who's unrepresented the most in the top league. Obviously Leeds, Bristol, Sheffield & now Newcastle spring to mind.

Dragões azuis e brancos™ wrote:London still rules though. Every side in the top half

Must be due to this massive refereeing conspiracy we keep getting told about, after all it's not like Liverpool and Man U have been on easy street all season long...

1 Greater London Urban Area 8278251 West Ham, Fulham, Chelsea, Arsenal, Spurs
2 West Midlands Urban Area 2284093 Aston Villa, Birmingham, Wolves
3 Greater Manchester Urban Area 2240230 Man Utd, Man City
4 West Yorkshire Urban Area 1499465 ...
5 Greater Glasgow 1168270 n/a
6 Tyneside 879996 Sunderland
7 Liverpool Urban Area 816216 Liverpool, Everton
8 Nottingham Urban Area 666358 ...
9 Sheffield Urban Area 640720 ...
10 Bristol Urban Area 551066 ...
11 Greater Belfast 483418 n/a
12 Brighton/Worthing/Littlehampton 461181 ...
13 Edinburgh 452194 n/a
14 Portsmouth Urban Area 442252 Portsmouth
15 Leicester Urban Area 441213 ...
16 Bournemouth Urban Area 383713 ...
17 Reading/Wokingham Urban Area 369804 ...
18 Teesside 365323 ...
19 The Potteries Urban Area 362403 Stoke
20 Coventry/Bedworth Urban Area 336452 ...
21 Cardiff Urban Area 327706 ...
22 Birkenhead Urban Area 319675 ...
23 Southampton Urban Area 304400 ...
24 Kingston upon Hull 301416 Hull
25 Swansea Urban Area 270506 ...


Rough conclusion: to more represent population spread, we need Leeds, Nottm Forest, Sheff Wednesday/Utd and Bristol City to replace Wigan, Burnley, Blackburn, Bolton. Maybe Newcastle for Hull and Bradford for Stoke too.

QI fact but about 150 years ago, Bristol was England's 2nd largest city. I'm sure a lot of you knew that anyway but its still quite an interesting fact and shows just how much urbanisation has occurred since then.

London rules

Most of those North West Clubs will finish in the bottom half.

Ray Parlour wrote:London rules

Most of those North West Clubs will finish in the bottom half.

So London's second rate clubs > the North West's second rate clubs?


Probably true, but who cares when the best two clubs in the league, as well as the best challenger to the top four, are all from the same area?

The North West most definitely rules.