If relegation was scrapped....

...and the PL became a closed shop of 20 teams, who would you choose to be those teams?

Only 2 rules:

1) You must include the 6 who have played in every season (assuming everyone knows who these are!)

2) You can only include teams who have played it up to and including 2017/18.

Mine would be:

Arsenal
Aston Villa
Bournemouth
Birmingham
Chelsea
Derby
Everton
Leeds
Leicester
Liverpool
Man City
Man United
Newcastle
Nottingham Forest
Portsmouth
Sheffield Wednesday
Southampton
Sunderland
Tottenham
West Ham


Tried to include a lot of big derbies like Villa/Brum, Forest/Derby & Saints/Pompey etc.

I reckon that would be an interesting league, though I'd never actually be in favour of making it a closed shop.

 

On merit I'd probably swap out forest for Coventry/Sheff Wednesday.
If it ever happened the only fair way would be most years spent accumulatively in the PL

 

I think that you'd have to swap Bournemouth for Blackburn, just because they've won it.
They'd probably need new owners, though!

 

Wait, I just noticed Derby. Did you include them because they're, er... record holders?

 

How can you put some of that **** in when you leave a team like Stoke out?

Stoke have done well to stick around as have West Brom.

 

Yeah I only included them to ensure another there was another derby fixture in the league tbh. Bournemouth is just my bias of wanting another South Coast side in there.

@RobEllious Sheffield Wednesday are in there? **** Coventry.

Should add that my list is a mixture of logical choice and personal preference. Hence the exclusion of Blackburn as their just a ****ing dull club.

 

It's always gonna be contentious... no Wolves? ...sleeping giant and derbies?

 

As have Swansea.

Who would your 20 be?

 

Wolves were my next team to go in before I ran out

By all rights they should be well ahead of Birmingham but as a neutral I'd rather see villa Brum twice a season.

 

Aw **** yeah, that's what you get for skim-reading. Still though, Coventry spent more time in the prem. Don't reckon I could close it off without every one of the actual winners either, so would definitely swap Blackburn for Bournemouth

 

Yeah most likely mate, like I say it was bias for them. You've gotta have Forest though surely? One of only 3 clubs with more than one EC.

I tried to get the spread around the country too, if you're going on purely the size of the club then we probably wouldn't get in there tbh.

 

Too much effort required for my liking.

 

Knew someone would come along with that soon... Kinda knew it'd be you too

 

Aye tough one mate, to be honest if it closed off as a 24 team league, old-school, it'd be the perfect amount. Then could fit forest, Brom and Stoke into my list. But no, you've made the rules clear

 

Yeah **** thread

 

Still posting on it though... Desperate for attention

 

Just bored at work!

 

Why do you think I did the thread?

 

Bored at work

 

Not sure how I feel about pompey being in there. I'd probably swap them for Brighton. Getting old, and nowadays I prefer away days not to involve the fear of actual death.