I'd say there are 3 tiers and the positions of the clubs in each generally fluctuate dependent on short term success. We're in the 2nd tier with Palace, QPR and Fulham. At the height of Curbs' success, could we claim to have been challenging WHU???
Remember around that time the board were talking about making us the 'biggest club south of the Thames'. Hope the current owner has the same ambition, as south of the Thames is well north of Liege!
We ARE the biggest club south of the Thames!
I think they were also including Southampton and Pompy! At the time we were probably the biggest!
I've tried to add a few criteria in and rank according to these. Not ideal, but better than guessing I think. I don't think it's quite there though, there are other criteria that could be considered and in particular I think having last season's league position will give quite big fluctuations - maybe a ten season average as someone above did with attendances would be better.
By this table, Charlton come below Fulham, QPR and the Glaziers. Notwithstanding concerns about my methodology it does be the question, are we all over estimating the size of our club?
I think your chart puts too much emphasis on a single season's performance!
Was surprised how many put Chelsea at No 1. I suppose that is partly a reflection of age. If like me you can remember the 4-1 and 5-2 thrashings of them in the 80s, not to mention the Battle of the Bridge, you hesitate to place them above West Ham. Sadly Abramovic has now built a longer term infrastructure there with his ill gotten gains, but it is still worth remembering that it is he rather than Chelsea who is 'rich'. If the Government decided - as they should IMHO - that he should be a target for anti-Putin sanctions, the whole thing could crumble fast
I'd say there are 3 tiers and the positions of the clubs in each generally fluctuate dependent on short term success. We're in the 2nd tier with Palace, QPR and Fulham. At the height of Curbs' success, could we claim to have been challenging WHU???
Remember around that time the board were talking about making us the 'biggest club south of the Thames'. Hope the current owner has the same ambition, as south of the Thames is well north of Liege!
We ARE the biggest club south of the Thames!
Real Madrid might have something to say about that.
Not sure biggest spend should have much, if any weight. If Bill gates bought barnet and spent his entire fortune on a single player it just means they're stupid.
Hope you don't mind but I took an alternative view of your table and worked out rankings based upon average ranking points across the four categories and it came up as follows
1st Arsenal 1.25 2nd Chelsea 1.75 3rd Tottenham 2.75 4th West Ham 4 5th Charlton 5.5 6th Fulham 6 7th QPR 6.5 8th Palace 7.25 9th Millwall 8.25 10th Brentford 8.75 11th Orient 9.75 12th Barnet 10.75 13th Dagenham 11 14th Wimbledon 11.25
The only difference in ranks is Charlton and Fulham swapping places with the table based on rank only and no points.
I'd say there are 3 tiers and the positions of the clubs in each generally fluctuate dependent on short term success. We're in the 2nd tier with Palace, QPR and Fulham. At the height of Curbs' success, could we claim to have been challenging WHU???
Remember around that time the board were talking about making us the 'biggest club south of the Thames'. Hope the current owner has the same ambition, as south of the Thames is well north of Liege!
We ARE the biggest club south of the Thames!
I think they were also including Southampton and Pompy! At the time we were probably the biggest!
The way Saints are going, we'll only need a 5-a-side team this year to be bigger than them! :-)
I've tried to add a few criteria in and rank according to these. Not ideal, but better than guessing I think. I don't think it's quite there though, there are other criteria that could be considered and in particular I think having last season's league position will give quite big fluctuations - maybe a ten season average as someone above did with attendances would be better.
By this table, Charlton come below Fulham, QPR and the Glaziers. Notwithstanding concerns about my methodology it does be the question, are we all over estimating the size of our club?
Hey, Stig, good work but in my view I don't think "biggest spend" is very meaningful as it is largely dictated by the availability of TV (or oligarch) money rather than "bigness" it therefore doesn't deserve the weighting you've given it. And another thing, Arsenal's biggest spend has not been on a player but on the Emirates - about £0.5bn wasn't it? And, if you're going to include QPR winning the pony League Cup, when it was a lowly tournament back in the 1960s, then surely you've got to include us winning the Southern War Cup and sharing the national trophy with Villa after a draw at Wembley?
Finally, as Barnet are in the Vanarama Conference, why haven't you also included Welling? :-)
These are the average attendances from World War 2 to 2013.
Arsenal - 39,162 Tottenham Hotspur - 35,864 Chelsea - 32,462 West Ham United - 25,639 Crystal Palace - 16,598 Charlton Athletic - 16,275 Fulham - 15,981 Queens Park Rangers - 14,178 Millwall - 11,260 Brentford - 9,122 Leyton Orient - 7,466
Also seasons spent in the top flight (including this season)
Arsenal - 98 Chelsea - 80 Tottenham Hotspur - 80 West Ham United - 57 Charlton Athletic - 26 Fulham - 25 Queens Park Rangers - 23 Crystal Palace - 15 Wimbledon - 14 Brentford - 5 Millwall - 2 Leyton Orient - 1
Clearly Arsenal are top then comes Tottenham and Chelsea who are very close then West Ham and then Us, Palace, QPR and Fulham who are again incredibly close. then Millwall, Brentford, Orient and Wimbledon.
Think Millwall sit on their own above Brentford & Orient and just behind that other group of 4. Give us 5 years in the premier league and we'd have thousands of hangers on like those clubs.
Right i've used spreadsheet formulae created a computer programme to take into account history, cups won, time in top league, average attendances, managers since the war,top scorers in league,bus routes,biggest willies etc etc etc and have come up with this list;
All good points cafcfan. Perhaps if the biggest spend was averaged out from the biggest spends under the last three (or whatever is appropriate) owners, or maybe biggest spends in the last three decades, that might diminish the skewing of the oligarchs. But that all gets a little too messy to calculate.
I take your point about The Emirates; on the player front Arsenal have been noted as being particularly thrifty for a club of their size. At least, until they splashed out on Ozil. That said if we are counting money spent on grounds we get the problem (or at least we will get the problem) of West Ham being gifted a similar amount by the taxpayer.
As to Welling, that's in Kent isn't it ;-) I know that by the same token Barnet is in Middlesex though.
Appreciate I'm nitpicking, but I guess this shows our biggest buy as Euell. Isn't it actually Darren Bent? When you take into account the sell on we paid Ipswich after he moved to Spurs, I think he ended up costing us about £5.5m.
Interesting because Mrs Stig was born in the Borough of Barnet but her birth certificate states Middlesex. I can see from the internet though that you're right about Herts. I guess this is because she was born elsewhere in the borough; not in the town. Learning something everyday through Charlton Life.
You may be right Stevie, I wasn't analysing it in that much depth. I just looked in the Sky Yearbook and took it as read. Trouble is if we adjust Charlton's spend to take account of sell-ons, you'd have to do that for the other clubs as well, how would we know?
I think we are bigger then Fulham, a couple of seasons for them in the championship and their "real" attendances will start to show with no tourists to boost them.
Despite some recent success Chelsea are still not a bigger club than either Arsenal or Spurs in my view. I also think we are bigger than QPR although Fulham have now probably edged above us.
Arsenal Spurs Chelsea West Ham Fulham Charlton QPR Palace Watford (If they count as a London Club) Millwall Brentford Orient Wimbledon Dag & Red
Us, Palace, Fulham, QPR and Millwall will always fluctuate as the London second tier. Millwall will always be in the bottom half of that tier unless they deliver Prem football, but the rest of us will take turns in various positions amongst that five.
For me, weighing up a few different considerations of current standings / recent history / long-term history, i'd go with the following:
Arsenal Chelsea Spurs Wham Palace QPR Charlton Fulham Millwall Brentford Orient others
1. Tottenham (have more fans than anyother london club 37,000+ waiting list 2. Arsenal 3. West Ham. Only big team in East London 4. Chelsea. If and when they drop down watch there attendance fall 5. Charlton. Our potential is just incredible 6. Palace 7.Qpr 8.Fulham 9.Millwall 10.Brentford 11.Orient 12.Wimbledon
1. Chelsea 2. Spurs 3.Arse 4. West Ham 5. Fulham 6. Charlton 7.Palace 8.Qpr 9.Millwall 10.Brentford 11.Orient 12.Wimbledon
Close between Brentford and Orient for me. Two clubs of a similar size and ambition but Brentford's promotion to the championship gives them the jump on Orient overall.
Qpr coming in at a mediocre 8TH- All the cash yes, still a nothing club in my opinion. As are the two clubs either side of them on the list above
West ham have always been a big club we just hate to admit it, same with spurs really.
We need to remember that the biggest club is different to best current team and clearly the situation is fluid . Ten years ago I would have placed Spurs at number 2 and benchmarked Chelsea and West Ham together . Clearly the Blues are now number two and following the Champions League triumph and recent title successes they are not that far behind Arsenal.
Lower down I benchmark us with Palace ,Fulham and QPR because I do see this as very fluid . SLL is right in that the Spanners are not quite in that group ,but are definitely above Brentford and Orient .
It is interesting because had we done this exercise in the 70's when I first started going to Charlton the O's would have probably been at least at a similar level to the Spanners and may even have had a good claim to be benchmarked with us. In the late 80's early 90's Fulham would have been a lot lower. At one time Barnet saw them as a rival club !
I see AFC as bigger than the Daggers partly because of the legacy of the Dons and have included Barnet because they could get back in the league whereas I can't see the likes of Welling ever making it.
Of course everyone is going to think that they are a "bigger" club than their local rivals. Especially when those rivals are clubs of a similar stature. I'm sure you can find Spurs fans who think they are a bigger club than Arsenal, and City fans that think throwing down a few hundred million quid on star players and winning the league a couple of time make them a bigger club than United.
Stig's methodology in trying to quantify through statistic is very good and with a few refinements will offer us the closest answer to the our question, but really it's something that come down to the perception of the supporters.
I think the only way we could get a definitive answer is to poll supporters of clubs from outside of the capital, and even then fans of London clubs will dispute it.
Of course everyone is going to think that they are a "bigger" club than their local rivals. Especially when those rivals are clubs of a similar stature.
But in our case we are bigger in every aspect. Although of course, annoyingly they could argue to be "better" because of the head to head record...
Of course everyone is going to think that they are a "bigger" club than their local rivals. Especially when those rivals are clubs of a similar stature.
But in our case we are bigger in every aspect. Although of course, annoyingly they could argue to be "better" because of the head to head record...
Until we can actually quantify what "bigger" is I think it's impossible to say. If I was pushed I'd say we are "bigger" than Millwall. However they seem to think it's based on notoriety, which is of course nonsense because they've never been notorious for anything but causing a few spats and inspiring some poorly produced Football Factory-esq films.
I couldn't comment on comparisons with sides like QPR, Fulham and Palace.
Comments
Updated to take account of feedback.
1st Arsenal 1.25
2nd Chelsea 1.75
3rd Tottenham 2.75
4th West Ham 4
5th Charlton 5.5
6th Fulham 6
7th QPR 6.5
8th Palace 7.25
9th Millwall 8.25
10th Brentford 8.75
11th Orient 9.75
12th Barnet 10.75
13th Dagenham 11
14th Wimbledon 11.25
The only difference in ranks is Charlton and Fulham swapping places with the table based on rank only and no points.
And, if you're going to include QPR winning the pony League Cup, when it was a lowly tournament back in the 1960s, then surely you've got to include us winning the Southern War Cup and sharing the national trophy with Villa after a draw at Wembley?
Finally, as Barnet are in the Vanarama Conference, why haven't you also included Welling? :-)
and have come up with this list;
Charlton
Charlton
Charlton
Charlton
Charlton
Charlton
Charlton
Charlton
Charlton
Charlton
Charlton
coz no-one else matters COYR
I take your point about The Emirates; on the player front Arsenal have been noted as being particularly thrifty for a club of their size. At least, until they splashed out on Ozil. That said if we are counting money spent on grounds we get the problem (or at least we will get the problem) of West Ham being gifted a similar amount by the taxpayer.
As to Welling, that's in Kent isn't it ;-) I know that by the same token Barnet is in Middlesex though.
Arsenal
Spurs
Chelsea
West Ham
Fulham
Charlton
QPR
Palace
Watford (If they count as a London Club)
Millwall
Brentford
Orient
Wimbledon
Dag & Red
For me, weighing up a few different considerations of current standings / recent history / long-term history, i'd go with the following:
Arsenal
Chelsea
Spurs
Wham
Palace
QPR
Charlton
Fulham
Millwall
Brentford
Orient
others
Arsenal
Spurs
Chelsea
West Ham
Palace
QPR
Charlton
Fulham
Millwall
Brentford
Orient
Wimbledon
2. Arsenal
3. West Ham. Only big team in East London
4. Chelsea. If and when they drop down watch there attendance fall
5. Charlton. Our potential is just incredible
6. Palace
7.Qpr
8.Fulham
9.Millwall
10.Brentford
11.Orient
12.Wimbledon
2. Spurs
3.Arse
4. West Ham
5. Fulham
6. Charlton
7.Palace
8.Qpr
9.Millwall
10.Brentford
11.Orient
12.Wimbledon
Close between Brentford and Orient for me.
Two clubs of a similar size and ambition but Brentford's promotion to the championship gives them the jump on Orient overall.
Qpr coming in at a mediocre 8TH- All the cash yes, still a nothing club in my opinion.
As are the two clubs either side of them on the list above
West ham have always been a big club we just hate to admit it, same with spurs really.
http://www.millwall.vitalfootball.co.uk/forum/forums/thread-view.asp?tid=112328&posts=7
They actually think they are a bigger club then us lol
We need to remember that the biggest club is different to best current team and clearly the situation is fluid . Ten years ago I would have placed Spurs at number 2 and benchmarked Chelsea and West Ham together . Clearly the Blues are now number two and following the Champions League triumph and recent title successes they are not that far behind Arsenal.
Lower down I benchmark us with Palace ,Fulham and QPR because I do see this as very fluid . SLL is right in that the Spanners are not quite in that group ,but are definitely above Brentford and Orient .
It is interesting because had we done this exercise in the 70's when I first started going to Charlton the O's would have probably been at least at a similar level to the Spanners and may even have had a good claim to be benchmarked with us. In the late 80's early 90's Fulham would have been a lot lower. At one time Barnet saw them as a rival club !
I see AFC as bigger than the Daggers partly because of the legacy of the Dons and have included Barnet because they could get back in the league whereas I can't see the likes of Welling ever making it.
1. Arsenal
2.Chelsea
3. Spurs
4 .West Ham
5. Charlton , Palace , Fulham , QPR
9.Millwall
10. Brentford ,Orient
12. AFC Wimbledon
13. Barnet, Dagenham
Stig's methodology in trying to quantify through statistic is very good and with a few refinements will offer us the closest answer to the our question, but really it's something that come down to the perception of the supporters.
I think the only way we could get a definitive answer is to poll supporters of clubs from outside of the capital, and even then fans of London clubs will dispute it.
I couldn't comment on comparisons with sides like QPR, Fulham and Palace.