Ask most football fans if theirs is a ‘big’ club and they will tell you with conviction: of course. ‘Giants’ from the North West to the North East, from Yorkshire to the Midlands to London and across the South will point to historic titles, cup glories, bumper crowds or modern TV riches and insist: ‘We are a huge club.’
Manchester United and Liverpool, with 38 English league titles between them, might reasonably point to last Sunday’s match and argue it was a contest between England’s two biggest teams.
Certainly over the years they have enjoyed serial trophy successes, global adulation, showcased generations of stars and both have rich, stirring histories in more than one sense.
Then again, supporters of Chelsea, Arsenal and Manchester City might reasonably scoff at that, arguing that at least their teams are likely to play at the highest European level next season.
They’re not scrapping around merely to squeeze into the top four.And then there are fans from all points on the map who will, with different levels of justification, swear their club is up there with all those names above, or getting closer by the day, or merely enduring a painful blip, perhaps of decades, but they will be back.
Yes, that’s you, fans of Leeds. And Tottenham. And Everton. And Newcastle, Wolves, Aston Villa, Sunderland, both Sheffield clubs, West Ham, Blackburn... and on and on and on.
So who, objectively, are the biggest clubs in England? That’s the question Sportsmail answers today.
We’ve used no opinion, just hard evidence to determine the answers. The outcome might surprise you. It will certainly provoke debate.
The starting point, to cast the net of candidates as widely as possible, was to narrow the field to ‘big’ clubs who are currently among the 92 in the Premier League or Football League and who have played in England’s top division for at least one season, ever.
That gives us 59 contenders, from all those named above down to clubs who once spent just a few seasons, perhaps only one, at the highest level a long time ago.
We’ve ranked the top 50, with Brentford, Carlisle, Northampton, Wimbledon, Oxford, Swindon, Leyton Orient, Luton and Oldham just missing out.
We ranked each of those 59 teams in six categories to assess how ‘big’ they are in each of them. We’ve considered trophies, all-time league performance by average finish since 1888-89, crowds (for this season, and historically), calibre of players over time (counting England internationals, and World Cup stars), modern global popularity (using social media followings) and money, measuring income.
‘Big’ clubs, by definition, win things, perform consistently at a high level over a long time, attract big gates to see star names, are widely followed within these shores and beyond, and have money, to buy and pay the best players.
Manchester United come out top by some distance. Nobody beats United’s pulling power in terms of attendance, considering both contemporary and historic seasons, and no club is as globally popular as them, or as rich in terms of revenue.
It is who comes second that might cause most debate. Despite their incredible trophy record, Liverpool are pipped to second place by Arsenal, the London club edging them out because of their huge crowds, global appeal and income.
Chelsea in fourth place are catching Liverpool. Manchester City are fifth, then Everton, Tottenham, Aston Villa, Newcastle and Sunderland round out the top 10, in that order.
West Brom in 11th are ahead of West Ham, famously never winners of the English title but also famously providers of three key players for England’s greatest triumph, the 1966 World Cup win featuring Bobby Moore, Geoff Hurst and Martin Peters.
Generations of Hammers fans will have their club fixed in their minds as bone fide giants partly because of the richness of that Sixties summer. Yet they have as much major silverware in their 120-year history as Bolton: four cups, and the last one was 35 years ago.Southampton, in 15th place, and Stoke, in 16th, are the other current Premier League teams in the top 20 biggest clubs.
Nine of the top 20 clubs ranked by trophies alone play outside the Premier League. One of those, Portsmouth, are in League Two, and another two, Sheffield United and Preston, are in League One.
Six of the biggest 20 clubs — Wolves, Leeds, Blackburn, Sheffield Wednesday, Bolton and Nottingham Forest — play outside the top division.
It may surprise many that Wolves are tied with Leeds but their nine major trophies to Leeds’ seven gives them the edge. The six Premier League clubs outside the top 20 could all be argued to be punching above their weight to be there.
They are Leicester (21st), Burnley (26th), Crystal Palace (30th), QPR (31st), Hull (32nd) and Swansea (34th). Yet there are clubs vying for promotion like Derby (22nd overall), Norwich (23rd) and Middlesbrough (29th) who would inevitably leap up the rankings by joining the Premier League, moving from ‘middling’ to quite big very quickly. They still have some way to go to catch United though.
Here’s how it was worked out:
Crowds:
We ranked all clubs on the size of their average gates during this season to reflect contemporary pull. Then we ranked each club by the size of their biggest historic gates. Their overall crowd rank is an aggregate of current pull and also potential based on past highs.
Global Fanbase:
We added up the total number of fans and followers for each club on Facebook and Twitter - by far the most popular global social media platforms. Every club has official accounts.
Trophies:
We counted 'major’ trophies won by each club, giving points for each; 10pts for each European Cup/Champions League win, 8pts for each top-division English title, 5pts for each FA Cup or other European trophy win, and 3pts for each League Cup win. No 'one-off’ trophies such as the Charity Shield are considered because they are not the product of multi-match competitions. And being a losing finalist does not count for points either - here at Sportsmail, winning is everything, second is nowhere.
Average league finish:
The average league finish position for each of the clubs since 1888-89.
Player quality:
We counted the number of players from each club who have played for England, all-time, ranking the clubs by total. This reflects historic 'bigness’. We then ranked the clubs by the number of players provided to the 2014 World Cup 'a measure of modern bigness’. The overall ranking is an aggregate of these two.
Income:
We ranked the clubs by their income for the most recent season available.
SPORTSMAIL’S exclusive table ranks the top 50 teams from the 59 who have played in the top flight for six categories: crowds, global fanbase, trophies, league finish, player quality and income. Their ranks are then added up for a final score - the lower the score, the better the club.
Club
Rank
1 Man Utd 1 1 2 4 1 1 10
2 Arsenal 4 3 3 2 3 4 19
3 Liverpool 10 4 1 1 1 5 22
4 Chelsea 3 2 5 7 5 3 25
5 Man City 2 5 8 9 5 2 31
6= Everton 6 8 6 3 5 8 36
6= Tottenham 8 6 7 6 3 6 36
8 Aston Villa 9 7 4 5 8 10 43
9 Newcastle 7 9 9 8 9 7 49
10 Sunderland 5 13 10 10 16 12 66
11 West brom 11 20 16 11 10 17 85
12 West Ham 22 10 24 13 12 9 90
13= Wolves 15 26 13 16 21 24 115
13= Leeds 14 23 15 12 25 26 115
15 Southampton 34 11 30 26 10 11 122
16 Stoke 17 17 40 22 14 14 124
17 Blackburn 31 30 11 14 16 25 127
18 Sheff Wed 12 34 14 19 18 35 132
19 Bolton 23 29 23 18 19 23 135
20 Nottm Forest 24 28 12 23 14 36 137
21 Leicester 21 22 27 24 25 30 149
22 Derby 28 33 21 15 20 33 150
23 Norwich 25 18 28 35 29 18 153
24 Sheff Utd 13 39 18 20 24 45 159
25 Birmingham 26 27 28 21 31 28 161
26 Burnley 27 31 21 25 27 34 165
27= Charlton 16 14 30 31 35 40 166
27= Fulham 32 15 47 32 21 19 166
29 Middlesbrough 29 32 40 17 13 37 168
30 Crystal Palace 18 19 47 45 29 15 173
31 QPR 36 16 40 40 21 21 174
32 Hull 19 14 47 39 42 16 177
33 Cardiff 20 21 30 37 50 20 178
34 Swansea 39 12 40 49 40 13 193
35 Portsmouth 35 36 19 29 33 43 195
36 Huddersfield 30 53 17 30 31 41 202
37 Ipswich 37 44 25 27 38 38 209
38 Wigan 54 24 30 46 37 22 213
39 Preston 45 51 19 28 27 47 217
40 Blackpool 48 38 30 33 38 32 219
41 Coventry 38 43 30 34 42 51 238
42 Notts County 46 41 30 36 33 53 239
43 Reading 42 25 56 53 42 27 245
44= Brighton 33 37 47 54 49 29 249
44= Watford 43 40 47 52 36 31 249
46 Barnsley 50 47 30 38 51 44 260
47= Bradford 44 45 30 47 47 49 262
47= Bristol City 41 46 47 44 42 42 262
49 Millwall 40 54 47 48 41 39 269
50 Bury 51 55 26 43 42 56 – Daily Mail