Mikel Arteta’s Arsenal are in danger of joining Tottenham, Newcastle United and Leeds United when it comes to the Premier League’s rich history of nearly men.
Over the years we’ve seen brilliant Manchester United, Manchester City, Chelsea, Arsenal and Liverpool sides win the league title and rack up plenty of other cups to boot. But what about the fantastic teams that came close but never quite delivered?
Here are six of the best Premier League teams that never won any silverware.
Mikel Arteta’s Arsenal (2020-)
Let’s get this out of the way nice and early: we’re well aware that Mikel Arteta has already led the Gunners to silverware.
And an impressive achievement it was too, masterminding against-the-odds victories over Manchester City and Chelsea in the FA Cup back when he was a fledgeling coach in his first six months in the job.
But that Arsenal wasn’t this Arsenal. It was still the Arsenal of latter-day Arsene Wenger and Unai Emery.
Arteta’s 2020 FA Cup final XI featured Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang wearing the armband, joined by Alexandre Lacazette and Nicolas Pepe in attack. It featured Rob Holding and David Luiz in the backline and Hector Bellerin and Ainsley Maitland-Niles operating as wingbacks.
Kieran Tierney the only member of the starting line-up still at Arsenal. A teenage Bukayo Saka an unused substitute. Reiss Nelson – now on loan at Fulham – the only other player in the entire squad still on the club’s books today.
There can be no questioning that Arsenal have improved exponentially after backing Arteta’s wholesale rebuild. They’ve gone from Europa League also-rans to genuine title challengers and a side to be taken seriously in the Champions League.
Their 84 points in 2022-23 was six more than their title-winning 1997-98 tally under Wenger, while last season’s 89 was just one shy of the legendary Invincibles’ total.
But it looks like a third successive runner-up placing this year. The awkward fact remains that almost every player in this squad hasn’t won anything with Arsenal bar the Community Shield. Sorry Mikel, that doesn’t count.
The Champions League – with Real Madrid, likely PSG and another elite European heavyweight in the final standing in their way – represents their last reasonable hope of a trophy in 2024-25. Gulp.
Otherwise it’ll be five successive seasons without a major trophy. This is a young team and there’s plenty of time, but they’re in danger of becoming everything they derided in…
Mauricio Pochettino’s Tottenham (2014-19)
Ah, Spurs.
After somehow conspiring to finish third in a two-horse race in Leicester City’s fairytale 2015-16 title victory, Tottenham only got stronger in the following years.
Antonio Conte’s Chelsea were so relentless in 2016-17 that it’s easy to forget quite how good runners-up Spurs were that year. They ended up on 86 points, lost the fewest games, scored more and conceded fewer than any other team in the league.
That was their peak, but even when they were past their best they still made it to a Champions League final – vanquishing Pep Guardiola’s all-conquering Manchester City and Erik ten Hag’s memorably brilliant Ajax side en route to the Madrid final.
Tottenham manager Mauricio Pochettino during their Premier League match against Manchester City at Etihad Stadium, Manchester, October 2014.
QUIZ: Can you name every manager to finish second in Premier League history?
Brendan Rodgers’ Liverpool (2012-15)
Really, we’re talking about just one season here. The Northern Irish coach’s first and third seasons at Anfield were downright mediocre. And, to be fair, most of Rodgers’ Liverpool squad did win something – the League Cup under his predecessor Kenny Dalglish.
But for two-thirds of the 2013-14 campaign, they seemed to capture lightning in a bottle. Powered by the astonishing form of Luis Suarez and Steven Gerrard looking hell-bent on finally getting his hands on the Premier League trophy, Rodgers’ Reds were captivating viewing from the turn of the year up until that defeat at home to Chelsea.
Liverpool took 44 points from 48 available in the first four months of 2024, winning 11 in a row and routinely putting three, four, five or six past the opposition.
There were obvious flaws in the team – not least the backline – but they were so irresistible in attack that they have a genuine claim to be the best side not to win a Premier League title.
There can certainly be no question that 2013-14 vintage Suarez is the best-ever player not to.
David Moyes’ Everton (2002-2013)
Moyes’ first stint at Goodison Park lasted long enough whereby this arguably encapsulates two or three different teams.
They never quite hit the title-challenging heights, nor produced the dazzling free-flowing football, of other sides in this list. But they were consistently competitive for long enough whereby they could – should? – have got their hands on a domestic cup.
The ‘big six’ did tended to monopolise silverware then as they still do now, but during Moyes’ tenure clubs including Middlesbrough, Birmingham City, Swansea City, Portsmouth and Wigan Athletic got their hands on League and FA Cups.
There was the loss to Chelsea in the 2008-09 FA Cup final and the painful semi-final defeat to Liverpool in 2011-12, but generally they failed to make it past the early rounds under Moyes.
You imagine he’ll be envisaging something a bit different this time around. Especially now he’s got a taste for silverware.
David O’Leary’s Leeds United (1998-2002)
Like Arsenal in 2024, Leeds can boast the (unfortunately meaningless) honour of calendar year champions – O’Leary’s ‘babies’ picked up 81 points from 39 matches in 2001, comfortably more than Sir Alex Ferguson’s Manchester United, Gerard Houllier’s Liverpool or Wenger’s Arsenal.
At the turn of the millennium, Leeds looked like they had the perfect formula for competing at the top table – solid defensive foundations left by George Graham, a promising and adventurous young coach, an academy producing talented gems and a chairman splashing the cash.
That all culminated in the Whites’ unforgettable run to the 2000-01 Champions League semi-finals. Three years later they were in the Championship. What a ride.
Kevin Keegan’s Newcastle United (1992-97)
We could also include Kenny Dalglish’s Magpies and Sir Bobby Robson’s side of the early noughties.
But it’s impossible not to look at Keegan – specifically in that Sky Sports booth, with those big headphones on – as the face of oh-so-close Geordie heartache.
Keegan’s Entertainers have gone down in footballing folklore, English club football’s equivalent to Brazil ’82 or the Netherlands in ’74 as a side that won the hearts and minds of neutrals. Not quite making it over the line was part of the appeal.
READ NEXT: The 10 players with the most goals + assists in Premier League history: Salah rising high…
TRY A QUIZ: Can you name every team to finish in the top four of the Premier League?