First Division. At the bottom, two teams were quite inferior to the league in general. At the top a battle between 3 clubs for the title, one of them quite surprising and perhaps incidental. The real battle was in Liverpool and was exciting to the very end of the season.
West Bromwich Albion – last and relegated with 24 points. Good times were over, downhill now.
Birmingham City – 21st with 29 points. Quite the expected – relegation was traditionally the likelier outcome.
Ipswich Town – lost the battle for survival between 7 teams and was relegated: 20th with 41 points. Like WBA, their strong period ended and now was going down fast.
Leicester City – barely survived: 19th with 42 points.
Oxford United – 18th with 42 points. Mere survival could be end of terrible season for another club, but for Oxford it was wonderful result – after all, they were modest club, playing for the first time among the best. It was not only that, though – this season was the best ever!
Coventry City – the eternal survivors. 17th with 43 points.
Aston Villa – 16th with 44 points. Their success a few years back was pretty much accidental one-time affair, it was quite clear at the time, so going down was hardly a surprise. They were losing players, not piling up talent: the predicament of poorer clubs.
Manchester City – 15th with 45 points. The prime goal – to stay in the league after their fresh return – was achieved, but building formidable team and restoring the leading position they had about 15 years ago was unlikely to happen. It was a matter of life or death only.
Southampton – 14th with 46 points. Their strange approach of getting few big-name veterans every year sooner or later was going to misfire. And it did – after few seasons in the top of the league they found themselves trying to avoid relegation.
Queen’s Park Rangers – 13th with 52 points. Not worried by possible relegation and even having good season, but the team was a bit uneven and hardly able for something better than midtable existence.
Watford – 12th with 59 points. Doing well actually, for a small club like them would not challenge the leading clubs for long. Now the surprise was gone and they settled in the middle of the league. It was great.
Newcastle United – 11th with 63 points. No miracles were expected from them and no miracles happened, but here was the future, already protruding in the grim present of the mid-80s: Paul Gascoigne and Peter Beardsley. A club like Newcastle cannot be blamed for having two vastly talented strikers and nothing else, though.
Tottenham Horspur – 10th with 65 points. Perhaps they were praised too much in the recent years and that somewhat blinded management: the squad was not truly great, it needed additional strong players, but remained unfinished. It reached its peak already, it was not going to go higher. The Spurs were not going to win a championship, that was certain.
Great season for Luton Town, perhaps their best ever – 9th with 66 points. But it was also an accidental one. Unfortunately, Luton was modest club.
Looking at the names here, this squad should have been able to do much better than 8th place and 68 points. Clough may have been a genius, but his much repeated excuse – that the team won everything and lost motivation for there was nothing else to concur – was lame: he had very strong squad and to end a bit ahead of Luton Town was not even routine, but a disaster. But Nottingham Forest did not have money, traditionally was a modest club, thus even the fans easily forgave. Too bad, really – the slow decline already started.
Arsenal – 7th with 69 points. Underachievers, that was what they were for many, many years.
Chelsea had second consecutive strong season after coming back from second division darkness – again 6th, but this time with 5 points more than the previous year: 71. However, it did not look like real comeback and even less like rapidly developing club – the squad was ordinary at best and running on adrenalin. Unlikely to stay among the top clubs for long.
Sheffield Wednesday – 5th with 73 points. Now, this was a team in good shape and having strong period. Perhaps not expected to become a title contender, but nearing its peak and bright.
Manchester United – 4th with 76 points. One looks at this squad and wants to cry – so much talent and not even a title contender. Year after year – nothing. Ron Atkinson must go…
Surprising and wonderful – West Ham United run for the title and came close to winning it. 3rd with 84 points at the end. Looking at the squad and one understand why they lost the title race: inferior squad compared to the other candidates. A freak accident at best, one time wonder. It was so nice the Hammers challenged the mighty, but… they did not have the real power.
With West Ham short on great talent, the real battle for the title happened in Liverpool – a clash between old local rivals, one at its peak and the other… well, the other was on its peak for something like 25 years.
Eventually, Everton lost the race by 2 points and finished 2nd with 86 points. Naturally, club and fans were more than disappointed, but with time excuse was found: Liverpool was blamed for stunting their development. Sky was the limit, goes the story, often repeated to this very day, and Everton was on the road to concur the world, but because of the Liverpool’s fans English clubs were banished from international football and thus Everton’s wings were viciously clipped off. Speculations cannot be proved with fact, though… as good as this Everton vintage was, the club historically had only sporadic strong periods. It is also questionable how would Everton fare in the changing reality of football – to keep and improve a strong squad… it was a big matter of policy, money, and competing with rich Italian and Spanish sharks. Liverpool had great tradition built already, almost uncanny ability to sell and buy at the right moment and very successful string of home grown managers – Everton did not have anything similar at its hands, so it was not that much a minute matter of who won or lose one championship, but long-term vision and ability to put it to practice. However, Everton was here to stay – they had great team, they worked on reinforcement.
It was not easy, but the end was… routine: one more title for Liverpool. 26 wins, 10 ties, 6 losses, 89-37 goal-difference. A little ahead of Everton in every department – a little, but ahead. The squad was the typically great squad, most names already more than well known. The biggest change this season was their new manager – Kenny Dalglish, a player-manager at first. Bob Paisley was returned as a consultant, given the unusual for Liverpool position and the lack of experience of Dalglish, but there was no problem. Liverpool continued its own tradition: change one great manager with another, coming from ranks, just like his predecessor. It was seamless and smooth transition as it was before.