By Opta Analyst | Created at 2026-10-02 13:10:19 | Updated at 2026-10-02 14:26:01
1 hour ago
After the Opta supercomputer ran 100,000 simulations of Manchester City’s 2026-27 Premier League season, we‘ve calculated the precise impact of every possible points deduction.
Ever since Manchester City were found guilty of breaching the Premier League’s financial rules, speculation has been rife as to what their punishment might be.
The club maintain their innocence, and on Friday confirmed they have lodged an official appeal against the Premier League’s ruling.
It’s a completely unprecedented situation in many ways, and there are so many unknowns that it’s impossible to say with any certainty what’s going to happen next. But the widely held view seems to be that any appeals process will mean it’s a long time before any final decision is made on what sentence City will serve (if they fail in their appeal).
The range of punishments being mooted is vast, and we’re not here to say where on the scale it should fall, but given that Everton and Nottingham Forest were both handed points deductions for financial rule-breaking in recent years, there is a real possibility that City will also face one this season.
Whether they are also given further sanctions remains to be seen and is not for us to speculate on. But what we can do here at Opta Analyst is use the wisdom of the Opta supercomputer to tell us precisely what impact any points deduction would have on the Premier League in 2026-27.
City are top of the Premier League at the time of writing with the only remaining 100% record, having become only the 14th team in the history of the competition to begin a season with five wins from five. But a points deduction could completely derail their season.
That said, they would have had a lot of work to do to go on and win the title regardless, given that only four of the previous 14 teams to begin with five wins went on to win the title.
Clearly, a fast start doesn’t necessarily bring success, and the Opta supercomputer currently makes them second favourites, with a 39.9% chance of winning the title, behind Arsenal’s 44.2% (based on no points deduction, as is currently the case).
But how exactly would a points deduction affect their chances? The Opta supercomputer has run 100,000 simulations of the rest of the season, before then applying every possible points deduction and spitting out a final league position for City. We can then look at the percentage of simulations in which City finish in each position to assign a likelihood of each eventuality, depending on the size of the points deduction.
So, we are now able to say the extent to which their title chances would drop depending on the points deduction, as well as their chances of qualifying for the Champions League. But perhaps most interestingly, how big the deduction would need to be to make it likely that City are relegated. Inspired by the fine work of Aurel Nazmiu on X, we used the Opta supercomputer to create this visualisation with numbers from our own model:
This is, of course, entirely speculative. It is still unclear what City’s punishment will be or if their appeal will be successful, given they maintain their innocence. We at Opta Analyst have no way of knowing how the punishment will be decided, whether there will even be a punishment, or if any sanctions will extend into future seasons.
But they could quite feasibly face a punishment that includes a points deduction, and with that comes the possibility of relegation from the Premier League this season.
According to the supercomputer’s findings, City’s chances of relegation are only certain – meaning they were relegated in every single one of the 100,000 simulations – when they were given a 74-point deduction. For every possible deduction of fewer than 74 points, there was at least one simulation in which City avoided the drop.
That means that the supercomputer saw (rare) circumstances in which City were docked 73 points but won enough games to still finish on a higher total than three other teams. That would likely require them to win almost all of their remaining games, which isn’t impossible, but it is very, very unlikely.
It took a deduction of 40 points to tip City over a 50% likelihood of relegation, with a steady increase from there up to 60 points, at which point their chances of relegation get very close to – but not quite – 100%.
For every deduction of 30 points of fewer, City were relegated in fewer than 20% of simulations. Anything up to 20 points, and their chances of relegation remain under 5%.
For Champions League qualification, it took a 38-point deduction to reduce City’s chances to under 1%, based on the Premier League’s top four making it into that competition. If a fifth spot is up for grabs – as it has been in the last two seasons – City would have slightly more wiggle room: a 40-point deduction would be needed to reduce their chances to less than 1%.
As for the title race, the supercomputer reckons City would retain a chance of more than 10% with anything under 10 points deducted, while it took 25 points being taken off their total for them to be reduced to complete outsiders, with less than a 1% chance of winning the league.
For now, there’s no knowing what City’s punishment will be, but the Opta supercomputer is able to give us a little more idea of the impact of any potential points deduction.
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