Mikel Arteta below Arne Slot and shock top three despite winning 2024 trophy

Arsenal amassed the most Premier League points in 2024 so whoop to them. But we have five bosses pegged as better than Mikel Arteta across the calendar year.

10) Thomas Frank (Brentford)
Began 2024 in 16th place after five straight Premier League defeats and the narrative emerged that they desperately needed the banned Ivan Toney to return. It transpired that keeping Bryan Mbeumo fit was actually the most important factor in an excellent calendar year which ends with them comfortably in mid-table. And comfortably in mid-table should really be more than enough for a club of Brentford’s size.

Across 2024 they have scored more goals than Aston Villa and have a better home record than Manchester United, often while having no actual, dedicated full-backs. The football may be a tad direct but nobody at Brentford is complaining about style while the Bees continue to buzz around the middle reaches of the Premier League.

9) Oliver Glasner (Crystal Palace)
The start of the 2024/25 post-Michael Olise season was more than a little dicey, but they end 2024 in excellent form with Maxence Lacroix, Trevoh Chalobah and Marc Guehi settling into an effective back three after the damaging exit of Joachim Andersen. Now to adjust to life without Guehi in 2025…

Even with that run of eight winless games at the onset of 2024/25 season, Palace have more points than Tottenham and Manchester United – by some distance – since Glasner was appointed manager in February. And like Frank, he has been hit with the summer exit of his most creative player, and it’s clearly taken Eberechi Eze some time to adjust to taking on that mantle.

There have been eye-catching thwackings of Manchester United and Aston Villa at Selhurst Park in 2024, but nothing will beat the 3-1 win over Brighton on their patch. Asked to sum up his feelings, Glasner said: “Happiness.” Fair.

8) Unai Emery (Aston Villa)
It’s undoubtedly been a trickier year than 2023, when Aston Villa were second behind only Manchester City and Unai Emery was second behind only Pep Guardiola on the managers of the year list. But Villa have still been the sixth-best team of 2024, claiming a place in the Champions League and then justifying that place with a famous win over Bayern Munich the highlight of an excellent start in Europe.

Conceding more Premier League goals than all but Brentford, West Ham and Wolves of the 17 Premier League clubs ever-present in 2024 suggests that something is awry in that department, but Emery is still managing a Champions League team with a chance of qualifying again, despite losing his best central midfielder in the summer. And that makes him better than the Eddie Howe of 2023.

7) Eddie Howe (Newcastle United)
We have to confess that the bare numbers are a shock: Newcastle have been comfortably the fifth-best team in 2024 after being eighth across 2023, despite no real improvement to their starting XI. By any measure, that’s impressive. And the added bonus is that Newcastle end 2024 in a domestic cup semi-final with at least some hope of ending their astonishingly long trophy drought.

The summer brought desperation for a centre-half and right-winger that was left unsatiated but 2024/25 has seen Jacob Murphy claim more Premier League assists than Anthony Gordon on the other flank and Dan Burn comfortably settle into life alongside Fabian Schar. It shouldn’t work but it does, and Howe has to take a large dose of the credit for his unfussy managerial style.

6) Mikel Arteta (Arsenal)
To those who say Arteta has undelivered in terms of trophies (and there are a couple in the Mailbox), we give you the calendar year champions of 2024. Whoop. That 1-0 win over Ipswich Town might have left some clawing their eyes out but it sealed the title for Arsenal after they came fourth in 2023. Whoop again.

In all seriousness, Arsenal have lost only three times in the Premier League in 2024 and remain unbeaten at home in 2024/25. Has it been enough to win a Premier League title? No. Will it be enough to win a Premier League title? Alas no. But Arsenal will comfortably progress in the Champions League, should comfortably qualify again and have a more-than-decent chance of winning a domestic trophy in 2025.

It’s been a B+ of a year when they needed an A. Maybe, just maybe, Arsenal should have bought a striker. You know that will be the very first thing Arteta’s eventual replacement will do…

5) Arne Slot (Liverpool)
Nothing has been won yet – hence him being as low as fifth – but what a bloody start.

The Dutchman has somehow made Mo Salah even better, rejuvenated Virgil van Dijk and turned Ryan Gravenberch into an elite central midfielder. The result is a Liverpool side six points better than the same stage last season.

His personal 2024: 50 games, 40 wins, nine draws, one defeat and one trophy.

4) Pep Guardiola (Manchester City)
The wheels have absolutely come off – exposing cracks in an ageing squad – but we cannot simply ignore an unbeaten first half of 2024 in the Premier League, including nine straight wins featuring 33 City goals. They were an unstoppable juggernaut. Which makes the fall off the edge of a cliff this season all the more catastrophic, though alarm bells should have started ringing when they lost the FA Cup final to Erik ten Hag’s rotten Manchester United.

The injury to Rodri this season is obviously a mitigating factor but blame falls squarely on the shoulders of Guardiola for failing to come up with a viable solution after a summer in which City were undoubtedly weakened. And it’s really not just Rodri.

Regardless, City have still been the third best team of 2024 and unlike the two men below him on this list, Guardiola has won a Premier League title (or six).

3) Marco Silva (Fulham)
They began the year in 13th and will end it firmly ensconced in the top half of the table and unbeaten in seven Premier League games.

The team that won back-to-back games 5-0 and then lost their next three matches has been left behind in 2023, replaced by an incredibly disciplined side that has lost only 11 Premier League matches across 2024 – the same as Newcastle and fewer than Aston Villa. They draw too many games to truly trouble the European places but Silva has forged a team that can bloody any and all noses.

The loss of Joao Palhinha could have been a devastating blow but some savvy summer business saw Joachim Andersen and Sander Berge arrive for not much more in total, while Emile Smith Rowe was a lovely bonus to add some guile and ease an over-reliance on Andreas Pereira.

Silva is an improver of footballers: Alex Iwobi, Calvin Bassey, Antonee Robinson (who will surely follow Palhinha out of the door) and Raul Jimenez were all central to the 2024 highlight of a win at Chelsea. Will Silva stay to improve them again in 2025?

2) Andoni Iraola (Bournemouth)
The seventh-best team throughout 2024 despite having the lowest revenues of any Premier League team neither promoted nor relegated in this calendar year. It’s been simply extraordinary.

It’s a particularly phenomenal record because 2024 started so badly, with no wins until March. It ends with no defeats since November.

And Iraola can take much of the credit because no manager has made more scoring substitutions this season, meaning the Cherries have gained 10 points from losing positions.

He has had to find solutions after losing his top goalscorer in the summer and has emerged clutching Justin Kluivert, Evanilson and Antoine Semenyo. Meanwhile, Lewis Cook is back in the form that made him an England international and Milos Kerkez has become one of the hottest left-back properties in Europe.

Is there anybody left who thinks Gary O’Neil was harshly sacked?

1) Nuno Espirito Santo (Nottingham Forest)
They began 2024 in 15th and end it in a Champions League place.

This was absolutely not a popular appointment and it was somehow even less popular at the end of March with Forest level on points with Luton Town. Ten points in those last eight games was enough to secure survival but exactly nobody was convinced Santo would even last the year at Forest, never mind mount an unlikely top-four challenge.

Santo has organised a phenomenal defensive side with more than a little flair to match the graft, and in a year the change has been extraordinary.

The team that started 2024 with defeat to Brentford: Turner; Tavares, Murillo, Omobamidele, Montiel; Danilo, Mangala, Yates; Dominguez, Wood, Hudson-Odoi.

The team that ended 2024 with victory over Everton: Sels; Aina, Morato, Milenkovic, Williams; Anderson, Dominguez; Elanga, Gibbs-White, Sosa; Wood

There are some caveats – namely injuries to Gibbs-White and Murillo – but that is a revolutionised team, boosted by the inspired signings of Elliot Anderson and Nikola Milenkovic. This was not a scattergun summer and this is not a scattergun manager.

“We have to realise that we haven’t achieved anything,” said Santo after five straight wins took Forest second. On the contrary, Nuno; you’ve smashed it.