Mauricio Pochettino has gone back to the 2016/17 title race and said Tottenham should have been awarded the Premier League crown after Chelsea were punished for rule breaches. Tottenham finished second that season, seven points behind Antonio Conte’s Chelsea, but Pochettino says the race was not fair from the start.

Pochettino's fairness argument

“We should win one Premier League, we should have been awarded it,” Pochettino said, while also arguing, “We didn’t compete before the start of the season with the same card.” He added: “But if you broke the rules then, ciao, you need to give it to another team.”

The basis for his claim is clear. Chelsea were punished for 74 breaches of financial regulations between 2009-22. In July they were fined £10million by the Football Association and handed a suspended two-window transfer ban. In March they were also fined £10.75m by the Premier League and hit with a nine-month academy transfer ban.

That does not amount to a stripped title, and the sanctions stopped short of changing the record books. Pochettino’s point is still easy to follow, though: if the rules were broken, the title should not have stayed where it was.

What the 2016/17 season still leaves open

Pochettino has tied the argument to the simple fact that Tottenham finished second, not champions. He also said: “The title should be for the team that was second… for sure, we deserve to be champions for that year, because we were the second best.”

The present-day contrast is stark. Tottenham finished 17th in the 2025-26 season on 41 points, while Chelsea finished 10th. That does not settle the old argument, but it does show how far the two clubs have drifted since the title race Pochettino is revisiting.

Pochettino is now the United States Men’s National Team manager, but this is still very much a Spurs grievance. He said he keeps in touch with Daniel Levy and added, “I think he feels like [I did] when I was sacked!” The row will not be resolved by nostalgia, and the only fixed point remains the 2016/17 season, when Tottenham were second and seven points behind Chelsea.

Written by Jack Mercer with AI-assisted research, cross-checked against 2 outlets. How we work →