THE Premier League has built much of its reputation on being ‘the most competitive league in the world’, where sides in the bottom half of the table regularly spring a surprise against the teams at the top. This year, though, things have been decidedly different.

With almost a third of the season gone, three Premier League teams – Manchester City, Chelsea and Liverpool – are still to taste defeat. Tottenham have lost three games, but only one of their defeats – a 2-1 reverse at Watford – came to a side below them in the table. Arsenal have lost twice – to Manchester City and Chelsea.

The top teams are not losing, and the clubs struggling at the bottom are not winning. Fulham, Cardiff City, Huddersfield Town, Newcastle United and Southampton have all won just one of their opening 11 games. Burnley and Crystal Palace have only won twice. None of the sides currently sitting in the bottom half of the table have beaten a side residing in the top five.

The result is a league table that already features a huge gap between the elite and the stragglers. Arsenal, sitting in fifth, and Crystal Palace, who are 14th, are already separated by a whopping 15 points.

If you’re a team at the top, you have precious room for error. But if you are a side at the bottom, a couple of wins can make a massive amount of difference, and home games against teams outside the established ‘big six’ are even more important than ever.

Newcastle won one of them last weekend, when they edged out Watford, and have an opportunity to claim another home success this afternoon when Bournemouth visit St James’ Park. Forget the games that contributed to such a tough start to the season for the Magpies – these are the matches that will ultimately determine their fate.

“If you analyse this season, the teams at the top are winning and not losing,” said Rafael Benitez. “They are winning almost all the time.

“The teams at the bottom, we are losing more than maybe in the past. What does that mean? It means the difference between these teams (in the top five) and the others is very big.

“So that means a couple of wins gives you a really good platform going forward. Getting back-to-back wins is really important for every position in the table – but especially if you are close to the bottom.”

Thirty-eight points is generally regarded as a reliable survival target, but last season, you could have finished in 17th position with just 34 points on the board.

The way things are going this season, the points total required to avoid the bottom three could be even lower, and if current trends are repeated to the end of the campaign, anything above 30 points would result in Premier League survival.

That is an unlikely prospect, but the days of teams ending up in the Championship despite making it to the 40-point mark appear to be long gone.

“I always say that 40 points is a guarantee to stay up,” said Benitez. “Last year it was much lower than that. What does that mean? It means the gaps in the table are getting much bigger.

“We have to be sure we do what we have to do because with a couple of wins, you could be 11th or 12th. It depends on what the others do, but it’s a big difference.

“You have to make sure that you compete because, if you’re in the games and get three points, it’s a massive difference because the other teams are also having problems to win.

“It’s too early to talk about exactly what you might need, but I’ve been doing some research and maybe with 36, you could be safe this year.”

Newcastle (probable, 4-2-3-1): Dubravka; Yedlin, Schar, Fernandez, Dummett; Diame, Ki; Ritchie, Perez, Kenedy; Rondon.