At the end of the 1997–98 FA Premier League season, a record total of nine English teams qualified for European competition. Premiership champions Arsenal and runners-up Manchester United qualified for the
Champions League, while
UEFA Cup places went to
Liverpool,
Leeds United,
Aston Villa and
Blackburn Rovers. Qualifying for the
UEFA Cup Winners' Cup were
Chelsea (as defending champions) and FA Cup runners-up
Newcastle United.
Crystal Palace, while finishing bottom, qualified for the Intertoto Cup. Manchester United led the table for most of the season, before a dip in form during the final two months of the campaign saw Arsenal overtake them in April, taking advantage of games in hand, and winning the league title with two away matches remaining, although the gap between the champions and runners-up was a single point in the final table as Arsenal lost their final two away fixtures and Alex Ferguson's men won both of theirs. Arsenal then completed the double by winning the FA Cup. Despite the sudden dismissal of FA Cup-winning player-manager
Ruud Gullit, Chelsea won the League Cup and European Cup Winners Cup under new player-manager
Gianluca Vialli. The gap between the Premier League and Division One of
the Football League was highlighted at the end of 1997–98 when all three newly promoted teams were relegated.
Crystal Palace was confined to the bottom place in the final table, having won just two home games all season and losing most of their games in the second half of the campaign.
Barnsley's first season in the top division ended in relegation, although they did reach the
FA Cup quarter finals and knocked out Manchester United in the Fifth Round.
Bolton Wanderers went down on goal difference, with 17th place being occupied by Everton: despite preserving top-flight football for the 45th season running,
Howard Kendall quit as manager at
Goodison Park after his third spell in charge. Another mark of the gap was that the three relegated teams in the previous season took the top three places in the
1997–98 Football League. Had
Sunderland not lost the play-off final to
Charlton Athletic on a penalty shootout, the 20 teams from the
1998–99 Premier League would have been exactly the same as those in the
1996–97 Premier League. ==Teams==