Unwanted records: Which Premier League teams hold the most dubious honours?

Crystal Palace
Crystal Palace are breaking all sorts of records...but for the wrong reasons

Crystal Palace set an 'unwanted record' with their 1-0 defeat to Southampton, becoming the first team in English top-flight history to start the season without a goal in their first five matches. With Manchester City, Manchester United and Chelsea to come in their next three matches, it could soon be no goals and seven defeats. Which other clubs hold their own unwanted record? 

Derby County - Lowest points total in Premier league history 

The most ignominious record of the lot. Derby were relegated with 11 points in 2007-8 in an exemplary case of a Championship team achieving promotion via the play-offs before their time. Billy Davies's squad was a hopelessly inadequate combination of Football League journeymen and has-beens such as Alan Stubbs, Robert Earnshaw and Robbie Savage. Their only victory was a 1-0 home win over Newcastle in September. Paul Jewell arrived after Davies's dismissal in November in a bid to delay the inevitable. Derby were relegated with six games still to play. 

Newcastle and West Ham - Most red cards in a match

One red card is careless, two in one game is reckless, but three in the space of 90 minutes is downright ridiculous. And who could forget Newcastle United pair Lee Bowyer and Kieron Dyer having a scrap in the centre circle with their team already down to 10 men and 3-0 down against Aston Villa in 2005. "I think it is a first for me, I have never witnessed that before," said the Newcastle manager Graeme Souness, himself no shrinking violet.

West Ham had previously set the bar against Leeds in 1995, when Ian Wright was sent off within 16 minutes for two bookable offences, before Shaka Hislop and Steve Lomas followed him for an early bath. Barnsley also finished with eight men against Liverpool in 1998, who needed a last-minute Steve McManaman goal to beat their beleaguered opponents. 

Kieron Dyer
Newcastle were already down to 10 men when Kieron Dyer and Lee Bowyer had a disagreement Credit: Getty Images

Tottenham Hotspur - Most goals conceded 

Tottenham have conceded 1,234 Premier League goals - more than any other team in the competition's history. Granted, only Spurs, Everton, Chelsea, Manchester United, Liverpool and Arsenal are top-flight mainstays since 1992. There was a reason Sir Alex Ferguson famously said 'lads, it's only Spurs' to his United side when trailing 3-0 at White Hart Lane in 2001. 

Chelsea - Most yellow cards

Arsene Wenger's Arsenal had quite the reputation for collecting cards when Martin Keown and Patrick Vieira were among their ranks, but no Premier League team has had more bookings that Chelsea with 1,547. Graeme Le Saux and Jon Obi-Mikel were responsible for plenty of them. 

Arsenal - Most shots on goal in a defeat 

West Ham's 1-0 win at the Emirates in their 2007 Great Escape under Alan Curbishley was the perfect encapsulation of Arsenal's early years in their new home. They peppered West Ham's goal with 35 shots, but Bobby Zamora's looping effort secured the perfect smash-and-grab three points. "It's difficult to say we had a bad game because we should have scored 10 and yet we lost the game," Arsene Wenger said post.  Arsenal are also the only team to let a four-goal lead slip, when they collapsed away at Newcastle in 2011.

Everton - Most own goals

Jamie Carragher often makes self-effacing references to the number of OGs he scored, but it is actually the blue lot from across Stanley Park who have scored the most own goals in Premier League history with 48. None of them as comical as Phil Neville finding his own net at Goodison Park against Manchester United, as his former team took a step closer to the title in 2007. 

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