While the Gold, Silver, and Bronze Awards recognise the best programmes of the 2025/26 Premier League season, the final rankings only tell part of the story.
This year’s reviews revealed a number of wider trends: clubs producing remarkable improvements, newly promoted sides immediately setting new standards, and the continuing importance of original writing in an increasingly digital age.
Here are some of the most notable stories from the season.
Crystal Palace’s Rise Continues
Few clubs can point to a more impressive transformation in their matchday programme over recent seasons than Crystal Palace.
Once a publication that struggled to compete with the Premier League’s strongest offerings, the Palace programme has steadily developed into one of the division’s most complete packages. This season’s issue continued that upward trajectory, combining excellent design work with a strong selection of historical features, impressive visitors’ coverage, and comprehensive information from across the club.
The result was a place among the season’s leading group and further evidence that sustained investment in editorial quality can transform a programme.
Sunderland Make an Immediate Impact
Returning to the Premier League after almost a decade away, Sunderland produced one of the biggest surprises of the season.
Red & White immediately established itself as one of the most distinctive programmes in the league, with the outstanding visitors’ section standing out as one of the best examples of its kind.
The contribution of club historian Rob Mason was particularly noteworthy. His carefully researched features demonstrated that opposition coverage can be much more than a collection of statistics and player profiles; it can become an engaging piece of football writing in its own right.
For a club experiencing its first Premier League programme season since 2016/17, Sunderland’s achievement was especially impressive.
Tottenham’s Step Forward
One of the most noticeable improvements from the 2025/26 season came at Tottenham Hotspur.
The introduction of several new historical features significantly strengthened the programme’s editorial offering. Features such as Wall to Wall, Spurs Unseen, and That Reminds Me added a greater sense of heritage and helped create a more balanced publication.
Combined with improvements in the consistency of the design and layout, the changes helped move the programme into the upper tier of Premier League publications.
The Importance of Ambition
Perhaps the most revealing contrast from this season’s awards was between programmes that embraced editorial ambition and those that took a more limited approach.
The strongest issues were not necessarily the largest or the most expensive. Instead, they were the publications that recognised the unique role a matchday programme can still play.
Supporters can find team news, statistics, and breaking stories online within seconds. What remains special about the programme is its ability to preserve memories: the stories of former players, the recollections of supporters, the history of a club, and the context surrounding a particular match.
The clubs that invested in these areas were consistently rewarded in the final rankings.
Looking Ahead
The 2025/26 season has shown that the matchday programme remains a thriving part of football culture.
While some clubs have reduced the depth of their offering, others continue to innovate and invest in thoughtful editorial content. The best programmes are no longer simply pre-match guides; they are historical records, collector’s items, and a permanent snapshot of a football club at a particular moment in time.
As we look ahead to next season’s awards, the challenge for clubs is clear: produce something that supporters will still want to read long after the final whistle has blown.