PSL Fixture Difficulty
Who has the toughest (and easiest) starts to the 2025/26 season?
The 30th season of the PSL is two games in, so we’re looking at the schedule to see which teams have the toughest and easiest starts to the campaign. Whatever their ambitions for the season, all teams will be looking to get off to a strong start. From title challengers to CAF contenders, all the way to teams aiming for the Top8 or simply securing safety, the importance of a strong start applies to all 16 teams.
Four teams (Durban City, Kaizer Chiefs, Marumo Gallants and Sekhukhune) have opened with maximum points from their two opening games, while three teams (Orlando Pirates, Richards Bay and TS Galaxy) have started with zero points from six. But which of these teams can point to the fixture calendar for “context”?
Importance of a good start for title-winning & safety
Only two PSL teams have won the title after losing their first game of the season (1996/97 Manning Rangers and 2007/08 SuperSport United). Of the 29 previous PSL champions, 22 have started the season with a win (76% of title winners). However, no team has ever won the title after losing its first two games of the season.
At the other end of the table, 160 teams have won their opening game of a PSL season, and just 4/160 of them have finished bottom of the table in that campaign (2012/13 Black Leopards, 2016/17 Highlands, 2019/20 Polokwane and 2021/22 Baroka). That’s a 98% safety rate if you win the opener. Moreover, 53 teams have won their first two games of the season, and only one has ended up at the bottom of the table (2019/20 Polokwane City), also a 98% survival rate.
Who has a tough start?
We used the Opta Power Rankings to measure the ease and difficulty of each team’s opening schedule. The Opta Power Ranking is a global system that assigns a score to domestic football teams on a scale of 0 to 100, with higher scores representing stronger teams. For instance, Liverpool is rated 100, making it the best club in the world. Al Ahly is rated 83.5, ranked 108th globally and first in Africa. Sundowns, with a rating of 82, are the best team in South Africa and the 4th best on the continent etc.
Based on these, Stellenbosch have been given the toughest start in the league of any club. To face all four trophy winners from last season in the first month of football - Chiefs (Nedbank Cup), Magesi (Carling Knockout), Pirates (MTN8) and Sundowns (league) is a tough hand. They’ve already dropped points in the first few games, and could find themselves in the bottom half of the table by the end of Game 5.
Chippa United, Magesi and Kaizer Chiefs are the other teams with tricky starts, with their average opponent rating above 73. One commonality they all share is facing Sundowns in the first five games, and either Stellies or Pirates as well. Chiefs will be happy with six points from six against sides that finished in the Top8 last season (even though they didn’t). A return of 10+ points from the opening five games is within reach, something Chiefs have only done once in the last eight campaigns. The last time they did so, they went on a title race that came short only on the last day (2020).
Who has an “easy” start?
Sundowns and Pirates have mild starts to the season (neither “easy” nor hard), so there may be some concern within the Bucs’ camp that they are yet to pick up a point before fixtures get harder. Likewise, TS Galaxy will be concerned by their start - they are seen as having the kindest start to the season based on opponent strength (an average of 68.7 in the Opta rankings with two new sides in their opening roster). Golden Arrows, Polokwane City and Siwelele also have kind starts to the season, and will be keen to build some momentum early on. Last season, these rankings had SuperSport as having the toughest start after 5 games. Two wins in five were the start of a tough season, in which they ended just one goal away from the playoffs.
We’ll tweak this as the season goes, tracking which teams have a tough Q2 or month after the international break, etc.