Coventry, Ipswich and Hull: what awaits the Premier League’s new arrivals

Coventry City, Ipswich Town and Hull City are the three sides making the step up to the Premier League this season, each returning to the top flight after very different spells away. For fans wanting to check Premier League betting odds ahead of the new campaign, all three promoted clubs will likely start as outsiders for survival.

The new campaign begins on August 22, a week later than usual because of this summer’s World Cup, giving all three a little extra time to prepare. Getting there was one challenge. Staying there is another altogether.

History is not kind to newly promoted sides. Last season followed the two previous seasons in which all three promoted sides went down. However, the 2025/26 season offered proof that the trend can be broken. Of the three promoted teams, Burnley were the only one of the trio relegated. Sunderland finished seventh to qualify for the Europa League, and Leeds finished 14th, both comfortably clear of trouble, giving Coventry, Ipswich, and Hull recent evidence that survival is possible.

Coventry City

Coventry’s return ends a 25-year absence from the top flight, with their last Premier League campaign coming back in 2001. Frank Lampard has been the man to finally close that gap, having taken charge in November 2024 with the club sitting 17th in the Championship. Last season, he was named the EFL’s Championship Manager of the Season, and he has since signed a new contract at the Coventry Building Society Arena, keeping him at the club until 2029.

Unlike their fellow promoted sides, none of Coventry’s current squad has significant recent experience of the Premier League, which makes the summer transfer window especially important. How quickly Lampard can add players capable of matching the physicality and pace of the division may decide whether this stay lasts beyond a single season.

Ipswich Town

Ipswich know exactly what is coming. The club were relegated from the Premier League as recently as the 2024-25 season, finishing second-bottom with 22 points. Their best-ever top-flight finish remains fifth, achieved back in 2000-01.

Kieran McKenna, who led the club up and down between the Championship and Premier League over the past three seasons, left Portman Road shortly after this year’s promotion was secured. Gary O’Neil has since been appointed in his place, arriving from Strasbourg with previous Premier League experience at Bournemouth and Wolves. Much of the Ipswich squad already knows the demands of the division, even if the man picking the team does not yet.

Hull City

Hull’s  were last in the Premier League in 2016-17, when they finished 18th and were relegated after just one season back among the elite. Fans looking ahead to the new season can already find football odds on how the newly promoted sides might fare. 

Their highest finish in the competition came in 2013-14, when they placed 16th, and that same season also produced the biggest occasion in the club’s history, an FA Cup final appearance against Arsenal at Wembley.

Hull achieved promotion through the play-offs, seeing off Millwall in the semi-final and Middlesbrough in the final, despite finishing sixth in the league, claiming the last remaining play-off place on the final day of the season.

Head coach Sergej Jakirovic takes charge of a squad built largely for Championship football, with far less recent exposure to the top flight than Ipswich. That gap in experience, both for the players and the head coach, is likely to make an already difficult return even harder.