What will be much harder to find out is how many times a team has been on more than 2 points per game at this stage then not made it. I’ve said it a few times now on here. I fully believe if we get 90+ points we’ll be 2nd place. 84- we’ll be 3rd or 4th. Only 85-89 leaves me interested in Leeds or Ipswich results, and even then only in the final 3-5 games.
I asked the question on our board this morning, you only have one choice, promotion or win the fa cup, nothing to do with the likelihood of winning the cup. Been a long time since either of our clubs won a major trophy, would you take this over going back to the PL?
Yes 100% The only problem with having such a good season this year is that you might have to go back to the completely pointless PL.
The issue is complicated. If you are competitive, this is the most fun league to be in. Everyone has a chance. That said, the three relegated teams always have the best chance. That means you have two years at most before you are struggling to make a real impact. After that time, the decline makes this league feel less exciting. When we went down to League 1, the Championship was not fun to be in.
Yeah it is a bit of a hypocritical opinion on my part. The reason I like the Champ is because we can blow vast majority of the teams out of the water financially (for at least one season anyway) and that translates to where you finish in the league. I don’t like the PL because we aren’t one of the teams that can blow teams out of the water financially and that translates to where you finish in the league. You have to get promoted from the Champ in year 1 or 2 after relegation otherwise you become another ex PL side who falls into line with the other ones in the Champ financially and the league becomes basically like the PL again where you can’t compete and is basically pointless, albeit on a smaller scale. The ideal for me would be to go up and down every year so at least you have one good year every two. Rather than finishing 9th-17th in the PL every year.
The ideal scenario for me would be cup this year and promotion next. Not that I think we have any chance of winning it but it would be nice to. Think our game against Chelsea and yours against Liverpool in the Cup, will be a good indicator how far away we are from being competitive if we were to go up.
Earlier this season, I went back through and looked at all seasons in the second tier since it first became a 46-game season (which was in 1988-89). The most unlucky side to finish 3rd was Sunderland in 1997-98, who finished on 90 points (that being when they famously lost the play-off final on penalties after a 4-4 draw). I've just looked it up, and by my calculations they had 58 points after 30 games. So not even they were on two points per game at this stage. After Sunderland, it's Brighton in 2015-16 who finished on 89 points. And I calculate that they had 56 points after 30 games. There are two seasons where the side in second finished with more than 92 points (being Burnley in 2013-14 and Brighton in 2016-17, both of whom got 93 points). So I suppose technically a team could have finished with 92 points but not been automatically promoted in either of those two seasons - but it just so happened that in both of those seasons, the third placed team "only" managed 85 points instead.
Right, being level headed know, we beat Leeda in game 46 and beat Scousers at end of Feb, and it is happy days
I don't know what I find more incredible: that there is currently a five-way tie for 6th place (as the scores currently stand), or that Leicester are a whopping 30 points clear of them.
They'd have been boosted by last night's result for sure. Fail to beat West Brom on Friday and they'll go to Swansea on Saturday knowing a win takes them back above us
To be fair we have been awful. Hopefully we can get back into winning ways. You have had a fantastic run.it had to end some where.
Think it’s Leeds now, can see them doing a similar run to us and not dropping many points between now and the end of the season. Think they’ll end up 6+ ahead of us before we play them final day