Will Still OUT

To follow up on Libby's point, you have to back to 2016-17 to find the last relegated PL side who failed to finish in the top six the following season but has since been promoted back to the PL. And that was Sunderland, who needed eight seasons and a trip to L1 before they returned.

Every other side relegated from the PL in that time, including the two who went down with Sunderland, either finished in the top six the following season or have never yet returned to the top flight. The former has happened 15 times in that period (Boro, WBA, Fulham, Cardiff, Norwich, Watford, Bmouth, Sheff Utd, Fulham again, Burnley, Saints, Leeds, Leicester, Sheff Utd again, Burnley again), whilst the latter happened 8 times (Hull, Stoke, Swansea, Huddersfield, WBA, Norwich, Watford, Luton). Of course some of those 15 teams did lose in the play-offs.

Your best chance of promotion is the season immediately after relegation. And if you don't achieve that, then at the very least you want a top six finish - the bare minimum. Amongst those eight sides listed above, being involved in Championship relegation battles has been more frequent than Championship promotion battles.

 

Here's some hopium for us all:

In our promotion season of 11/12, the eventual champions, Reading, had;

12 points after 10 games (same as us now) (15th place)
27 points after 20 games (11th place)

Then of course they went and won 20 of the next 26 games. Pretty epic.

 

Danny Rohl set to be named Rangers manager today

 

I hope that's true so we can stop talking about Danny ****ing Rohl and Glasgow ****ing Rangers.

It's probably a bit much to expect us to stop talking about Russell ****ing Martin though!

 

There goes the possibility of a return to what looked to be plan A in the summer. Not that I expect the board to even consider parting with Still prior to the new year.