With the busy festive fixture feast over and done with, ahead of an FA Cup weekend, it's time to check in with the Predictions Table. Big Al's title is under threat! He's in danger of doing a Man City! He's below Gaffer purely for the manufactured drama, as there's currently nothing to separate them. Stretchy establishes a one-point lead at the top of the table following a perfect 2-2 score prediction in the Fulham match. I've leapt up to second after a string of correct result guesses. Evesham rounds off the top three, dropping down from the top spot from when we last checked in. Spanish holds the mid-table ahead of this season's Mr Positivity, Yorkie and San Diego - yes, we've got two of them. Maybe an upturn in form for the second half of the season will see a jump up the table? Towards the bottom of the table are the part-time predictors. Mike could climb the table if he gets in a few more predictions. Warky and Royston will probably bow out with the 100% record. Ristac - a new entry - currently foots the table. A reminder that it's two points for a correct result (win, draw, or lose) and five points for a correct scoreline. The FA Cup predictions - if we do have a cup run - don't count towards the totals. Unless it's requested by popular demand.
Great effort Nuggets, and well done Stretchy. Good to see the old Gaffer holding his own! Sorry to see Warky drop off in more ways than one.
Out of interest I am wondering if our Statitician, numbers supremo can have a go at predicting our final place in the Prem, based on our form after 20 games? Or is that tempting fate!
Well, if we persist with our current points-per-game record, we'd finish the season on 31 points (rounding up from 30.3, to be optimistic). That points total is typically not good enough to avoid relegation. Over the last 24 odd seasons this millennium, 31 points would've been enough to keep us up in only three seasons (2009/10, 2020/21, and last season's 2023/24). Last season is worth focusing on because Luton got relegated at 18th with a points total of only 26 points. That's the lowest points total for a 18th place team since the Premier League went to 20 teams.
5 points out of our first 10 games (30 possible points). 11 points out of our most recent 10 games (30 possible points again). If we take the 11-point form over our remaining 18 games, we'd put another 20 points on the board. That would result in us finishing on 36 points and would've been good enough to keep us up in the last eight Premier League seasons.
Thanks again oh stats supremo! I am sure we can be more optimistic of getting those points once we have finished a good window shopping and getting several key players back.
