Looks like it's 2 from 4 for automatic promotion.

What do you reckon will be enough points to take at least second place?

I'll go fir 85 (which in effect means 11 more wins from 20 games)

92 pts minimum

more than 85

mdd2 wrote: ↑

Sun Jan 05, 2025 7:28 pm

92 pts minimum

Really...with 4 teams going at it and each taking points off each other (at times) I suspect a lower number of points might be needed this season.

Either way, mid-80s or low 90s required, I think we're likely to get enough....esp if we can beat 2 - or maybe all - of the other 3 up there with us.

I think it indicates the top 4 (and I possibly rather arrogantly think Sunderland, despite playing great footy, may just drop off) are a fair way ahead of the rest, so *more* points will be needed, as more points are being taken from the rest of the league.

Hopefully things do slow down a bit, and it's less.

I'll go 93 points needed to clear 3rd, i.e. finish second though.

Leeds
Burnley
Sheff
Sunlan

UTC

I think it’s 2 from 3 with Sunderland being a clear 4th place around 5-10 points behind the automatic places but well clear of the chasing play off pack.

The difference between 3rd and 1st won’t be a lot I don’t think and I think the automatic places for us will boil down to if we can find a way to break teams down that turn up to our place for a point.

Although maintaining an average of two points per game would be good, I think it would be a first in the history of the Championship to need 92 points, as last season was the highest third place points total with 90 points, i.e., Leeds.

With our squad depth and assuming we're able to use the window to good effect we look capable of maintaining our 2:1 points ratio which would surely see us over the line

One other team - probably Leeds - are capable of matching that but two of the current top four are likely to fall just short

If we are still in the automatic places come the end of January - given the track record of our head coach and a number of our senior players we should be in an extremely strong position

Nobody has ever reached 92pts and not been automatically promoted. I think that’s within our grasp.

Oddly we all know that Leeds have a tendency to implode toward the end although this year might be different. My main question about how good they may be is how long is it since they actually had a difficult game? While we have been playing Sheff Utd and Boro and Watford they have been playing at home to Oxford and had games v Hull and Derby. The only ‘hard’ game was Rovers at home and they drew.
Anyway auto promotion may need 90 points. Last time we were here Sheff Utd finished second on 91/92 points. Might not need that much because we are all probably gonna take points off each other. I’m going to go for us as Champions and possibly Sheff Utd second. Leeds may fall away and strangely, as someone else has pointed out, I’m not convinced by Sunderland at all. They only beat us 1-0 when we had no team to speak of and are a little bit lacking in consistency. I do however think we already have the top four in place, we just don’t know in which order.

GrahamBranchsPerm wrote: ↑

Sun Jan 05, 2025 8:38 pm

I think it indicates the top 4 (and I possibly rather arrogantly think Sunderland, despite playing great footy, may just drop off) are a fair way ahead of the rest, so *more* points will be needed, as more points are being taken from the rest of the league.

Hopefully things do slow down a bit, and it's less.

I'll go 93 points needed to clear 3rd, i.e. finish second though.

Leeds
Burnley
Sheff
Sunlan

UTC

You may be right with the points, but Burnley will finish 1st with Leeds 2nd.

Sunderland have a few hard away games, us, Boro, West Brom, Sheff Wed, Norwich and Leeds. Leeds have us, Sheff Utd and Boro away. Quite a few points could be dropped in those matches. Sheff Utd have a reasonable run in, Leeds and Boro at home and Sheff Wed away. There are going to be quite a few points dropped in those games so we need to make sure we come out the right side in our games and make sure we don't lose them.

The key to us being promoted is, as has been said, us finding a way to break teams down at home.

If we carry on picking up draws against the lesser teams, we’ll miss out.

This for me is why the January window is so important - we need someone who can unlock the defences of the teams that come and park the bus (and Parker perhaps needs to take the handbrake off occasionally).

It isn't just the lesser teams we have to worry about at home.

Better sides in the division will have seen how inferior teams have had success against us, and will have equally seen how coming and opening up went for Watford. There seems to be an assumption the top teams will come and give us more of a football match but I don't think that's a given at all.

I suspect we'll see better teams come with a game plan to sit tight but counter more effectively than the lesser sides have - much as we have at Leeds and Sheffield Utd etc.. That makes it all the more important we discover a cutting edge when we dominate territory.

I think the sensible assumption is we'll need 92 points to get promoted and to achieve that consistency over a season we do need more edge at home.

claretspice wrote: ↑

Mon Jan 06, 2025 9:44 am

It isn't just the lesser teams we have to worry about at home.

Better sides in the division will have seen how inferior teams have had success against us, and will have equally seen how coming and opening up went for Watford. There seems to be an assumption the top teams will come and give us more of a football match but I don't think that's a given at all.

I suspect we'll see better teams come with a game plan to sit tight but counter more effectively than the lesser sides have - much as we have at Leeds and Sheffield Utd etc.. That makes it all the more important we discover a cutting edge when we dominate territory.

I think the sensible assumption is we'll need 92 points to get promoted and to achieve that consistency over a season we do need more edge at home.

Yes, fair point regarding better teams adopting a similar approach.

It’s resolving that cutting edge issue that’s the biggest area of focus for me, in this window. Which position(s) to achieve this, I’m not 100% sure.

We have options in the 10 (particularly if Ramsey comes back in and / or we utilise Flemming in there) but up to press, it’s an area that I think we have struggled, alongside the left wing.

Looking at the way Leeds have crumbled in their last two games, I'm personally of the opinion they won't get an automatic. I think it'll be;

Sheff U
Burnley
Boro
Sunderland
Leeds
WBA

We are more or less unstoppable away. We have been next to useless at home at breaking down a low block since the end of Summer. The number of chances we create at home is embarrassing.

Parker plays it way too safe at home. He might get-away with it. Who knows?

It will be tough but the solid defences go a long way. At Bramall Lane on Boxing Day with Boro and Rovers away to come we were staring at being possibly 10+ behind Blades and Leeds. Now we are level, more or less. Even if we had drawn Blades and Rovers that would have been a big gap.

So it shows how teams can fall away.

I tend to agree that 92 may be needed. Now we have our tricky away games all gone, that is very possible. OK, we have the big three at home to come but most will be mid table sides for whom single points won’t be enough and by the end of the season many will down tools. I expect us to win our fair share. Against the big three, there has to be a real chance of turning them over at home under the lights at night - and what a difference that could make to the table.

Here are some suggestions to try harder to score at home.

A cb to run straight at the opposition at pace, with Cullen covering. Things happen when you do.

Full backs to overlap much more and get bye- line crosses in.

Play 2 up top.

Stop Trafford wasting time.

If Kolo plays he has to be from the left.

As Sean Dyche used to say, this team is nowhere near the finished article but we are top of the form table and we have beaten both Leeds and Sheffield United away. We're definitely setting down markers and getting points in the big pressure games.

Stan used to split the season into blocks of 6 games. If we ignore the first two games which gave us 6 points we can split the rest into blocks of 6.
The points totals have been 11, 6, 14 and 14 respectively.

I can't remember who it was but someone said clean sheets win you titles and we're already on 17 for the season. We conceded 4 goals in our first 6 games but just 5 goals in the last 20, 3 goals conceded in the last 12 games.

We scored 9 in our first two games then in blocks of 6 ,5, 3, 7 and 7. Parker has been clear on wanting us to score more, that's why he brought Barnes back, that's why he's still looking for attacking options according to his interview with sky. Clearly Bashir Humphreys has been working on his crosses to add an additional threat which has paid dividends twice.

28 points for the last 12 games. Keep that form up and we end on 98 points. If we hit a difficult patch like we did at the end of October and early November we could still finish on 91 points with the same form as the last 20 games. In reality we are likely to fall somewhere between the two.

The style might be less attractive than under Kompany but it's as relentless as under Dyche.

Thanks for all that info dibradio!

I've also just discovered that every team achieving 90 points (or more) has ALWAYS been automatically promoted......apart from DL last season who managed to get 90 points and not go up (chortle)

My 85 points suggestion might well be a little low as the average for coming second is rising (and is around 89 points for the last 10 seasons, apparently) but it does look likely that 12 more wins plus the odd draw will be enough to go up from the last 20 games.

I've done some " back of a fag packet " calculations ... As " Goddy " points out, with the exception of Leeds last season, every team that's acquired 90 points over the last 20 years has gone up automatically. By contrast, in 2007-08, Stoke finished runners-up with 79 points, but 76 would have been enough to do it. The average points required over the last 20 seasons is a tad over 84, that is to finish one point above the 3rd place team ...

The maxim that 92 points, ie 2 points a game, will almost always see you promoted, is there for a reason it seems ....

So my 93 / 94 looks too high based on history.

But 92 is the run rate as things stand - see us and Sheff (and that's ignoring Sheff's 2 point deduction). Leeds are marginally above.

Guess it generally drops second half of the season though as the lower placed teams get more desperate at the end and start plucking out crazy results?

UTC

Interesting stat on the Sunderland board (half way down)
https://www.readytogo.net/smb/threads/3 ... 320/page-5

Suggests there have been more draws this season than last

I think 90 /91 points could be enough for
automatic promotion.

I think 90 /91 points could be enough for
automatic promotion.

ClaretOfMancunia wrote: ↑

Mon Jan 06, 2025 10:19 am

Looking at the way Leeds have crumbled in their last two games, I'm personally of the opinion they won't get an automatic. I think it'll be;

Sheff U
Burnley
Boro
Sunderland
Leeds
WBA

1 Burnley
2 Leeds
3 Sheff U
4 Sunderland

You'd have to say that it's pretty much impossible for any team outside of the top four spots to gain automatic promotion with the size of the gap

The higher points needed in recent years tallies with the parachute money / financial gap.

More teams now can hoover up most opposition, so there is a battle at the top between a few clubs, most of whom are wealthy by this division’s standards.

Given the gap is rising, the minimum points needed may too. 92, as I wrote on the thread above, feels like it may be needed.

Goddy wrote: ↑

Mon Jan 06, 2025 2:50 pm

Thanks for all that info dibradio!

I've also just discovered that every team achieving 90 points (or more) has ALWAYS been automatically promoted......apart from DL last season who managed to get 90 points and not go up (chortle)

My 85 points suggestion might well be a little low as the average for coming second is rising (and is around 89 points for the last 10 seasons, apparently) but it does look likely that 12 more wins plus the odd draw will be enough to go up from the last 20 games.

Not so. Sunderland got 90pts in 97/98 and failed to get promoted after that epic playoff final with charlton

Interesting to note that despite our lack of goals it's pretty much as you were regarding the teams competing for promotion

Surely we should be able to win all our remaining away games, and at least 4 or 5 home matches.

That would be more than enough.

We should all know by now there are no easy games, let alone believing we can win every away game.

Spijed wrote: ↑

Thu Jan 23, 2025 11:02 am

Surely we should be able to win all our remaining away games, and at least 4 or 5 home matches.

That would be more than enough.

It's the draws which is killing us, we are now 6 points behind where we were 2 years ago.

It's interesting that Leeds have only played one of the current top 6 twice, and that was 6th placed Rovers. They still have us, Sheff Utd, Sunderland, and Boro to come. February is their acid test. They have a mini-run of Watford (a), Sunderland (h), Sheff U (a) and WBA (h). Let's see where they are after these.

Same goes for Sheff Utd. They have 4 of the top 6 to come (us, Leeds, Boro and Rovers).
Sunderland have 3 (Boro, Leeds and Blackburn) to come.
We only have 2 (Leeds and Sheff U).

Hopefully we will benefit as they take points off each other, especially after this weekend as we will only have Sheff Utd left to play!

jlup1980 wrote: ↑

Thu Jan 23, 2025 12:00 pm

It's interesting that Leeds have only played one of the current top 6 twice, and that was 6th placed Rovers. They still have us, Sheff Utd, Sunderland, and Boro to come. February is their acid test. They have a mini-run of Watford (a), Sunderland (h), Sheff U (a) and WBA (h). Let's see where they are after these.

Same goes for Sheff Utd. They have 4 of the top 6 to come (us, Leeds, Boro and Rovers).
Sunderland have 3 (Boro, Leeds and Blackburn) to come.
We only have 2 (Leeds and Sheff U).

Hopefully we will benefit as they take points off each other, especially after this weekend as we will only have Sheff Utd left to play!

I wouldn't read too much into that. Good teams beat their rivals. Some good teams crumble under the pressure and start dropping silly points. Leeds could lose all 5 of those tough games, win every other game and still get promoted at a canter. So many ifs and buts. What we want to see is teams regularly dropping points away, like Leeds were doing before Christmas.

ChorltonCharlie wrote: ↑

Thu Jan 23, 2025 12:29 pm

I wouldn't read too much into that. Good teams beat their rivals. Some good teams crumble under the pressure and start dropping silly points. Leeds could lose all 5 of those tough games, win every other game and still get promoted at a canter. So many ifs and buts. What we want to see is teams regularly dropping points away, like Leeds were doing before Christmas.

I think its more the fact that we have more opportunities to benefit from others dropping points against each other, especially once we get past Monday night as nobody else in the top 6 plays each other this weekend. Clearly we have to keep matching everyone else in the meantime - which isn't easy at the moment as the top 4 are really pulling away - but when Leeds play Sunderland and Sheff U back to back, we play PNE and Sheff Weds. Win those games and we know we make points on someone around us... which could be the difference come May.