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Punting Canary

Time for a dose of reality - Relegation expectations

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The panic, fear and disappointment of a lack of transfers on this forum

astounds me.  Its time to look at some facts rather than peoples

cock-eyed polarised views of the situation.  Firstly history now

suggests that the magic mark for staying up is 37 and not 40 points as

often touted around, and this year might be even lower.  If you don''t

believe me the analysis is here.http://news.sportingsolutions.com/2013/01/29/the-great-escapes/This

article is mainly based on QPRs plight but has some very relavent

points regarding Norwich''s position and what is needed to avoid

relegation.With this in mind and given we have 27 points already

it is my suggestion that we need 10 points from the remaining 14 games

at an average of 0.71 points per game.  Given that so far this season we

have averaged 1.125 pts per game this should be very achievable given

the the squad has not been weakened by any new additions.  One other

point to examine as in the remaining 14 games we have 5 home games

against teams in the bottom half of the table where the points

expectation would be higher than say away trips to the top 4.Indeed

we would have to perform at a level similar to the way QPR have

performed from the beginning of this season (0.66pts per game) to even

think of going down.Whilst this is not impossible the 24 games

we have played this season do give a fair indication of Norwich''s level

of performance and in my opinion we would have to underperform massively

from here on in to get relegated.On this basis I and the

bookmakers rate our chances of getting relegated at about 13%.  At the

start of the season that expection was approximately 50%.  Indeed the

following article gives details about how in bookmakers eyes we have

outperformed their expectations this season.http://media.sportingindex.com/ZmsMedia/Sporting%20Solutions/Documents/press_articles/Sporting%20Solutions%20-%20Premier%20League%20-%20The%20Season%20So%20Far.pdfWith

this in mind it surely makes financial sense not to break the bank/wage

structure to chase after players in this transfer window who would

command much more in the January transfer window than in the summer.  As

for the managers dealings in the transfer market I think we can have a

little more faith in Chris Hughton to do the right thing.  Bassong (POTS

imo), Whitaker, Garrido, and to a lesser extent Turner have all proved

shrewd purchases and have strengthened the defence.  He knows we need a

striker or two but why pay over the odds now when we can hopefully

reassess in an easier market in the Summer, in deals that are better for

the Club in the long term.Mr McNally is a hard nosed

businessman, and what this Club has needed since Gordon Bennett left. 

He is not everyones cup of tea and we have to pay more now for our

Premier League football, but it is still a Club that is well run and

that fans voices can be heard by the board.  Other fans would love to

have the Club that we have, and admire the way it is run, and we are in

so much better shape than we were three years ago when Mr Doncaster

left.OTBC

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Many thanks for that analysis. A touch of calm rationality about the place is most welcome.

Personally I''d put our chances of relegation around 5%; just my opinion of course.

Bassong getting crocked is my biggest fear.

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I think its unlikely that we will get relegated.     I am struggling to know what the true team is - as our season has so far had three distinct periods,   2 where the points per game is far below the 0.66 per game highlighted as a doomsday scenario and one where the performance was at champions league/european level.

 

We need to normalise a little (whatever that it) and play to our potential more often.    It is on that basis,and the coming home fixture (we need oour strongest teams for those fixture - Bassong in cotton wool!) ,  combined with too many clubs below us being in turmoil that I am confident we will be safely avoid relegation - although it will be a roller coaster journey!

 

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Excellent post Sir. Well constructed, well researched, well thought out. Unfortunately the Muppets won''t get past the first 3 lines. 😁

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PC - What can one say - superbly put.

 

And I fully agree with your sentiments about the board - forgive me for pasting in what I have written elsewhere:

"Thank goodness we now have a professional board and management team at the helm - not prepared to be pressurised, nor bullied and to have the confidence to keep their own counsel and not reveal any dealings until completed.

I like our current set up, I have confidence in our current set up, and I believe we will have many happy and successful years with our current set up."

 




 

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An excellent post.

 

For me the spine of our best team this season has been Ruddy, Bassong, Tettey, Holt.  These are the players that make the difference.  The question is whether they stay fit, and could we cope without them ?

 

Ruddy is effectively out for the rest of the season.  With Bunn and Camp competing for the spot now, I think we have good enough cover.  Not as good as Ruddy, but good enough to prevent this being a weakness like when Gunn was injured.

 

Bassong is the big concern.  If he is crocked, we could struggle.

 

Tettey I''m hoping is over his injury and the fatigue that was evident in the Liverpool gain.  Again, if he was out for a long period, it would worry me, but I don''t think he''s as key as Bassong.

For Holt, I''m hoping Becchio will give us "good enough" cover (or perhaps better than that) - i.e. a striker who can come in and make you think he''s a reasonable chance of getting a goal or two when he starts, unlike Kane, Morison and Jackson.

 

So if Basso stays fit I am confident we''ll be ok.  I''d agree that the risk is about 5%.  Let''s hope we can go to Man C on the final day with our safety assured a few weeks before, and stop them winning the title!

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[quote user="Brighton Yellow"]This is literally the best post I have read on here in about 2 years.[/quote]

 

....and to discover why it hasn''t made the "top post" spot, one only has to look at the plethora of negative subject headings on the forum to see why! It''s not negative, and therefore must be dismissed by the doom-mongers!

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I agree with the OP 100%. People are basing their relegation fears around the last few games and not the entire season. Had we had our unbeaten run just now instead of int he middle of two dips I think far fewer would be predicting relegation now. Some people just react to very recent history instead of looking at the bigger picture. We have got into a very decent position nearly two thirds of the way through the season without the addition of a multi-million pound striker.

Like others, though, I do worry about how we might cope if Bassong is injured for any length of time. Hopefully R Martin could suffice. I think Whittaker made an appreciable difference too. I hope he is ready for action again soon.

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Something to add to that:In the 17 seasons since the Prem went to 20 teams, 51 teams have been relegated, and of them, only 3 had 27 or more points after 24 games, thats a bit under 6%. Those teams were: 2010/2011: Blackpool - 39 points1999/2000: Wimbledon - 33 points1996/1997: Sunderland - 40 pointsGiven that 2 of those teams went down with extraordinarily large points totals, and this season it looks like you should be able to stay up with a much lower total, you''d have to say that the odds are potentially even lower than 6%.

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Makes my 5% guesstimate about right then!

Would be nice to be 0% though. But there''s only 5 or 6 clubs you could say that about.

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Indeed an interesting take on some of the figures but I dont find it quite so reassuring maybe as others. You say that we would need a colapse in form equal to QPR''s haul of 0.66pts per game earlier in the season to find ourselves in trouble, well the form table looking at the last 8 games has us averaging 0.625pts per game (as opposed to QPR''s 1.125pts per game).

When looking at the last 8 games and supposing this trend continues for the last 14 games we will be overtaken by Reading, Southampton, and Newcastle. The only 3 teams that would finish below us would be

norwich - 35.75pts

QPR - 31.75pts

Wigan - 28.75pts

Villa - 28.75pts

so when you factor in the fact that QPR have just added some serious quality to their team in January and will have done so in the expectation of imporving their pts per game it looks as like it could come right down to the wire.

 

im not saying this is what will happen, merely interpreting the stats mentioned and applying more recent data (last 8 games form)

 

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An excellent post and the analysis from Sporting Solutions pretty much backs up what I said just after Xmas. 37 points should stay up this season and we are well on course for 43-44 points.I predict that there will be at least four teams with less than 40 points and more than likely 5 teams below that level.I''m still going for QPR and Reading as down with Villa, Southampton and Wigan in a toss up for the last spot. Looking at my pre-season predictions I see I have us losing 2-1 tomorrow. I hope to be proved wrong there.

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I agree with your point Son of a Gunn but one thing just to keep in mind in using a sample size as small as 8 you get a fair amount of deviation from the "average" or mean performance depending on who you are playing.  In those 8 games Norwich have played Spurs, Man City, Liverpool, and Chelsea.  The points expectations in those games is obviously lower than say playing the run of games than Norwich have between now and the Swansea game.  Even though you get surprises (in Norwich''s case Man Utd, and Arsenal this year) point expectations over the course of a season tend to work out.  Taking this weekends boomakers odds as a basis for the QPR game (QPR Evens (50%), Draw 5-2 (28%), Norwich 7-2 (22%) if the odds were correct if you played the game 100 times Norwich point expectation from the game would be 0.94pts (0.28 x 1pt + 0.22 x 3pt).This compares to a point expectation of 1.42pts for the Fulham home game if you multiply the odds out so you can see what a huge difference a tricky run of fixtures can have particularly away from home against the top 4.  The point expectation against the likes of Man Utd away on current form is 0.35pts.So a tricky run of fixtures in the Premier League can have a short team effect positively or negatively on the expectation but over the course of a season the points expectation tends to regress to the mean.On a seperate note this in my opinion was something Paul Lambert was very aware of when managing in League 1, and the Championship where points expectations had much less variance as the quality of the opposition was not as high, and more closely matched.  I believe that he had the opinion with this in mind that all out attack was the way forward.  Where on paper in games where  are more closely matched there is an argument for trying to press for a win more often as you only need to win one of the 3 games to have the same effect as drawing all 3.  If you try this in the Premiership (which might be where he is getting found out) where the teams are not as evenly matched you are likely to get found out as the point expectation is much more highly stacked in favour of the team with much more class. 

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Agree entirely with the OP.I look at it this way - another 3 wins (plus a couple of draws) should be enough. Looking at the remaining fixtures, I can certainly see 3 or 4 winnable home games there, and that''s without factoring in the possibility of a surprise, out of the blue victory like Spurs away last April.From where we are now, I see a total of 42 or 43 points. Job done.[:D]

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With respect the OP misses the main point of this transfer window. No-one seriously thinks it is probable we will get relegated. But it is possible, and not just a theoretical possibility. It could happen. Because of that the directors (who have always stressed how important staying up this season is financially) made available around £10m or so to strengthen the squad to improve our chances. The result, depending on how much we paid Leeds for Becchio, was that we spent perhaps one-twentieth or even less of what was available.

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There is a mathematical argument Purple that we should have broken the bank for Hooper.  The chances of us getting relegated are between 10-13%.  Indeed given this present chance if it was considered, that Hooper for arguments sake, would have made the difference to definitely keep us up then there is a mathematical argument for paying around £4 million over the "correct" price for him given that there is about a £40m difference between us staying up and getting relegated in the first year alone (10% x £40m=£4m).Much depends on what % effect you think Hooper or similar might have had as to how much you should pay over the odds.In their wisdom whether right or wrong the board have obviously considered it prudent in the long term in their opinion for the benefit of the club that the money can be spent more wisely further down the line.  Time will tell.

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[quote user="Punting Canary"]There is a mathematical argument Purple that we should have broken the bank for Hooper.  The chances of us getting relegated are between 10-13%.  Indeed given this present chance if it was considered, that Hooper for arguments sake, would have made the difference to definitely keep us up then there is a mathematical argument for paying around £4 million over the "correct" price for him given that there is about a £40m difference between us staying up and getting relegated in the first year alone (10% x £40m=£4m).

Much depends on what % effect you think Hooper or similar might have had as to how much you should pay over the odds.

In their wisdom whether right or wrong the board have obviously considered it prudent in the long term in their opinion for the benefit of the club that the money can be spent more wisely further down the line.  Time will tell.
[/quote]

 

From one PC to another (!) I am not fixated with Hooper at all. My point is simpler than that, amd simpler than your mathematical calculations. It is that the board made available what by our standards was a great deal of money because of the danger of relegation, and it didn''t get spent. I cannot believe Hooper was the only player out there who was worth buying.

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[quote user="ricardo"]An excellent post and the analysis from Sporting Solutions pretty much backs up what I said just after Xmas. 37 points should stay up this season and we are well on course for 43-44 points.I predict that there will be at least four teams with less than 40 points and more than likely 5 teams below that level.I''m still going for QPR and Reading as down with Villa, Southampton and Wigan in a toss up for the last spot. Looking at my pre-season predictions I see I have us losing 2-1 tomorrow. I hope to be proved wrong there.[/quote]

The question will be whether all of the signings start. I can see Samba being on the bench having not had much time with the team.

It''s not a position you would necessarily want to throw someone completely new into.

On the flip side, if they do we really need to get in amongst them from the off and put it up them (Dad''s army reference). If we prevent them from settling that might expose the lack of knowing each other in terms of communication etc. Put them on the ropes and I think they are as still as brittle as they once were.

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Excellent post and I agree almost entirely. We now have a well run '' tight ship '' which is a million miles from the mess the current Chief Exec inherited. I doubt anyone can seriously suggest things aren''t a lot better than they were only three years ago.Only point I would question is regarding the Club taking notice of fans opinions. With perhaps the exception of the backlash over the overpriced Spurs League Cup tickets which bearing in mind the low attendance, Mr McNally could do little else other than hold his hands up and say, " Sorry ", I don''t think NCFC are particularly interested in what '' Joe Public '' has to say.If the way they''ve distanced themselves from supporters groups is any indication anyway.

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Excellent post. I still feel Russell Martin will do an adequate job in central defence if needed. He is a good organiser and strong in the air and always gives 100%. Would accept he is now on the slow side for a fullback.

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