THE RUN-IN

[PurpleCanary 6,386]

So, 40 points the safety mark again eh! Who''d have thought it.[;)]

OK, it might be 38 or 39 will be safe, but with very little to spare. So taking 40 points and with winnable games in red (and some games are in red for both  teams, because that is football!):

Reading will not get beyond the mid-30s. Nor will QPR, unless they win five out of the last eight. Southampton (34 points), with a nice last seven, will get past 40. That leaves:

Newcastle: 33 points. Fulham, Sunderland, Liverpool and Arsenal at home; WBA, West Ham and QPR away. Two very winnable home games and not a single difficult away game. Unless Europa League tiredness is a factor they will get at least two wins and some draws.

Stoke: 34 points. Villa, Man Utd, Norwich and Spurs at home; QPR, Sunderland and Southampton away. In awful form and not scoring (does that sound familiar?) but four winnable games there, and they draw a lot. At least one win and three draws should be not be beyond them. Pulis''s experience a bonus.

Norwich: 34 points. Swansea, Reading, Villa and WBA at home; Arsenal, Stoke and Man City away. Similar to Stoke. Lousy form and no goals. Three winnable homes but on current form that should - dispassionately - translate into one win only and a couple of draws. And one point from nine away at best. Which makes 39 or 40 points.

Wigan: 30 points. Spurs, Swansea and Villa at home; QPR, Man City, West Ham, WBA and Arsenal away. Probably the hardest club to call. They have done this before (such as last season) and seem to have luck going for them. They have just won the two they had to, and still have two very winnable home games left, but their next three are away, and they don''t have one obviously easy away game left. One away win and they can get to 40; no away wins and they won''t.

Sunderland: 31 points. Everton, Stoke and Southampton at home; Chelsea, Newcastle, Villa and Spurs away. There might be a new-manager bump (unless it''s Terry Connor) but there is only one game there on current form they might win. They could easily lose all four away. At best they could get one win and three draws, taking them to 37. Only if they win two will they have a chance of getting to 40.

Aston Villa: 30 points. Fulham, Sunderland and Chelsea at home; Stoke, Man Utd, Norwich and Wigan away. An optimistic view would be four winnable games, but they now need to win three. Two wins and two draws looks likelier, taking them to 38. Looming large is the the last game of their season, at Wigan. Both cannot win.

In short if Norwich win only one more game but get some draws they should stay up. Two wins would make it certain. Whether these calculations should have been necessary is another matter.

[Stig 0]

So many ifs. This will likely come down to the last week or two, I just hope Hughton his preparing them all for a nail biting scrap. Expect the worse?

[Graham Paddons Beard 2,791]

[quote user="PurpleCanary"]

So, 40 points the safety mark again eh! Who''d have thought it.[;)]

OK, it might be 38 or 39 will be safe, but with very little to spare. So taking 40 points and with winnable games in red (and some games are in red for both  teams, because that is football!):

Reading will not get beyond the mid-30s. Nor will QPR, unless they win five out of the last eight. Southampton (34 points), with a nice last seven, will get past 40. That leaves:

Newcastle: 33 points. Fulham, Sunderland, Liverpool and Arsenal at home; WBA, West Ham and QPR away. Two very winnable home games and not a single difficult away game. Unless Europa League tiredness is a factor they will get at least two wins and some draws.

Stoke: 34 points. Villa, Man Utd, Norwich and Spurs at home; QPR, Sunderland and Southampton away. In awful form and not scoring (does that sound familiar?) but four winnable games there, and they draw a lot. At least one win and three draws should be not be beyond them. Pulis''s experience a bonus.

Norwich: 34 points. Swansea, Reading, Villa and WBA at home; Arsenal, Stoke and Man City away. Similar to Stoke. Lousy form and no goals. Three winnable homes but on current form that should - dispassionately - translate into one win only and a couple of draws. And one point from nine away at best. Which makes 39 or 40 points.

Wigan: 30 points. Spurs, Swansea and Villa at home; QPR, Man City, West Ham, WBA and Arsenal away. Probably the hardest club to call. They have done this before (such as last season) and seem to have luck going for them. They have just won the two they had to, and still have two very winnable home games left, but their next three are away, and they don''t have one obviously easy away game left. One away win and they can get to 40; no away wins and they won''t.

Sunderland: 31 points. Everton, Stoke and Southampton at home; Chelsea, Newcastle, Villa and Spurs away. There might be a new-manager bump (unless it''s Terry Connor) but there is only one game there on current form they might win. They could easily lose all four away. At best they could get one win and three draws, taking them to 37. Only if they win two will they have a chance of getting to 40.

Aston Villa: 30 points. Fulham, Sunderland and Chelsea at home; Stoke, Man Utd, Norwich and Wigan away. An optimistic view would be four winnable games, but they now need to win three. Two wins and two draws looks likelier, taking them to 38. Looming large is the the last game of their season, at Wigan. Both cannot win.

In short if Norwich win only one more game but get some draws they should stay up. Two wins would make it certain. Whether these calculations should have been necessary is another matter.

[/quote]

 

A good deal of sensible thought Purple. Hard to argue. I do think, and have said so for many months that it will take more points to be safe this year than last owing to two important points. One is form, last year Blackburn, Bolton and Wolves, by now were on poor runs. This year Villa, Southampton and Wigan who a few weeks ago were in the bottom five along with Reading and QPR have won a few. The other is the fact that the teams are playing each other. After 31 games last year, the third bottom club had 28 points. Villa have 30 this year. 

 

So your point being where will the 5-6 pts come from? For each possible win, you can find an equal reason to predict a loss. And your final point,/question is well made. Why have we tried to limp over the line? Why have we not "chanced" a win in earlier matches - Newcastle, Fulham, Southampton to name but three? I think it was obvious that this was going to happen when you try to rely on draws. But that is another matter.

 

My question back would be this. With a "new manager" bounce, how much more likely would 6 points (and £100m) be? I cannot believe that the thought hasn''t crossed McNally''s mind. Lose to Swansea, and maybe a couple of million quid to , say, DiMatteo, to keep us up, would look like small beer against next years income.

 

[Joanna Grey 0]

"My question back would be this. With a "new manager" bounce, how much more likely would 6 points (and £100m) be? I cannot believe that the thought hasn''t crossed McNally''s mind. Lose to Swansea, and maybe a couple of million quid to , say, DiMatteo, to keep us up, would look like small beer against next years income."

FFS. We''ll see how Sunderland get on with that scenario shall we?

[Faded Jaded Semi Plastic SOB 1,223]

Personally I think we will need to get 40 points to be safe, maybe even 41. I have looked at the run in for us and our relegation rivals and I think it will be nip and tuck.....

[Aggy 944]

All fair enough conjecture Purple, means little until we see the actual results of those games though; it just takes one or two flukey and unexpected results and the whole prediction goes out of the window.

It is entirely in our own hands; pick up 6 or more points from the Reading, Villa, West Brom and Stoke games (and the other 3 of course, but I think those are the 4 we''re mostly likely to get anything from) and we''ll stay up.

I think our record against the sides around and below us is actually fairly promising for the remaining games. We have dropped a few points against such sides (draws at QPR, Villa, Reading, Southampton etc.) but we haven''t actually lost very many. And certainly draws against those sides will be a lot better for us than for them.

GPB - it''s a gamble. What if it backfires badly and we go down? At this moment in time, having just splashed a fair chunk of cash on Van Wolfswinkel I doubt very much that McNally has had any serious thoughts about sacking Hughton.

[PurpleCanary 6,386]

[quote user="Graham Paddons Beard"]

 

My question back would be this. With a "new manager" bounce, how much more likely would 6 points (and £100m) be? I cannot believe that the thought hasn''t crossed McNally''s mind. Lose to Swansea, and maybe a couple of million quid to , say, DiMatteo, to keep us up, would look like small beer against next years income.

 

[/quote]

 

GPB, Sunderland MIGHT get a small lift from a new manager but equally they might not. The bottom line is they are playing very badly at the moment and have a daunting set of away games. Based on  the run-in I think they are the likeliest third team to go down. As to us, I do not want Hughton sacked now. I regard our troubles as stemming as much from what didn''t hapen in January - which I assume was not Hughton''s fault - as from his apparent failings.

Even if we went down I would be happy for him to stay on, unless the board had decided from behind the scenes stuff that he wasn''t up to it, or if there was a clearly better alternative. Which Poyet might be.

[BOO 0]

It will require 40 points this season to stay up, our goal difference is worse than Newcastle, Stoke and crucially Sunderland who Inthink we will be fighting with for the third relegation spot, so we will probably need 41 points.

We have scored 5 PL goals this year !!

We have .81 points per game this year.

To achieve your predicted total Purple we will need to achieve .86 points per game.

So firstly where do you think the goals are going to come from?

Secondly what makes you think that our points to games ratio is going to improve from what we have done so far in 2013?

Thirdly this is going to be in a context of increased pressure from being in a dog fight, that will need leadership to pull us through, where is that going to come from now?

[Joanna Grey 0]

"Stoke: 34 points. Villa, Man Utd, Norwich and Spurs at home; QPR, Sunderland and Southampton away. In awful form and not scoring (does that sound familiar?) but four winnable games there, and they draw a lot. At least one win and three draws should be not be beyond them. Pulis''s experience a bonus."

Draw a lot? Two draws in their last ten is not "a lot". They have also lost seven of their last ten.

[Graham Paddons Beard 2,791]

[quote user="Aggy"]All fair enough conjecture Purple, means little until we see the actual results of those games though; it just takes one or two flukey and unexpected results and the whole prediction goes out of the window. It is entirely in our own hands; pick up 6 or more points from the Reading, Villa, West Brom and Stoke games (and the other 3 of course, but I think those are the 4 we''re mostly likely to get anything from) and we''ll stay up. I think our record against the sides around and below us is actually fairly promising for the remaining games. We have dropped a few points against such sides (draws at QPR, Villa, Reading, Southampton etc.) but we haven''t actually lost very many. And certainly draws against those sides will be a lot better for us than for them. GPB - it''s a gamble. What if it backfires badly and we go down? At this moment in time, having just splashed a fair chunk of cash on Van Wolfswinkel I doubt very much that McNally has had any serious thoughts about sacking Hughton.[/quote]

Fair point Aggy. And it would most certainly be a gamble. What I''m trying to do here is get into McNally''s mind - who let us not forget did earn a hansome bonus according to my most recent Report and Account, related to staying in the Prem.  

[PurpleCanary 6,386]

[quote user="Aggy"]

All fair enough conjecture Purple, means little until we see the actual results of those games though; it just takes one or two flukey and unexpected results and the whole prediction goes out of the window.

It is entirely in our own hands; pick up 6 or more points from the Reading, Villa, West Brom and Stoke games (and the other 3 of course, but I think those are the 4 we''re mostly likely to get anything from) and we''ll stay up. I think our record against the sides around and below us is actually fairly promising for the remaining games. We have dropped a few points against such sides (draws at QPR, Villa, Reading, Southampton etc.) but we haven''t actually lost very many. And certainly draws against those sides will be a lot better for us than for them. GPB - it''s a gamble. What if it backfires badly and we go down? At this moment in time, having just splashed a fair chunk of cash on Van Wolfswinkel I doubt very much that McNally has had any serious thoughts about sacking Hughton.[/quote]

 

Aggy, of course that is true, which is why I don''t predict individual games - that way lies madness - but try to assess sets of fixtures.

 

 

[PurpleCanary 6,386]

[quote user="Joanna Grey"]"Stoke: 34 points. Villa, Man Utd, Norwich and Spurs at home; QPR, Sunderland and Southampton away. In awful form and not scoring (does that sound familiar?) but four winnable games there, and they draw a lot. At least one win and three draws should be not be beyond them. Pulis''s experience a bonus." Draw a lot? Two draws in their last ten is not "a lot". They have also lost seven of their last ten.[/quote]

 

They have drawn 13, which is the equal highest total in the league. I think that counts as a lot. Added to which, as you will see from their fixtures I helpfully provided, they have some very winnable/drawable games left.

[Joanna Grey 0]

If you are going to rely so much on current form in your analysis then the fact that they have not drawn a lot (but lost a lot) on current form should have some influence.

[priceyrice 133]

[quote user="PurpleCanary"][quote user="Graham Paddons Beard"]

 

My question back would be this. With a "new manager" bounce, how much more likely would 6 points (and £100m) be? I cannot believe that the thought hasn''t crossed McNally''s mind. Lose to Swansea, and maybe a couple of million quid to , say, DiMatteo, to keep us up, would look like small beer against next years income.

 

[/quote]

 

GPB, Sunderland MIGHT get a small lift from a new manager but equally they might not. The bottom line is they are playing very badly at the moment and have a daunting set of away games. Based on  the run-in I think they are the likeliest third team to go down. As to us, I do not want Hughton sacked now. I regard our troubles as stemming as much from what didn''t hapen in January - which I assume was not Hughton''s fault - as from his apparent failings.Even if we went down I would be happy for him to stay on, unless the board had decided from behind the scenes stuff that he wasn''t up to it, or if there was a clearly better alternative. Which Poyet might be.

[/quote]

 

I am curious as to why you think our problems stem from our lack of activity in Jan. KK has come in and looked good, scored the winner in the game against Everton. It''s also almost exactly the same team as those who went on the 10 game unbeaten run.

I think complacency is a much more likely cause. Happened once we reached 40 points last season and has happened again after appearing to be safe this year.

[Aggy 944]

GPB- I was very careful not to say that McNally will have had no thoughts about replacing Hughton because he doesn''t seem like the sort of person not to have had that thought. I imagine he has had a plan in place for the last few months of who he would try to bring in if Hughton took us too close to the drop. But I think he has got to a point of the season where he believes us to be safe (or will be good enough to stay safe), decided to splash the cash on van Wolfy and now will stick with him. But certainly I would be very surprised if McNally hasn''t had a plan B in to replace Hughton, just that I don''t think he will have ever gotten too close to worrying about having to use it this season.

[ricardo 8,034]

So, why is WBA not a winnable game?

[Joanna Grey 0]

Yeah, good question Ricardo, especially when Villa have a better current form than WBA and have a lot more to play for.

[York Canary 29]

Should have won WBA tbh. Definitely winnable at home. Belief is the main thing - if we can keep that at home at least I fancy we can beat anyone in all honesty. Let''s start with Swansea please

[norfolkbroadslim 225]

I can guarantee that it will not take 40 or 41 points to stay up this season.  Villa, Wigan AND Sunderland will not ALL get another 10 or 11 points!

 

Villa still have Sunderland & Wigan to play.

Wigan still have Villa to play.

Sunderland still have Villa to play.

 

Both teams cannot win!

 

Villa - 7 games left

Sunderland - 7 games left

Wigan - 8 games left

 

[I]

[PurpleCanary 6,386]

[quote user="ricardo"]So, why is WBA not a winnable game?
[/quote]

 

Any game is winnable in the sense that we might win it, but one has to make an honest assessment, and in the real world we are unlikely to win all four of our remaining homes games. Since WBA are the highest placed I left them off the list. I have looked at Norwich in the same way I have assessed the other teams. For example, you could make an argument for Sunderland winning at least two of their three homes games, but I have them down only for one win. That is the kind of realism I applied to our chances.

[ricardo 8,034]

[quote user="norfolkbroadslim"]

I can guarantee that it will not take 40 or 41 points to stay up this season.  Villa, Wigan AND Sunderland will not ALL get another 10 or 11 points!

 

Villa still have Sunderland & Wigan to play.

Wigan still have Villa to play.

Sunderland still have Villa to play.

 

Both teams cannot win!

 

Villa - 7 games left

Sunderland - 7 games left

Wigan - 8 games left

 

[I]

[/quote]Impossible for some people to understand that Slim. Everybody is seeing great form for all our rivals and poor form for us. It may look completely different after next weekend when the home/away games even up at 16 each.

[ricardo 8,034]

[quote user="PurpleCanary"]

[quote user="ricardo"]So, why is WBA not a winnable game?[/quote]

 

Any game is winnable in the sense that we might win it, but one has to make an honest assessment, and in the real world we are unlikely to win all four of our remaining homes games. Since WBA are the highest placed I left them off the list. I have looked at Norwich in the same way I have assessed the other teams. For example, you could make an argument for Sunderland winning at least two of their three homes games, but I have them down only for one win. That is the kind of realism I applied to our chances.

[/quote]Come now Purple, you of all people should know that you can''t judge single games like that, in fact you''ve just stated it yourself. WBA could just as easily be a win as any of the others else wise how did we beat Arsenal but only draw with QPR?

[BOO 0]

Broad slim, Villa have 10 points from their last seven games, Wigan have 11 points from their last eight games, the only team on current form unlikely to get to forty points is Sunderland, it is them we will be in a dog fight with, they have a better goal difference than us and a new manager. It all depends on if they get a bounce from getting a new man in!

[norfolkbroadslim 225]

Van wink [ap]

[BOO 0]

And your considered response to my well made point is?

[Highland Canary 78]

I thought we''d get to 37 points but the bonus point at Sunderland takes us to 38 if we beat Reading and a point against West Brom. We''ll get absolutely spanked if we fall back and play for the 0-0 against Swansea which I assume will be our tactics.

[Faded Jaded Semi Plastic SOB 1,223]

My "back of a fag packet assessment", without over analysis is:

Stoke - 39 Points (4 Defeats Man U, QPR, Spurs and Southampton), 2 Draws (Villa and Sunderland) and one win (us)

Villa - 41 Points (3 Defeats Liverpool, Man U, Chelsea, 2 Draws (Stoke and Wigan) and 3 wins (Fulham, Sunderland and us)

Newcastle - 40 Points 3 Defeats (WBA, WHU, QPR), 3 Draws (Sunderland, Liverpool, Arsenal) and 1 win (Fulham)

Sunderland - 40 Points 3 Defeats (Chelsea, Villa, Spurs), 3 Draws (Newcastle, Everton, Stoke) and 1 win (Southampton)

Wigan - 39 Points 3 Defeats (QPR, Man City, Arsenal), 3 Draws (WHU, Spurs, Villa) and 2 wins (WBA and Swansea)

This shows that even with our rivals playing eachother it is possible for each of them to reach the 39 point mark, which means we need to get at least 6 points from our last 7 games.

[ricardo 8,034]

[quote user="Vanwink"]Broad slim, Villa have 10 points from their last seven games, Wigan have 11 points from their last eight games, the only team on current form unlikely to get to forty points is Sunderland, it is them we will be in a dog fight with, they have a better goal difference than us and a new manager. It all depends on if they get a bounce from getting a new man in![/quote]So where are they going to get another 10 points from in their next 7 games? and why will Sunderland get a bounce?Yes we can all do the predictor and make it come out like we forecast but that is not reality is it?

[ricardo 8,034]

[quote user="Sons of Boadicea"]

My "back of a fag packet assessment", without over analysis is:

Stoke - 39 Points (4 Defeats Man U, QPR, Spurs and Southampton), 2 Draws (Villa and Sunderland) and one win (us)

Villa - 41 Points (3 Defeats Liverpool, Man U, Chelsea, 2 Draws (Stoke and Wigan) and 3 wins (Fulham, Sunderland and us)

Newcastle - 40 Points 3 Defeats (WBA, WHU, QPR), 3 Draws (Sunderland, Liverpool, Arsenal) and 1 win (Fulham)

Sunderland - 40 Points 3 Defeats (Chelsea, Villa, Spurs), 3 Draws (Newcastle, Everton, Stoke) and 1 win (Southampton)

Wigan - 39 Points 3 Defeats (QPR, Man City, Arsenal), 3 Draws (WHU, Spurs, Villa) and 2 wins (WBA and Swansea)

This shows that even with our rivals playing eachother it is possible for each of them to reach the 39 point mark, which means we need to get at least 6 points from our last 7 games.

[/quote]Yes SOB, very easy to work the predictor to make it come out like that. The only thing we can say for certain is that it won''t. There will be unexpected results for all teams and it is most unlikely that 39 points will be needed to stay up.

[PurpleCanary 6,386]

[quote user="ricardo"][quote user="PurpleCanary"]

[quote user="ricardo"]So, why is WBA not a winnable game?
[/quote]

 

Any game is winnable in the sense that we might win it, but one has to make an honest assessment, and in the real world we are unlikely to win all four of our remaining homes games. Since WBA are the highest placed I left them off the list. I have looked at Norwich in the same way I have assessed the other teams. For example, you could make an argument for Sunderland winning at least two of their three homes games, but I have them down only for one win. That is the kind of realism I applied to our chances.

[/quote]

Come now Purple, you of all people should know that you can''t judge single games like that, in fact you''ve just stated it yourself. WBA could just as easily be a win as any of the others else wise how did we beat Arsenal but only draw with QPR?
[/quote]

 

I am not judging a single game. You have entirely misunderstood what I have said. I looked at our home games and decided - and I think this is highly reasonable but do tell me if you disagree - that on current form it is improbable that we will win all four. I assessed them as a group rather than individual games.

Of course we COULD beat WBA and not beat Reading, who look the weakest. But if we are unlikely to win all four - I think we will win one or two - then as a guide I  highlighted the three that looked (and of course this is to an extent subjective) the weakest. If I started giving us WBA as winnable then I would be adding potentail wins to all the other teams as well, and from past relegation battles I don''t think that is realistic.

It is possible I have been fractionally - but only fractionally - more pessimistic with Norwich than with other teams, but I still have us staying up. I think, if nothing else, we will finish with more points than Sunderland. But that is because I have tried to apply the same rigour to them as to us.