Sid's Stats

This is the page linking to some stats compiled by Sid that you might find interesting.

Behind The Headlines - Stats of 2006/07

Everybody knows Manchester United won the Premiership (Champions for the 16th time), and Chelsea were runners-up and won the FA Cup, and that Liverpool, Arsenal and Spurs all finished in exactly the same positions (3rd, 4th & 5th respect.) as per 2005/06, but let’s look at some lesser known but perhaps more interesting facts from the last season.

4 Clubs enjoyed their best-ever season in 2006/07:

• Reading, in their first season in the top division of their 80 seasons, finishing 8th in The Premiership

• Colchester United, in the Championship (level 2) for the first time over their 55 seasons, finishing 10th

• Cheltenham Town, finishing 17th in League 1 (level 3), their best to date in their short 8-year tenure

• Yeovil Town, finishing 5th in League 1, and achieving a Play-Off Final, their best to date in their embryonic 4-year tenure

And though not their actual best-ever, Portsmouth finishing 9th in The Premiership, had their best season in 52 years. Scunthorpe United also had their best season, finishing top of League 1, since 1963/64

On the other hand 6 Clubs suffered their worst-ever season in 2006/07:

• Leeds United, finishing bottom of The Championship and relegated to the third level for the first time in their 90 season tenure (incl 8 as Leeds City)

• Bury, finishing 21st in League 2, their worst in their long 102 seasons

• Torquay United, bottom of the entire League for the 5th time in their 73 seasons, but this time relegated to The Conference, making this their worst

• Wycombe Wanderers, finishing 12th in League 2, their worst in their 14 seasons

• Macclesfield Town, finishing 22nd in League 2, their worst in their 10 seasons

• Boston United, finishing 23rd in League 2 and returning to The Conference after just 5 seasons membership

And whilst not quite their worst ever season the following three Clubs each had a pretty bad season also:

• MK Dons/Wimbledon had their worst finish (4th in League 2) since their very first season 30 years ago

• Norwich City had their worst finish (equal with 1995/96) since 1963/64

• Ipswich Town finished just one place higher than the previous season (which was their worst finish for 40 years) – still leaving 2006/07 as their 3rd worst finish (equal) for 48 years.

THE CHAMPIONSHIP PLAY-OFFS

An alternative method

The play-offs are worth a fortune to the Club gaining promotion to The Premiership – now reportedly up to £60m.

This means that the Club finishing 3rd in The Championship over the entire season potentially stands to lose that same £60m, unless they come through the play-offs successfully.

This does not happen very often, in fact has happened 7 times in the 21 seasons it has been in effect – that means 14 times (exactly twice) the 3rd team has failed to gain promotion. Even when they have finished the season as many as12 points or up to 28 goals ahead of the play-off winner!

Since this can now literally mean survival to many Clubs, surely a fairer system should be seriously considered.

Here is my suggestion:

Round 1:             5th v 6th  (2 legged)
Semi-Final:             4th v Winners R1
Final:                3rd v Winners Semi

Both the Semi and the Final could be at Wembley.

Although this reduces the number of matches from 5 to 4, the same number of teams are involved, and final season league placings become much more relevant, and fairer.

To win the Play-Offs:

Clubs finishing 5th and 6th must win 3 ties (playing 4 matches)
Club finishing 4th must win just 2 matches
Club finishing 3rd must win just 1 match

The team whose place would have given them direct promotion (without Play-Offs) i.e. the 3rd placed team, would simply await their opponents in the Final at Wembley.

Surely that would be some consolation for missing out on automatic promotion? Currently the only ‘benefit’ they get is to play the 6th team away first over 2 legs in the Semi-Finals. One does not need to be a sports psychologist to know that all the pressure is in fact on the 3rd team and all the “nothing to lose” forces are with the 6th.

In fact 5 teams finishing 6th have gone on to win the Play-Offs. The statistics are very even over the 4 play-off positions. 7 have won from 3rd, 4 from 4th, 5 from each of 5th and 6th. Until the last 2 seasons (where 3rd position has prevailed), it was 5,4,5,5. This strongly supports the “lottery” theory.

It is time to consider changing that system.

Some Statistics of The Play Offs

The Play Offs have been contested since 1986/87. The first 2 seasons included the team which finished 4th bottom in (then) Div 1, along with 3 from Div 2.

In 1986/87 this team was Charlton Athletic, and they won the PO’s and thus remained in Div 1. The following season 1987/88 the Div 1 side was Chelsea, but they were relegated after failing to win the PO’s.

From 1988/89 all 4 teams contesting the Div 2/Championship PO’s have come from Div 2/Championship.

This Table is sorted on ‘%age success’ i.e. the ratio of PO wins (promotion) to the number of PO’s contested.

In all, 34 clubs have participated in these Div 2/Championship PO’s. Ipswich Town have contested the most, a total of 7 times.

Notts County have the only 100% record, winning from 3rd in 1991/92. 8 clubs have good records with 50% or more success rate as shown in Table.

Millwall, Preston, Sheffield Utd and Tranmere Rovers all have a miserable PO record, with 3 failures each. However Ipswich have failed twice as often, although they have also won one, in 1999/00. Most others who have not been a winner have only contested one or two PO’s.

This Table shows from which position in The League the winners of the PO’s finished, over the 21 seasons. e.g 5 teams had finished in 6th place in qualifying for the PO’s

This Table and those below includes some general facts and figures