Title race 2023/4

[fightoffyour]

3 minutes ago, Pinebro said:

I just want Buendia back 

[GingerCollins29]

42 minutes ago, Pinebro said:

How the actual heck are we still in a title race

Because we have performed as well as the best in the country for 12 months

[Taxahunter]

9 minutes ago, Pinebro said:

I just want Buendia back 

He isn’t good enough for where We are going

[Pinebro]

32 minutes ago, Taxahunter said:

He isn’t good enough for where We are going

He is exactly what we needed against Sheffield United and generally against low block teams

[GingerCollins29]

6 minutes ago, Pinebro said:

He is exactly what we needed against Sheffield United and generally against low block teams

He had a very good pre season as well, such a shame as it really felt like this was going to be a big year for him

[VillaChris]

3 hours ago, Delphinho123 said:

Man City were the real winners last night. We’re not good enough to win the league. 

Yep, was reading in the paper they could've been 12 points off the lead if others had won their games over xmas. Instead everyone dropped points, they won at Everton and basically if they win ten straight again they'll be very comfortably in the lead so it is their title to lose yet again.

De Bruyne will also be back imminently which makes a huge difference to their connectivity in the final third.

[AvonVillain]

14 hours ago, turvontour said:

Why if we go joint top on Saturday, what would be the basis for it? We also likely won't be anywhere near as weakened team wise as we have been in the last week or so. 

I was referring to the negativity on a football forum. It's sort of like wondering why there's so much negativity on Twitter. It'll never be any different.

[birdman]

1 hour ago, fightoffyour said:

For sure. The type of player we need to combat those low blocks!

[Delphinho123]

1 hour ago, fightoffyour said:

Superb.

[ender4]

We are currently on for 78 points for the full season assuming we carry on exactly as we are.

 

Whats the average amount of points needed to win the title?  I have a feeling it’s much higher and so we would need to improve a lot to get near it.

[Mark Albrighton]

6 minutes ago, ender4 said:

We are currently on for 78 points for the full season assuming we carry on exactly as we are.

 

Whats the average amount of points needed to win the title?  I have a feeling it’s much higher and so we would need to improve a lot to get near it.

Hopefully the format here is vaguely legible.

	1st	2nd	3rd
22/23	89	84	75
21/22	93	92	74
20/21	86	74	69
19/20	99	81	66
18/19	98	97	72
17/18	100	81	77
16/17	93	86	78

I make the average for 1st there to be 94 points.

For those who look at it that “you just have to get more than 2nd”, the average for 2nd place has been 85 points.

For completion, 3rd has been 73 points.

[villan-scott]

19 minutes ago, Mark Albrighton said:

Hopefully the format here is vaguely legible.

	1st	2nd	3rd
22/23	89	84	75
21/22	93	92	74
20/21	86	74	69
19/20	99	81	66
18/19	98	97	72
17/18	100	81	77
16/17	93	86	78

I make the average for 1st there to be 94 points.

For those who look at it that “you just have to get more than 2nd”, the average for 2nd place has been 85 points.

For completion, 3rd has been 73 points.

Isn’t there something somewhere that these recent years the tally to win the league is abnormally high due to City and Pep being so dominant? So hopefully this season is lower as City faulter a bit. 

[Mark Albrighton]

9 minutes ago, villan-scott said:

Isn’t there something somewhere that these recent years the tally to win the league is abnormally high due to City and Pep being so dominant? So hopefully this season is lower as City faulter a bit. 

Probably, yes.

I did think about looking at more historical final league tables. But there’s three factors to consider.

1. Man City are unfortunately still a consideration when it comes to calculating this figure. If they weren’t around I’d be tempted to look at “pre Man City” seasons.
2. There’s probably diminishing value in going back further to look at previous seasons. Recent data is probably more worthwhile than say, pre 2010.
3. I can’t be arsed to look at any more league tables. 
    

[TRO]

On 27/12/2023 at 18:59, danceoftheshamen said:

So having absorbed the last 2 "performances" and having calmed down a little now, I think it clearly shows that we are very weak in certain area's still. Especially when losing a few first choice mainstays.

Kamara is clearly essential to us, we obviously need another RB too and the Mings injury is coming home to roost right now too. We are also lacking another good option up front so when Watkins is off the boil we have a viable alternative to come in. 

There is no way, in my view, that we are in a title race as things stand. A few signings in Jan might keep us up there but that's an awful lot of ifs buts & maybe's as firstly any new signing would have to hit the ground running, which of course is never guaranteed.

For me our form has dipped alarmingly since Torres & Kamara have been out. Notably since Cash & Ramsey have come back into the team also. We are clearly not working on the right hand side at the moment. I feel both Diaby & Bailey have gone massively off the boil & even Watkins has gone back to the ineffective, annonymous version of himself. Lots of huff & puff with a poor touch. He is the most likely to poach a goal however and with no alternative it makes us very predictable to play against currently. 

Block us off and allow the ineffective wide players like Cash, Bailey, Diaby & Digne to have the ball and we are powder puff. Surround Watkins and then counter us with rapid wide players making runs from deep & we struggle. Brentford, Sheff Utd & Utd second half all did this and we struggled massively. That Croatian "Mostar" team did the same too & it was like watching a re-run of the game against them against Sheff Utd too.

I think we'll be competitive once Torres & Kamara are back but to challenge for top 4 we need new signings. 

The biggest issue is Duran, he looks a liability when he comes on at the moment and Watkins is looking jaded.

Shocking performance that second half at Manure though, it was all self inflicted too from what I was watching constantly just gifting them the ball back giving them more than enough opportunity to break our offside which is clearly the issue as they have players who know how to run onto a simple ball over the top. They always do it against us and yet we keep on givng them chance after chance to have another go at it. Attrocious performance.

 

Eloquently put, in a nutshell.

Bravo.

[Rustibrooks]

I think 86 points might be enough for any team to win the league this year. (Just a guess based on the top 4)

As a rough estimate if we are going for the title, we would need to get around 47 points? Which if I calculated correctly it’s 2.47 ppg. It will be tough but if we can get some reinforcements and have some luck with injuries then who knows?

 

[VillaAlex]

I'd say Liverpool are favourites right now.

They are 1st, they've played most of the top half away, except Arsenal, Man Utd and ourselves. They're currently the toughest side to beat. The one game they lost was due to a major VAR error. The only real bad result they've had is drawing away to Luton.

They're also in a European competition they'd happily drop in favour of prioritising the title. Arsenal and Man City won't do that. 

Probably see what they're made of most when Salah goes to the AFCON but I still think they have more goals throughout their frontline, compared to the impact of Arsenal losing Saka, or us losing Watkins. 

 

 

[Marka Ragnos]

5 hours ago, Pinebro said:

He is exactly what we needed against Sheffield United and generally against low block teams

This is accurate. The problem is, we don't have him, so we need someone to step up and channel a bit of Super-creative Buendian Playmaker to deal with low blocks. Who do we have? Buendia is unique. He's an original. McGinn seems sort of the closest to me, but he's frankly already doing so much other stuff. Diaby is amazing, but a totally different style of player who would work better with a Buendian player (though obviously not Buendia) as his complement on his left. Bailey needs more space to work than Buendia does. Sorry, drifting off topic here a bit.

 

[Made In Aston]

4 hours ago, Mark Albrighton said:

Hopefully the format here is vaguely legible.

	1st	2nd	3rd
22/23	89	84	75
21/22	93	92	74
20/21	86	74	69
19/20	99	81	66
18/19	98	97	72
17/18	100	81	77
16/17	93	86	78

I make the average for 1st there to be 94 points.

For those who look at it that “you just have to get more than 2nd”, the average for 2nd place has been 85 points.

For completion, 3rd has been 73 points.

That 18/19 season was mad. How can you get 97 points and still not win the title?! 

[Jareth]

1 hour ago, Made In Aston said:

That 18/19 season was mad. How can you get 97 points and still not win the title?! 

Financial doping.

[Jareth]

Still pos