Ollessendro
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I was going to take a look at the league table after 19 games last season, but the new "improved" website appears to have removed the capabiolity to view the Table as it was after any given fixture for reasons that escape me...
I did some pointless geeky analysis earlier, see the 2nd tab in the spreadsheet attached. You can see that last season Charlton and the Pigs had higher points than Tranmere and we have (Huddersfield were 3rd with 38 and this season MK Dons have 33 points in 3rd) suggesting a lower points tally is on the cards this term.
Of the 20 seasons since the league went to 3 points for a win, in the third tier, the team in 1st after 19 games have gone on to win it in the majority of cases (12 out of 20) and get automatic promotion in 14/20 cases. However, that leaves 6 times that the leaders at this stage have fluffed it.
(Perhaps worrying for us?!) The teams in 2nd at this stage have only gone on to get promoted 7 out of 20 times. But a quarter of the time 2nd have gone on to actually win the league.
Half of the time teams in 3rd (5) and 4th (5) have gone on to take an automatic spot. There's some interesting one's in there too. Look at Bolton in 91/92, lying down in 14th with only 26 points and 9 points behind 2nd. Yet they went on to get 90 points that season. Other teams have come from low positions or points tallies to get automatic promotion too.