Why? It's the past 5 months so a huge sample size, and one that gives you a much better idea of how a team is progressing rather than early high flying or early struggling.
Top 4 race 2016/17
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In the latest episode of the United Hour Podcast, Nik (@Rood) is joined by CEO Duncan Drasdo and Financial Director Andy Green from the Manchester United Supporters Trust for a special episode on all things behind the scenes at Old Trafford including a brief history of MUST and their aims today, views on INEOS and Sir Jim Ratcliffe so far, and the Old Trafford regeneration.
Why? It's the past 5 months so a huge sample size, and one that gives you a much better idea of how a team is progressing rather than early high flying or early struggling.
If it involved a pressing game I would say yes, but the way to play Liverpool is to sit back and break. It doesn't take much energy and is an easier gameplan to follow.
The likes of West Brom and Southampton presently have little to play for yet beat Arsenal and took Spurs to the limit.
Against City and ourselves I would say the beach effect would be a bigger advantage, we tend to score first but let sides back into it. Maybe those sides won't have the fight in them to mount a comeback as the season comes to a close.
Liverpools problem is getting that first goal and it's not that taxing trying to keep them out. They rarely threaten the goal.
They need teams to come out and attack, not lazily play within themselves in their own half.
The last bit doesn't really fit with the statistic that we've created more chances inside the oppositions area than anyone else this season.
We're also top scorers in the league, failing to score three times this season from what I can remember (United, Hull and Burnley). It doesn't seem that easy to keep us out.
Ah now be fair, stats do lie. How many times must you struggle v lower sides for it to hit home.
Anyway it's not really a full season assessment, it only really applies since the new year.
How many of your goals have been actual consolation goals? Goals that get you back into games that you're well beaten in but can't quite pull it back?
Arsenal will have good stats in games scored etc but most of those goals are throw away goals? Teams are still comfortable against them.
One goal all season in the PL, a couple of weeks ago against Leicester. Wow!
Yeah, that's it, well done.
Please don't change your approach to smaller sides. It's all rosey, there's absolute no need for a plan b.
None whatsoever. Teams outside of the top 6 do not look comfortbale against your attack.
United have scored in 28 out of the last 30 odd games yet it's a fact we struggle to score. These stats are meaninless and clouds the actual 90 mins of football.
How many times do you fall behind in games when your attack has let you down and your defence is as bad as ever?
We're arguing semantics here, I could have phrased it better but the argument coming the other way doesn't hold up either. Seriously though, plan A is excellent. Never deviate from your energy-less plan A
I was just answering your question as I do think every stat has to be put in perspective, so I'm not pinning down anything on that. It's quite simple for me: we're only playing teams right now which we should be beating. Therefore, and certainly if you look at the remaining fixtures of the other contenders, we should be getting top four by the end of the season and will only have ourselves to blame if we don't. I'd have snapped your hand off before the season to be in a position like this at the end of March (another Cup final would've been nice though but we seriously bottled that one), but if we don't get top four now our season will have been a failure imo, you can quote me on that by the end of the seasonYeah, that's it, well done.
Please don't change your approach to smaller sides. It's all rosey, there's absolute no need for a plan b.
None whatsoever. Teams outside of the top 6 do not look comfortbale against your attack.
United have scored in 28 out of the last 30 odd games yet it's a fact we struggle to score. These stats are meaninless and clouds the actual 90 mins of football.
How many times do you fall behind in games when your attack has let you down and your defence is as bad as ever?
We're arguing semantics here, I could have phrased it better but the argument coming the other way doesn't hold up either. Seriously though, plan A is excellent. Never deviate from your energy-less plan A
Even then, I've thoroughly enjoyed this season so far and our style of play is intriguing, I'd much rather watch our games than yours even though you might end up with two trophies by the end of the season. Games like yesterday are why I love football, even though we didn't get the three points it was 100x more enjoyable than your game vs Boro imo.
Surely it's better to assess this at the end of the season? We could have a strong finish which would make things look different with regards to how we perform against defensive set ups.
Goals scored are goals scored. We managed three against Bournemouth and two against Swansea in games that we lost. We lost those games because our defence was and still is very poor, not because we struggled against defensive set ups.
Its our home form that served us so well this far: 10 consecutive home league wins (and 12 in all competitions) ... for Spurs that's a Prem-era record sequence.
Yeah bit of a concern considering we still have to go to the lane.
That will be the last ever match at WHL, it should be an absolutely cracking atmosphere. Might actually work against Spurs since it will be such an emotional rollercoaster.
Just been going through everyone's remaining fixtures at work (yeah I'm busy) and got these final league positions:
1.Chelsea
2.City - 80 points
3.Spurs - 79 points
4. Pool - 76 points
5. Utd - 74
6. Arsenal - 74
I tried being very charitable to Utd and Arsenal giving both the most wins despite obvious fixture pile up.
1.Chelsea
2.City - 80 points
3.Spurs - 79 points
4. Pool - 76 points
5. Utd - 74
6. Arsenal - 74
I tried being very charitable to Utd and Arsenal giving both the most wins despite obvious fixture pile up.
The stakes might also play a part, if the pressure of the result is off the team it could allow greater freedom. But if the game is important for top 4, the added pressure could also be negative as you say.
Swear we always have a nightmare when we play teams at their ground for the final time.
Did exactly the same thing yesterday. I had this:
1 Chelsea 95
2 City 78
3 Tottenham 77
4 Liverpool 77
5 United 74
6 Arsenal 70
Only after doing this, I realised I had us winning six and drawing three, but realistically I know we'll drop at least one, probably two games away from home imo. But I also tried to be as easy as possible on the other contenders, so I don't know... It's hard to predict so far in the future as momentum (and injuries, fatigue) will definitely play its part as well.
Honestly looking at the remaining schedule, it will be a miracle if we get top 4. It will also take a monumental meltdown from the teams above us (namely the dippers and citeh).
If Mourinho pulls it off somehow it will be a massive achievement given our position. Not to mention the sheer amount of matches we potentially have to play.
Its beginning to look more and more like the Europa League is our best chance of CL next year.
If Mourinho pulls it off somehow it will be a massive achievement given our position. Not to mention the sheer amount of matches we potentially have to play.
Its beginning to look more and more like the Europa League is our best chance of CL next year.
We'd have to show consistency at getting wins, which we've failed to do, I just think we've buggered it up for ourselves sadly. Even though I expect the teams ahead of us to mess up a few more times, I feel it's totally unrealistic for us not to do the same.
I really can't see us winning six games though I'd love to obviously. If we draw one of your predictions we still finish on 75 which should be enough.
One thing this exercise has proven is that momentum will carry City and Spurs through for sure. Give or take a Spurs brain fart which you can't predict in for.
So two Liverpool fans think you'll go from 12 points in your past 10 games to at least 20 points from the next 9 games.
Can't knock your optimism lads that's for sure.
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I had it similar to that but with Liverpool and United both drawing an extra game instead of winning. It's going to be an exciting finish, that's for sure.
Just done this over at http://www.worldfootball.net/table_calculator/eng-premier-league/
Have no clue how I ended up with this but it would seem I have little faith in United and overrate Everton by quite a bit as I have them going unbeaten till the seasons end.. Tried to be as honest as I could. I also have Liverpool, Chelsea and Spurs not losing. So I'm pretty sure I'm way off.
EDIT: Saw what I did wrong. I left two United games at 0-0 as I was rushing the scores lol. Fixed.
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I came up with almost the exact same result.
Chelsea
City - 80
Spurs - 79
Liverpool - 77
United - 76
Arsenal - 73
Knowing that i am usually slightly biased towards stronger teams in these kind of tips, I'd say that Arsenal, United, Liverpool and Spurs all drop 1-3 more points, but United finishing top4 is very unlikely. Arsenal has the outside chance to surprise everybody with a strong run in.
The previous 10 games consisted of Arsenal, Spurs, City, even a resurgent Leicester since Ranieri was sacked a game too early.
Edit: And Utd and Chelsea. And losing Coutinho and Mane and countless cup games we embarrassingly couldn't handle. None of those distractions or absences now.
The next 9 focuses the eyes on the prize.
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We all know your good against the big boys though. That's not where the points are dropped (often).
You're better against the better sides though and have done best in those during the last 10, I think you'll pick up 17 points from your remaining games.
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Which is why we are showing dropped points in nearly half of our remaining 'easy' games. Well I'm showing 4 games at least. That's a large percentage of dropped points already catered for in our predictions.
Are you suggesting we will drop points in nearly 75% of our remaining 'easy' fixtures?
Interesting that everyone has predicted us finishing 5th based on the games yet to come.
We do have a pretty tough run-in.
We do have a pretty tough run-in.
Which is why we are showing dropped points in nearly half of our remaining 'easy' games. Well I'm showing 4 games at least. That's a large percentage of dropped points already catered for in our predictions.
Are you suggesting we will drop points in nearly 75% of our remaining 'easy' fixtures?
9 games, draw 2, lose 2, win 5. That's actually optimistic considering your form since the turn of the year.
So 17 points I'd say.
Our form over the last five games, which is always more accurate for context, is WLWWD.
You've converted two of my draws into losses thus dropping two more points. Which is fair enough. So an absolute shit case scenario for us and an overly generous scenario for you will see us on the same number of points, just about. Goal difference comes into play.
How do you see your next 2 away games? Burnley are very testing, while Swansea are tricky.
Poor comment, just to suggest the general narrative 'Liverpool fans are deluded' probably. So you're suggesting we'll have another meltdown like around New Year's then, when we were missing Coutinho and Mane and were playing better teams? In your next post, you're basing your prediction off our form since the turn of the year when in fact, the last few weeks have shown nothing but signs that we're back on the up - convincing home wins against two other contenders, a decent away draw against another contender and a come-from-behind victory against a lesser team, albeit Burnley but that was something we struggled with in the beginning of the season.
So yes, us getting 21 out of a possible 27 is certainly doable, maybe a bit optimistic and it might end up being 17 like you say but what fan is not optimistic about his team's chances (probably a wrong question in the FF of the Caf but still). Assuming we'll win our next two games (at home vs Everton who've been wank against us in recent years and at home against Bournemouth), we'd need 15 out of 21. That's still a lot, don't think I don't realize that, but so close to top four at that point we should be able to push on.
Definitely not saying we're already there but I think at this moment we have a better chance as United for getting top 4 imo.
This time 2 weeks ago people had us finishing 6th, now we're 5th with 2 games in hand to go clear in 4th.
Posters are underestimating the fact we could go away to Spurs with a point suiting us both or Arsenal could be in complete freefall and is only flagged as tougher than Everton at home in name only.
It's all about the next 3 for me. Win those and we'll be able to navigate the close of the season. We're a tough side to beat, the champions elect could only beat us by 1 with a man advantage and suddenly we're going to lose / drop points in every awkward game till May? Especially with our away record.
Some of us have faith!
Agreed. I'd settle for 4 points if offered.
I'd say on the contrary, it's all in our hands now. We are in a great position to finish in the top 4. If anything, the usual chokers should be worried (Pool and Spurs).
The extra games are not an excuse either. We have potentially five more games than pool, but the other four have still the FA Cup to fight between them.
The problem for us is that we only have 4 home games left:
Home:
Watford
Bournemouth
Arsenal
Utd
Away:
Burnley
Swansea
Palace
Leicester
West Ham
Hull
The West Ham game is a particular worry, they will throw the kitchen sink at us.
On the plus side because of our GD I think 15 points will be enough for top 4, but we really have to push if we can for top 3 as some monster qualifying ties look possible.
That said I'd still take 4th if you're offering!
Ah, the old mythical chokers garbage.
These projections are interesting inasmuch as 6pts is only a single result +/- for two teams & most of you don't have more than that covering at least a couple of teams. So still relatively close in theory.
But if you won these two you would make a giant step towards the Champions League.
We need to win the EL. Then anything that happens in the league is a bonus.
The absolute optimum outcome, while almost impossible, is that we win the EL, Leicester win the CL, and we finish 5th with Liverpool above us in 4th but not qualifying for the lolz.
The absolute optimum outcome, while almost impossible, is that we win the EL, Leicester win the CL, and we finish 5th with Liverpool above us in 4th but not qualifying for the lolz.