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Is this the target next season? In the 16 seasons since the introduction of the 20 team Premier League there have been just 3 occasions where 40 points hasn't been enough. The average points total for the team finishing 17th over those 16 seasons has been 38.5. On 12 out of 16 occasions even 38.5 points would have been more than enough to survive. Unfortunately it wasn't enough for Ollie and for Blackpool. There has also been 3 occasions where 17th and 18th have been divided by just goal difference. In 2004-05, WBA pipped Palace on the last day of the season to stay up with just 34 points, which to date is the lowest points total accumulated to stay up.
Arguably with all of the top teams likely to have significantly strengthened their teams this summer (Man City already have, Spurs need to, Henderson and Adam have gone to Liverpool, Young and Jones have provided more depth at United and even Sunderland will be much stronger this season than last) we will see fewer examples of teams like Wolves beating the big boys and Blackpool defeating Liverpool home and away meaning that the total needed to survive will probably be nearer the late 30s than the early 40s. In other words if our rivals aren’t picking up surprise points against the top sides then we won’t need to either. Wolves stayed up by a single point in a season in which they accumulated three against Manchester United – Birmingham, Blackpool and West Ham picked up just one point against the Champions.
If the big teams do strengthen and the league reverts back to 09/10 season when there were just 96 drawn matches compared to the 111 last season there will be fewer points distributed round the division. As already mentioned a number of teams picked up points against the big teams when they weren’t expected to. In fact Chelsea finished last season with 15 points fewer than the year before. Even Manchester United accumulated fewer points winning the league (80) than they did coming runners up the year before (85).
Also interesting to note (and quite obvious when you think about it) the years that the top sides all reach the 80+ mark the points needed for survival is reduced. Quite simply when the likes of Chelsea, Arsenal, Liverpool and the Manchester clubs aren’t dropping points against teams at the bottom they have obviously accumulated more and the smaller teams have accumulated fewer.
So how many do you think we will need?
Arguably with all of the top teams likely to have significantly strengthened their teams this summer (Man City already have, Spurs need to, Henderson and Adam have gone to Liverpool, Young and Jones have provided more depth at United and even Sunderland will be much stronger this season than last) we will see fewer examples of teams like Wolves beating the big boys and Blackpool defeating Liverpool home and away meaning that the total needed to survive will probably be nearer the late 30s than the early 40s. In other words if our rivals aren’t picking up surprise points against the top sides then we won’t need to either. Wolves stayed up by a single point in a season in which they accumulated three against Manchester United – Birmingham, Blackpool and West Ham picked up just one point against the Champions.
If the big teams do strengthen and the league reverts back to 09/10 season when there were just 96 drawn matches compared to the 111 last season there will be fewer points distributed round the division. As already mentioned a number of teams picked up points against the big teams when they weren’t expected to. In fact Chelsea finished last season with 15 points fewer than the year before. Even Manchester United accumulated fewer points winning the league (80) than they did coming runners up the year before (85).
Also interesting to note (and quite obvious when you think about it) the years that the top sides all reach the 80+ mark the points needed for survival is reduced. Quite simply when the likes of Chelsea, Arsenal, Liverpool and the Manchester clubs aren’t dropping points against teams at the bottom they have obviously accumulated more and the smaller teams have accumulated fewer.
So how many do you think we will need?
NPower Champions 2010/2011
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