For those too young to remember, West Ham’s last Championship campaign led to successful promotion via the play-offs with a Wembley final defeat of Blackpool, the side who finished fifth in the league table standings, thanks to goals from the irrepressible Carlton Cole and Ricky Vaz Té (main image).
A great day out, wonderful celebrations and fourteen years in the top flight to follow.
However, following changes to the format, the play offs are now a tougher beast with the jeopardy of finishing fifth meaning yet another knock out game awaits. Before the ‘semi finals’ there is a preliminary game for the sides finishing fifth, sixth, seventh and eighth to endure, before the victors compete against third and fourth place teams as before.
A physical and mental minefield.
Just the smallest of slip-ups by West Ham this season could easily see them condemned to the jeopardy of a play off competition. The latest OPTA predictions have the gap between second and fifth place as just under six points.
Play off jeopardy has never been greater – now FIVE teams will lose out
Just two wins being the difference between automatic promotion and full ‘play off roulette’ at the end of a forty six game season.
Latest predictions show the Championship winners likely to muster 81.62 points, second place 79 and fifth place, with its resultant full blown play-off chaos, 73.82 points.
Dropping points from winning positions or sitting in for a draw has never had such a damaging consequence. Bear that in mind next time a sloppy goal gets conceded or West Ham fail to pick up a win after dominating.
For the record OPTA still has West Ham on track to be in first place come May and guaranteed automatic promotion – but using just eight games to forecast the next forty two is notoriously unreliable and few will be overly euphoric at this stage.
Nuno needs to keep chalking off the wins, however dull the football, and cautioning against over complacency.
One reminder of the difference that six points could make should be enough to banish any rubbish about ‘respecting the point’. Six teams will contest the play offs for the first time next May. Which mean five sets of fan heartbreak. Enough said.
If football was that easy to predict, then the authors of that report would be sitting on a pile of cash and the bookies would be weeping for once.
They may as well copy the AFL (Australian Football League) system then. Here, the team who finishes top of the league at the end of the season is only called the Minor Premiers.
The AFL finals system to become Premiership Winners uses a multi-week tournament where the top 10 teams play knockout matches, culminating in a Grand Final; from 2026, the “final ten” system adds a Wildcard Finals Round before the top eight stage, with the two Wildcard winners joining the top six to compete in Qualifying, Elimination, and Semi-Finals before the Grand Final.
Coming from England many years ago, I think it’s absolutely ridiculous but Aussies just love finals and the AFL cashes in big time. This year they have increased the number of teams qualifying for the finals to include also-rans. I don’t know why they even bother having a league campaign. Then again, everything seems crazy about AFL. I will say it can be a very exciting watch though. Especially in the Finals!
MT, let’s not overlook that ” respect the point ” BFS, assembled at the time, the most expensive Championship squad in history, he was still outcoached by
Brian Mc’Dermott (Reading) and Ian Atkinson (Saint’s) who had just been promoted from league One!
We walked away from Wembley scratching our head’s, saying how on earth did we win that one, as Ian Holloways inexpensive group of journeyman players out played us in the final ( I know that we routed them in the league, both H & A).
BFS, set us back years in youth development, playing ethos, boring games.
Yes, he was mandated to keep us up and he succeeded, but my goodness we should have been so much better than we were in that Championship season.
I’ll never forget how he disrespected our football heritage and tried to insult our intelligence of how the game should be played.
MT, let’s not overlook that ” respect the point ” BFS, assembled at the time, the most expensive Championship squad in history, he was still outcoached by
Brian Mc’Dermott (Reading) and Ian Atkinson (Saint’s) who had just been promoted from league One!
We walked away from Wembley scratching our head’s, saying how on earth did we win that one, as Ian Holloways inexpensive group of journeyman players out played us in the final ( I know that we routed them in the league, both H & A).
BFS, set us back years in youth development, playing ethos, boring games.
Yes, he was mandated to keep us up and he succeeded, but my goodness we should have been so much better than we were in that Championship season.
I’ll never forget how he disrespected our football heritage and tried to insult our intelligence of how the game should be played.
Indeed, it was as if BFS was specifically hell-bent on goading the fan base.