[Albion] The bottom half of the Premier League: 10 teams, 6 points

[scousefan]

I agree that tough games come in patches and it’s hard to judge where teams really are relative to each other. However we are coming up to the half way point where teams have played each other once. At that point (if you swap the Chelsea and Watford gages we will probably be close to bottom three.

When we didn’t sign a striker in the summer I would have taken that. If we can strengthen we’ll in January we will be OK.

One question is who has the hardest second half of the season. Despite our previous away form I would argue that points should come at home, so it may be better to have home fixtures against weaker clubs (and therefore away fixtures against stronger clubs). Our fixture list is quite well balanced. We have the following home games in the second round of matches: Bournemouth, Chelsea, West Ham, Swansea, Arsenal, Leicester, Huddersfield, Spurs, Man Utd. For comparison Palace have: Man City, Burnley, Newcastle, Spurs, Man Utd, Liverpool, Brighton, Leicester, West Brom. I would suggest that winning our home faves against West Ham, Swansea and Huddersfield will be key that’s staying up.

 

[Dougie]

Well, you can always run poorly in a 400 m race...and then speed up...

Or finish last .

 

[Steve.S]

I expected us to be near or at the bottom by now, so it’s a bonus we are not. West Ham, Bournemouth and Palace all have squads to slowly pull away from the bottom. I think it will be Swansea, West Brom and then one from Huddersfield, Stoke and Us. We have to face the fact that we do not have enough strength in depth

 

[OzMike]

Really no easy games in this division and can't really complain about our position, just some of the performances.

 

[Weststander]

think we'll be in 17th by end of year out of bottom 3 by goal difference and the striker search will be paramount to our possible survival

The search should have neen done by now, with TB and Winstanley having had a furtther few months to get everything ready. We need the new signings at the beginning of January, with more winnable games in that month.

 

[Nobby]

I expected us to be near or at the bottom by now, so it’s a bonus we are not. West Ham, Bournemouth and Palace all have squads to slowly pull away from the bottom. I think it will be Swansea, West Brom and then one from Huddersfield, Stoke and Us. We have to face the fact that we do not have enough strength in depth

No one mentions Newcastle. Poor run of form and in the middle of a sale process which seems to be stalling.


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[AZ Gull]

If we lose both, they still need to win both to go above us (4 points would do, but would require a significant GD swing)

They are three points behind us. 4 points would put them above us (if we lose all three matches), irrespective of GD swing. I assume you meant to say 3 points would do (but would require a significant GD swing).

 

[Bozza]

They are three points behind us. 4 points would put them above us (if we lose all three matches), irrespective of GD swing. I assume you meant to say 3 points would do (but would require a significant GD swing).

No, I did mean to say 4. For some reason I mis-read the table - I'm not entirely sure how - maybe I was looking at West Brom.

Three is obviously the correct answer.

 

[Napier's Knee]

No one mentions Newcastle. Poor run of form and in the middle of a sale process which seems to be stalling.


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This. And Benitez has got a hard question to ponder if he wants to carry on being considered "one of Europe's top coaches" - does he stay and try to stabilise Newcastle with all the risks that brings - or does he jump when offered something better (as he will be, purely on the basis of Hobson's Choice)?

 

[Steve.S]

No one mentions Newcastle. Poor run of form and in the middle of a sale process which seems to be stalling.


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Agree they could be in the mix.

 

[AZ Gull]

Palace won't play at home against 10 men every week.

No, but they have beaten Stoke at home (which we failed to do), and have just beaten Watford at home, which we have yet to match. Plus they beat Chelsea.

They may well have had an appalling start to the season, but the simple fact is they are currently only 3 points behind us (albeit from one more game played).

 

[el punal]

Are you impersonating a siren? Or a prick? Which is it?

You!

 

[The Gem]

Palace won't play at home against 10 men every week.

You mean like the 10 men they played last night for all of FIVE minutes !!!!!!

 

[Spicy]

Would have bitten your hand off at the beginning of the season for 13th at this stage.

Agreed and we have got used to doing ok. Hoping we can find the determination we showed in the first few games again and not be afraid of our opponents.

 

[Dave the OAP]

Other than the last ten minutes tonight, we were utterly dire.

But that just proves the point...this division is all about results. I think that also describes some managers tactics in the premier. Certainly hughton's style is set us up to not get beaten and hope we catch teams out at some time during the 90 minutes Warnock explained that when on TV a while ago. He theory is that if you are hard to beat, it tends to frustrate teams who then push on and leave gaps.

there is no doubt that this will come down to the wire, but we can see that teams are starting to put runs together, in the same way as we had earlier this season.

If we look at our next few games, we would have gone into this division targeting Burnley, Watford, Bournemouth as games that are must wins to keep us in here. The likes of Tottenham and Chelsea probably are not on our radar and it begs the question as to use these games to rest our " best " players and give a go at the fringe players, so concentrating of the next two home games.

 

[Dave the OAP]

The Premier League is all about goals. A strong team, good defence etc might get you through in some lower divisions, but I've always felt the Premier League is such an attacking and open league that it is the teams with quality in front of goal that will do enough to win games and those without that will struggle.

Therefore, I find it hard to believe Palace will be in a relegation battle. Like him or not (and I'm definitely in the 'not' camp), Zaha is the best player in the bottom half of the division and Townsend, Loftus-Cheek and Benteke aren't bad either. The same goes for West Ham. Hernandez, Carroll, Antonio, Arnautovic etc have no place at the bottom of this league. If we go back a few weeks I'd have been saying the same about Leicester and Everton, both of whom have now started to climb away.

So at the other end of the spectrum, we have Swansea, Huddersfield, Newcastle, Stoke, West Brom and BHAFC. All those teams look woefully short of quality in attack and are likely to be in the relegation battle until the very end unless they get it right in January.

The only team I can't place at the moment is Bournemouth. Unlike the teams I just mentioned they do have some quality upfront in Defoe, Wilson and King, but I'm not sure they're good enough to guarantee survival, particularly as the rest of their team is fairly basic. So I would still say they're a contender for the bottom three, but one with an advantage over most of the others.

Spot on

 

[Machiavelli]

The Premier League is all about goals. A strong team, good defence etc might get you through in some lower divisions, but I've always felt the Premier League is such an attacking and open league that it is the teams with quality in front of goal that will do enough to win games and those without that will struggle.

Therefore, I find it hard to believe Palace will be in a relegation battle. Like him or not (and I'm definitely in the 'not' camp), Zaha is the best player in the bottom half of the division and Townsend, Loftus-Cheek and Benteke aren't bad either. The same goes for West Ham. Hernandez, Carroll, Antonio, Arnautovic etc have no place at the bottom of this league. If we go back a few weeks I'd have been saying the same about Leicester and Everton, both of whom have now started to climb away.

So at the other end of the spectrum, we have Swansea, Huddersfield, Newcastle, Stoke, West Brom and BHAFC. All those teams look woefully short of quality in attack and are likely to be in the relegation battle until the very end unless they get it right in January.

The only team I can't place at the moment is Bournemouth. Unlike the teams I just mentioned they do have some quality upfront in Defoe, Wilson and King, but I'm not sure they're good enough to guarantee survival, particularly as the rest of their team is fairly basic. So I would still say they're a contender for the bottom three, but one with an advantage over most of the others.

Great post. There's really not too much I'd disagree about re your analysis of players and clubs, and I certainly think the six you identify are the ones that are most in trouble. Swansea in my view are as good as down, and West Brom look in trouble. If that is the case, we'll need to get results against both of them.
I agree about Bournemouth, and would take any of those three strikers as our first choice, and that's despite how well Murray and Hemed have done for us this season. It was obvious at the outset that we needed a different style of striker to them, one that could play on their own up-front, but with more pace, and a goalscoring ability at least as good as Hemed's and, ideally, equal to or better than Murray's. This leads to why Bournemouth are potentially down there in the mix, and I can only think of two reasons. First, their midfield and defence is inferior to their rivals. Second, their style of play -- which is attractive but hasn't deviated from Howe's script for a while -- has been worked out by cannier managers.

 

[Papa Lazarou]

This thread is depressing me...

Not that I'm suggesting it's wrong, just depressing in a realistic sort of way.

 

[Bozza]

This thread is depressing me...

Not that I'm suggesting it's wrong, just depressing in a realistic sort of way.

I know I keep banging the "hope we don't regret those 4 home draws" drum, but it's those games that may end up hurting us.