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The Business End of the Season


Kmcalpin
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Of late, things have been a  little argumentative and acrimonious at times on on here. So lets have some harmless fun.

Given BobbyBingo's thought provoking post on the Dundee match day thread, I thought I'd try to predict the outcome of the 7 remaining games. It comes with a significant health warning though. Some big assumptions: the bottom 6 remains as is; our post split fixture list pans out as we would predict; and my predictions are inherently biased by being a slight pessimist. Here goes:

Dundee (A) 0 pts

Hibs (H) 1 pt

Ross County (A) 0 pts

Livingston (H) 3 pts

Aberdeen (A) 0 pts

St Johnstone (H) 1 pt

Hibs (A) 0 pts

So, thats one win and 2 draws and we finish of 38 points in 9th position, behind Hibs and Aberdeen. The one factor suppressing any optimism I might have is that we are virtually certain to concede at least one goal in every game. Post split results are notoriously difficult to predict and we could realistically finish with anywhere between 37 and 40 points. I think Ross County will finish on about 35 points and St Johnstone will also end on about 35 points. Goal difference will be crucial and the scrap for 11th spot could be very very tight.

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Dundee (A) 1 pts

Hibs (H) 1 pt

Ross County (A) 1 pt

Livingston (H) 3 pts

Aberdeen (A) 1 pt

St Johnstone (H) 3pts

Hibs (A) 0 pts

 

10 points for me....... (leaving us on 43 - possibly ambitious given how bad we have been all season. Would bite your hand off for that right now

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I agree about hating the split. It makes us look like a tinpot league and takes away some of the integrity of playing every team the same number of times.

I also hate the playoffs for a similar reason. There is no way a team that finishes fourth should get a sudden death chance for promotion over the team that finished second after a full season. After Dundee Utd and Raith Rovers have opened a huge gap and been slugging it out every week, can you imagine if it was Dunfermline - 17 points behind - who got the shot at the playoff? Would be a travesty.

I'd rather not have any play offs and prefer a straight 2 up, 2 down. If we do need to have one, however, then 2nd bottom vs 2nd top is the only way for me.

I'm not going to make any predictions about the business end of the season yet. Once we know who we're playing (and where) I'll fire up the ZX Spectrum and figure it out.

 

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7 hours ago, weeyin said:

I'd rather not have any play offs and prefer a straight 2 up, 2 down. If we do need to have one, however, then 2nd bottom vs 2nd top is the only way for me.

 

 

very sensible way forward and completely onboard with this.  It's a complete nonsense that someone who's 10-12 points could adrift could end up being promoted.   

If that was deemed the appropriate way forward for promotion - them same would need to apply for relegation, which no-one would ever sign up for.

Overall the Scottish game is like a slow painful death and becomes more amateurish as each season passes. 

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I will go........

Dundee (A) 1 pts

Hibs (H) 1 pt

Ross County (A) 1 pts

Livingston (H) 3 pts

Aberdeen (A) 1 pts

St Johnstone (H) 1 pt

Hibs (A) 0 pts

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9 hours ago, weeyin said:

I also hate the playoffs for a similar reason. There is no way a team that finishes fourth should get a sudden death chance for promotion over the team that finished second after a full season. After Dundee Utd and Raith Rovers have opened a huge gap and been slugging it out every week, can you imagine if it was Dunfermline - 17 points behind - who got the shot at the playoff? Would be a travesty.

100% agree. There is little or no sporting integrity in the current system. Did Partick Thistle not beat Peterhead in the 2006 playoffs on penalties?  Both clubs finished 13 points behind the runners up, Morton. A complete farce.

I'm all for discretionary play offs though. You could set a points difference margin, for example, teams finishing on the same points, or within say 2 points of each other. Final league placings in such tight situations could easily be down to refereeing errors.  If teams finished more than 2 points apart then there are no playoffs. 

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Two wins , two draws and three losses. Depending on winning the important ones against second and third bottom

And remembering we are total bottle merchants at six pointer games..

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2 hours ago, Kmcalpin said:

100% agree. There is little or no sporting integrity in the current system. Did Partick Thistle not beat Peterhead in the 2006 playoffs on penalties?  Both clubs finished 13 points behind the runners up, Morton. A complete farce.

I'm all for discretionary play offs though. You could set a points difference margin, for example, teams finishing on the same points, or within say 2 points of each other. Final league placings in such tight situations could easily be down to refereeing errors.  If teams finished more than 2 points apart then there are no playoffs. 

The playoffs should be the same as the English system ie 2 sides relegated from the Scottish Premiership, 1 automatic promotion from championship and the other spot via the playoffs. As what we have now is biased in favour of the side finishing 11th as they only have 2 games to play.

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We’ve got 7 wins, 12 draws and 12 losses across 31 games. If that pattern continues for the final 7 games, I don't see anything other than 1 win, 3 draws and 3 losses.

We're not very good.

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42 minutes ago, Spiderpig said:

The playoffs should be the same as the English system ie 2 sides relegated from the Scottish Premiership, 1 automatic promotion from championship and the other spot via the playoffs. As what we have now is biased in favour of the side finishing 11th as they only have 2 games to play.

Team in 11th play 38 + 2 across the season, if the team finishing second gets through they play 36 + 4, pretty equal.

The inequality is if the team in 3rd or 4th prevails but from above they have an ‘unearned’ opportunity.

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53 minutes ago, Spiderpig said:

The playoffs should be the same as the English system ie 2 sides relegated from the Scottish Premiership, 1 automatic promotion from championship and the other spot via the playoffs. As what we have now is biased in favour of the side finishing 11th as they only have 2 games to play.

Still destroys the integrity of the league format. Look at the English Championship this season. Ipswich, Leeds and Leicester fighting for the top spot with 87, 86 and 85 points respectively. If there are 3 promotion spots they deserve one each for their consistent form. Norwich, who are 6th and 21 points behind Leicester (and won only 19 games compared to Leicester's 27 wins) shouldn't even be in that conversation.

Playoffs are a horrible American idea that should have stayed this side of the Atlantic.

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53 minutes ago, weeyin said:

Still destroys the integrity of the league format. Look at the English Championship this season. Ipswich, Leeds and Leicester fighting for the top spot with 87, 86 and 85 points respectively. If there are 3 promotion spots they deserve one each for their consistent form. Norwich, who are 6th and 21 points behind Leicester (and won only 19 games compared to Leicester's 27 wins) shouldn't even be in that conversation.

Playoffs are a horrible American idea that should have stayed this side of the Atlantic.

Not true, the league integrity is fine, the teams know how many automatic promotion spots there are when they start so they all strive for the top two places, and if say a team misses out by 1 point or goal difference etc then tough they've not been good enough over the league season. But now with the playoffs they have another chance to get promoted as do the other 3 teams in the playoff spots who have all had decent seasons to earn those spots. 

The best teams over the season usually get promoted either route 1, automatic or route 2 a playoff final win, just as the worst teams get relegated,so for me the English system works well.

 

 

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4 hours ago, wellfan said:

We’ve got 7 wins, 12 draws and 12 losses across 31 games. If that pattern continues for the final 7 games, I don't see anything other than 1 win, 3 draws and 3 losses.

We're not very good.

Good news is, if the pattern continues across the board, we're safe, and I don't see any of the leopards changing their spots at this stage.

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  • 4 weeks later...

A good day today in terms of results although it would have been the icing on the cake to pick up something ourselves. For us to be caught by either Ross County or St Johnstone now they need to record 2 wins and 2 draws and 2 wins and a draw respectively, and for us to pick up nothing. We should be safe enough for 9th place and the bottom 6 table will probably look pretty much as is in terms of final placings. I'd have bitten your hand off months ago to finish 10th never mind 9th. 

The consolation for our good friends in Dingwall and Perth is that whoever finishes 11th should coast through the play offs.

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On 4/2/2024 at 12:20 PM, wellfan said:

We’ve got 7 wins, 12 draws and 12 losses across 31 games. If that pattern continues for the final 7 games, I don't see anything other than 1 win, 3 draws and 3 losses.

We're not very good.

3 wins, 1 draw and 1 loss since this prediction. Let’s see if we can make it 5 wins, then maybe I’ll change my opinion of Kettlewell. 

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