A question

[BobG]

If Rovers lost 1-0 this Saturday and Crawley won 1-0,  just how would the placings in the league of both be decided?

Note! It couldn't be by points, goal difference, goals scored or victories. Results across their 2 games??

BobG

Later: damn!! Goal difference and goals scored would do it after all. Crawley would have 1 more. But assuming that would have been identical, it's still an interesting question

[Nudga]

Rock, paper, scissors, obviously!

[IDM]

Goal difference wouldn’t be the same..

[Dutch Uncle]

Could happen with us and Crewe

e.g. we lose 0-2, Goals F/A, currently 71-66 become 71-68
Crewe lose 3-4. their goals, currently 68-64 also becomes 71-68
If Barrow and Crawley win then Crewe and us are vying for the last playoff place.

Don't know the answer, but we would have both more wins and a better head-to-head vs Crewe

Edit: I remember in the mid 1960s, probably 1964-65, I was staying with my relatives in Swansea, and the local papers were full of the situation regarding relegation because on the last day a not unrealistic combination of results would put Swansea and someone else (Swindon maybe) on identical points, goals scored and conceded. I think they were thinking it would be a one off playoff. The situation didn't arise, Swansea lost badly, were relegated fair and square, and anyway the rules will certainly have changed since then.   

 

[Monkcaster_Rover]

Meet in Coventry or somewhere in the middle and have a big dust up.

[wilts rover]

It's quite convoluted but essentially after a number of criteria have been exhausted - a play-off.

https://www.gazettelive.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/how-promotion-would-decided-clubs-11238267

[Herman Hessian]

league position is determined, in order, by points obtained, goal difference, goals scored, a mini-league of the results between two or more teams ranked using the previous three criteria, and finally a series of one or more play-off matches

[BobG]

Thank you Wilts. Thank you Herman.

Hope you're both well? It's been a while....

BobG

[Iberian Red]

If Rovers lost 1-0 this Saturday and Crawley won 1-0,  just how would the placings in the league of both be decided?

Note! It couldn't be by points, goal difference, goals scored or victories. Results across their 2 games??

BobG

Later: damn!! Goal difference and goals scored would do it after all. Crawley would have 1 more. But assuming that would have been identical, it's still an interesting question

Maybe take a leaf out of some of our Etonian,Bullingdon Club PMs.



Soggy biscuit.

[Herman Hessian]

Thank you Wilts. Thank you Herman.

Hope you're both well? It's been a while....

BobG

all good thanks, Bob - you know me - out the woodwork at the sniff of some reflected glory, never been one for the hard yards... 

[adamtherover]

Can we just get woody and big tom in the ring, Crewe can bring as many as they want, winner goes through !!!

[Wokingviking]

Remember the days of “Goal Average” in the days when it was also just 2 points for a win and so there were often more teams tied on points than nowadays? (Or I may be imagining that, I have no statistics to back it up)

I think Goal Average was calculated as the ratio of goals scored to goals conceded.  Which meant you could have exactly the same goal difference as another team, but if you scored more (and correspondingly conceded more of course) then bizarrely you were worse off.  The system favoured defensive play.

[Dutch Uncle]

Remember the days of “Goal Average” in the days when it was also just 2 points for a win and so there were often more teams tied on points than nowadays? (Or I may be imagining that, I have no statistics to back it up)

I think Goal Average was calculated as the ratio of goals scored to goals conceded.  Which meant you could have exactly the same goal difference as another team, but if you scored more (and correspondingly conceded more of course) then bizarrely you were worse off.  The system favoured defensive play.

I reckon young people's mental arithmetic is worse today than in the 1960's for 3 reasons:

- Calculators instead of log tables (remember them?)
- Going metric
- Goal Difference replacing Goal Average

29 of us huddled together in t' Cowshed with a log tables book recalculating Goal Average with every goal going in against Aldershot, with the 7-0 taking us from 5th to top. The youth of today.....................

[dickos1]

If we lost 1-0 and Crawley won 1-0 they would go above us on goal difference

[BobG]

Yes.  We all know that Dickos. See the postscript to the original post. I added it  within 3 minutes of the original post.

[wilts rover]

Thank you Wilts. Thank you Herman.

Hope you're both well? It's been a while....

BobG

No problem Bob. See you at Wembley although we will both have to make our own way there this time.

[graingrover]

In the olden days either Barrow or  Workington would be bottom of League 4 every season .There was no way Non League clubs would be admitted but Workington had to apply for re election. The decision was a majority vote by all other fourth division clubs . Can you imagine the number of rounds  the Workington Chairman must have paid in opponents Board rooms after games ever increasing as end of season approached .Dutch may have the detail in his super data base ?

[Draytonian III]

Hartlepool 11
Crewe 7
Barrow 6
Workington 5
Rovers 3
Are amongst the teams who had to apply for re-election, the number is the times they had to

[Herman Hessian]

In the olden days either Barrow or  Workington would be bottom of League 4 every season .There was no way Non League clubs would be admitted but Workington had to apply for re election. The decision was a majority vote by all other fourth division clubs . Can you imagine the number of rounds  the Workington Chairman must have paid in opponents Board rooms after games ever increasing as end of season approached .Dutch may have the detail in his super data base ?

all the information is on wikipedia, here - i never knew that Saturday's opponents had been slung out the league and then voted back in again...

[graingrover]

Hartlepool 11
Crewe 7
Barrow 6
Workington 5

Spoilt my story a bit but I did not realise WE had had to apply three times !

[Herman Hessian]

looks like the footballing authorities have really got it in for Gateshead - this season's ejection from the national league play-offs, and being thrown out of the league on the one and only time they had to apply for re-election - seems a trifle harsh given the multiple times that Hartlepool, Halifax, Southport and the like went cap in hand to the league !

[graingrover]

Sentimentally speaking the only club which I was sorry to see lose league status is Bradford Park Avenue ( Kevin Hector was a classy player )

[Donnywolf]

I remember Wigan ( then Borough ) trying to nick a place every year but it was seeming like a closed shop

Then one year it seemed like they could be "in" finally.

However they handed out Pens inscribed "Into the League with Wigan Borough" at the Meeting and they failed to get in

We can't be bought said the voting Clubs lol so they blew them out again

[Wokingviking]

It was called “The Old Pals Act” and the only reason Barrow and Workington lost the vote was because the rest of the fourth division didn’t like the long away trips.

[scawsby steve]

I remember Wigan ( then Borough ) trying to nick a place every year but it was seeming like a closed shop

Then one year it seemed like they could be "in" finally.

However they handed out Pens inscribed "Into the League with Wigan Borough" at the Meeting and they failed to get in

We can't be bought said the voting Clubs lol so they blew them out again

That's it, Wolfie, you've just confirmed your Methuselah status in remembering Wigan Borough.

They folded in 1932 and were replaced by Wigan Athletic.

[Surrey Rover]

Up until season 1975/76 there was no limit on the number of non league clubs who could apply to join the Football League. From season 1976/77 only two were permitted.

In that last season of unlimited applications Gainsborough Trinity were amongst nine non league sides who applied but fell well short with just one vote.
http://www.englishfootballstats.co.uk/Level%204%20Tables/1975-76.htm

[Donnywolf]

I remember Wigan ( then Borough ) trying to nick a place every year but it was seeming like a closed shop

Then one year it seemed like they could be "in" finally.

However they handed out Pens inscribed "Into the League with Wigan Borough" at the Meeting and they failed to get in

We can't be bought said the voting Clubs lol so they blew them out again

That's it, Wolfie, you've just confirmed your Methuselah status in remembering Wigan Borough.

They folded in 1932 and were replaced by Wigan Athletic.

Yes , thanks SS.

I remember the bribery cost them a place in FL but had it seared in my head that it was Wigan Borough and I hold my hands up .

I also remember Springfield Park ( Wigan's home Ground ) as having the thinnest goal posts I've ever seen

Hope someone at least confirms that one as I've mentioned it on here a few times and nobody has commented lol

Cheers again Wolfie

[BobG]

I remember watching none league Wigan Athletic winning, I think 2-0, at Belle Vue in an FA Cup tie. That was so, so, bad.....

BobG

[Campsall rover]

Man Utd won the 1st Div on goal average from Leeds Utd in 1964/65 season

Leeds drew their last match 3-3 at Birmingham
If it had been 2-2 Leeds would have been Champions
Yes it was that close
Unbelievable Jeff

But yes it favoured conceding less goals not scoring more.

[Dutch Uncle]

The thing that bugged me about Goal Average was people saying 'we lost out by 0.36 of a goal' or something similar.

First, importantly, Goal Average was a unitless quantity, just a number. It is just like for example gradient. A gradient of 1 in 10, or 10% is unitless (1 foot height gained for every 10 feet travelled horizontally or feet divided by feet). No-one would say that is a gradient of 0.10 feet.     

Secondly annoyingly, it made it sound close when it often isn't.

For example 80/50 is a goal average of 1.6; 60/50 is a goal average of 1.2

So the first is better by 0.4 which sounds close, but the second team would have needed 21 goals without reply to beat the first. 

Here ends the mathematics lesson