It's that time of year...

[drfchound]

It looks quite simple what Dickos is saying.
If a team hits very good form over the last fifteen games then they can achieve promotion.

[ravenrover]

For goodness sake fellas you are arguing about "what ifs"

[dickos1]

After todays loss, rovers ppg ave for the season has dropped to 1.48. which if continued would give us 68 points. Or 11th based on bst calculations.
A win against Bradford would only increase this to 1.53.
With games running out, We are miles off anything above 1.7. A win increases the ppg by around 0.5. So we would need a run of 4 wins to get above 1.7.

I’m comparing the last 15 games, so over the last 15 games we’ve averaged 1.6ppg, pretty much Danny’s tenure that.
Continue this form and we will finish this season on 70 points.
This time last year Bristol rovers and port vale were 9th and 11th in the league
Both got promoted

I'm not sure I understand the point you're making with respect to last year's promotions.

Port Vale ended the season P15 W9 D2 L4

Bristol Rovers ended the season P15 W10 D3 L2

So two sides won promotion from difficult positions by having exceptional form for the final 15 games. Is that what you think we will do?

Do you think the port vale and Bristol suppprters thought they could do it? Bristol went up automatically from similar form to us.
Dismissing it because of what we’ve done so far seems daft to me

[BillyStubbsTears]

No-one is dismissing it. I just suggest it's unlikely that we will get 33 points from the final 15 games. Not impossible. Just unlikely. You want to dream about that happening? Fine, fill your boots.

[normal rules]

I’m looking at it purely from a statistical perspective using ppg which obv changes with each and every game. A winning run changes things dramatically, as does a losing run.
A win here and there interspersed with losses changes little. And we don’t seem to be picking up points from draws. In fact we have drawn the least amount of games to date. Just 4. Along with our lack of strike power our ability to not get at least one point will no doubt be the Achilles heel for reaching the playoffs.
Yesterdays game, the Hartlepool game and the one at orient being good recent example.

[dickos1]

No-one is dismissing it. I just suggest it's unlikely that we will get 33 points from the final 15 games. Not impossible. Just unlikely. You want to dream about that happening? Fine, fill your boots.

Majority of the things that happen in football are unlikely,

[Silkscarf]

BST is just doing this for a bit of fun and I thank him for that. It’s just one way of looking at what might happen in future based on past events. But we all know from life this can never be 100% accurate. Stuff happens.

Last season we had literally months of people saying we are already down. We cannot stay up because our form is terrible. Look at the ppg , we’re hopeless etc. But other teams lose too. As it turned out we could have stayed up without our form being massively better. It’s fine margins as we know. Winning one game against a close rival would have done.

The fact is we’re in with a decent chance of the playoffs. We have players who can produce a good performance sometimes. Weeks ago many forum sages were saying forget it we’ve no chance with this squad.

[normal rules]

Weeks ago some were predicting non league.
And here we are , 4 points from the magical 50 with 15 games left.

[Filo]

Weeks ago some were predicting non league.
And here we are , 4 points from the magical 50 with 15 games left.

No way does the bottom 2 in L2 get anywhere near 50 points in any season, we’ve been safe for a good few games now

[Campsall rover]

Weeks ago some were predicting non league.
And here we are , 4 points from the magical 50 with 15 games left.

Imo we are already safe. I don’t see any of the bottom 3 getting 46 points never mind the bottom 2

Talk of National League was always ridiculous.  This squad is far better than last season & has got far too much ability and nous to be anywhere near the bottom of this league.

Anyway I think we can all look upwards from this point onwards. One prediction I will make is we will win more than we lose from the last 15 games.  Whether we make the play offs or not I don’t know.
But what I do know is we could. 
Need to get Miller scoring goals again. Think that’s the key.

[BillyStubbsTears]

No-one is dismissing it. I just suggest it's unlikely that we will get 33 points from the final 15 games. Not impossible. Just unlikely. You want to dream about that happening? Fine, fill your boots.

Majority of the things that happen in football are unlikely,

Agreed.

But just because SOME unlikely things happen, doesn't mean that a specific unlikely thing will happen.

[BigH]

Think we’ll get 7 wins and 3 draws out of our remaining games.

Would take us to 70 points and probably a 9th placed finish.

[normal rules]

Think we’ll get 7 wins and 3 draws out of our remaining games.

Would take us to 70 points and probably a 9th placed finish.

Get your sen down the bookies then.
Imo, there is no chance of this happening.

[Chris Black come back]

We have 15 games left. In the last 15 games we have won 8, drawn 0, lost 7. That’s 24 points and exactly equivalent to 7 wins and 3 draws.

[normal rules]

We have 15 games left. In the last 15 games we have won 8, drawn 0, lost 7. That’s 24 points and exactly equivalent to 7 wins and 3 draws.

That’s two off to the bookies. Good luck.

[Sammy Chung was King]

Nine wins, three draws, three losses, that would take us to seventy six points.

[BillyStubbsTears]

Nine wins, three draws, three losses, that would take us to seventy six points.

That's title-winning form for a third of the season.

[Chris Black come back]

We have 15 games left. In the last 15 games we have won 8, drawn 0, lost 7. That’s 24 points and exactly equivalent to 7 wins and 3 draws.

That’s two off to the bookies. Good luck.

I’ve expressed no view either way. I’ve given you facts, which you can read into what you wish.

[GazLaz]

71 or 72 points will be needed for 7th as previously stated. We are likely to finish about 9th or 10th on 66/67.

[Sammy Chung was King]

Nine wins, three draws, three losses, that would take us to seventy six points.

That's title-winning form for a third of the season.

Looking at the fixtures left that’s what I see happening. If so then we would be happy to be in the playoffs, but thinking what if we had started the season like this, we could have been champions ?

[BillyStubbsTears]

So yeah. If we'd had title winning form all season, we would win the title.

[normal rules]

And so, after today, the ppg has dropped to 1.42 ppg.
That’s 65/66 points come season end. Ish.
Which is 12 or 13th.
Unless there is a serious turnaround in form.

[normal rules]

What’s the latest calc BST?

[dickos1]

10 points from the last 6 games is a v good return.
 

[BillyStubbsTears]

What’s the latest calc BST?

Coming up.

[BillyStubbsTears]

Update after today.

1st 87 92 90
2nd 84 82 87
3rd 82 81 80
4th 79 79 79
5th 75 79 77
6th 73 76 76
7th 73 72 76
8th 70 69 75
9th 69 69 72
10th 69 69 67
11th 67 65 64
12th 64 65 64
13th 63 60 63
14th 61 58 57
The totals for all but one position have stayed within a +/2.5 point range over the last the and a half weeks. But a number of sides around the playoffs have hit form, pushing up the predicted points totals for some positions.

That's the flip side to Dickos's comment about 10 points from 6 games being a decent return. It isn't bad, especially in the context of the quality of opposition in those games. But it's no better than Carlilse, Northampton, Salford, Tranmere and Barrow, worse than Sutton and significantly worse than Stockport, Mansfield and Bradford.

Given that we were already playing catch up on most of those sides even before the recent run of 6 games, we have slipped even further behind them.

The predictor hasn't yet predicted a final total of less than 72 points for 7th place. That would require us to finish P13 W8 D1 L4.

If today's 76 point target is right, we'd have to end the season P13 W9 D2 L2
Title winning to exceptional title winning form required for the last 30% of the season.

It's not impossible, but you're a braver man than me if you put big money on it.

[BillyStubbsTears]

PS. The predictor doesn't predict individual team's final position, but for information, if we keep our form over the last ten games going to the end of the season, we finish in 11th-12th place with 64 points.

Keep the form over the last 6 games going and we finish 9th-10th with 68-69 points. We're likely to need at least something close to 2 points a game from here on in to have a chance of scraping into 7th place.

[dickos1]

The next two home games are massive if we win them both then we’ve got 16 points from 8 games.
Continue at that rate and we will end the season on 73 points which will be borderline

[Bessie Red]

PS. The predictor doesn't predict individual team's final position, but for information, if we keep our form over the last ten games going to the end of the season, we finish in 11th-12th place with 64 points.

Keep the form over the last 6 games going and we finish 9th-10th with 68-69 points. We're likely to need at least something close to 2 points a game from here on in to have a chance of scraping into 7th place.

If you look at the next 6 games (4 at home, 2 away) we could realistically get 14 points (draws against Salford & Northampton wins against Harrogate, Wimbledon, Crawley & Crewe). This would put us on 61pts with 7 to play. Looking at the last 7 we have a good chance of getting 12 pts. It is an extremely difficult ask to do the above but can be done. We are not conceding as many as we had been and look alot more secure at the back. We need GM to find his early season form & we may have an outside chance of getting to 73 points after 46 games. Tough but definitely doable.

[BillyStubbsTears]

Bessie.

I agree. It's possible but very unlikely. And the predictor currently says that would only be enough for 8th-9th place.

We CAN make the playoffs of course. But it would require form that we haven't exhibited for several years.