Away Matches The Key To Any Chance Of The Playoffs

[Loderingo]

Listening to the Cardiff game on Radio Wales (my internet went down and that was all I could get on Virgin) they had a lot of praise for the pace of our attackers but noted the fact that we didn't use that very well as we kept hoofing long balls. If we can stop doing that and use our pace on the counter attack well we might have a real opportunity in the 2nd half of the season. Looking at our fixture list is really quite oddly unbalanced with 6 of the top 7 at home and all of the bottom 6 away.

HOME

Newcastle (1st)

Forest (2nd)

WBA (3rd)

Swansea (4th)

Cardiff (5th)

Leicester (7th)

Doncaster (12th)

Coventry (15th)

Barnsley (16th)

Derby (18th)

AWAY

Sheff U (6th)

Palace (8th)

Blackpool (9th)

Mboro (13th)

Watford (14th)

Ipswich (19th)

S****horpe (20th)

Sheff W (21st)

Reading (22nd)

Plymouth (23rd)

Peterboro (24th)

Starting with the home ties, the 6 of the top 7 will likely be more open games than some we've seen like S****horpe who came to AG for a point. On the one hand we might have more chances to score but on the other hand these teams will have better attacks and won't let us off the hook as teams like Reading did. We should expect to be turned over at least once. Realistically 2W, 2D, 2L would be OK from these 6 games. The other 4 home games look more winnable and we got 10 points from these games last year but 2W,2D is more plausible. Looking at the away games Sheff U and Palace will probably be hard games, while Blackpool is hard to predict being the last game of the season. The rest though shouldn't give us too many sleepless nights. If we use our pace well then I think we could get something like 6W, 3D, 2L from those. So in total that would give us 10W, 7D, 4L and 37 points for a total of 72, which might just be enough to scrape in. We'd probably need one more win to be sure.

TBH I think it might be a bridge too far but lets at least give it a go. Cardiff are 4 points ahead of us but have lost 2 more games (because they have won 3 more). Too may draws have cost us and will cost us. We need to go for broke especially away from home and use that pace well.

The bookies put us at 12-1 for promotion (so maybe 3-1 get to the playoffs), which feels right. For the pessimists we are 25-1 for relegation. Interestingly Gary Jognson is joint 2nd favourite as next Champ manager to leave at 5-1 after Nigel Clough.

[mindjuicer]

Worth a bump.

Hope counter-attacking is next on the list of things that need coaching cos we suck at it.