Championship - 2023/24

Players can still dive to win penalties without VAR.

Players can still miss penalties and concede last-minute winners at the other end.

Same old, same old.

 

Sounds like a hoot.

 

Mostly but some Mondays , Fridays as well .
As an aside how do you think you will fare next season ?
Or would you rather postpone comment until you know who is staying and who is bailing out ?

 

I genuinely have no idea mate, there was going to be a mass exodus anyway because of contracts being up this summer or next. The club has been leaderless since Rodgers mentally checked out two years ago and built a massive white elephant training complex so will need to sell sell sell.

It’s going to be a very different looking club next season either way, could go straight back up, could do a Sunderland.

 

I dare say at the start of the season he thought he'd get the chance to go back to Hillsborough next season!

 

While your financials don't seem great at the moment (borrowing money against future Prem money which won't come now...gulp), one thing you will have in your favour is that you will be able to recoup a lot from the likes of Maddison and Barnes. Hard to say who will stay, because this is quite possibly the most unexpected relegation in Prem history

 

Probably needed a spoiler alert, so apologies in advance, but the top 6 next season will be, in no particular order, Leeds, Leicester, Soton, Sunderland, Middlesbrough and Ipswich.

 

Magazines and websites etc. always predict each summer that the top 6 will be the three that came down plus the three that lost in the playoffs, so your only outlier is Ipswich instead of Coventry.

 

What odds Leeds vs Leicester is the Friday night kick off match.

 

Barnsley so VI can give them a good clap at Oakwell

 

Yes, and…?

 

I think my underlying point was that those, in my view, unimaginative predictions are always wrong. The three clubs coming down don’t automatically do well (hello Watford and Norwich) and it’s always likely that a team or two will emerge from lower down the division to make the playoffs at least like Coventry did. Ipswich is an interesting shout, but getting straight to the top after promotion is always tough.

 

As if he lasts that long!

 

I worked out you were 7 when it happened, so I don’t know how well you remember it (if you were into football back then) but for me Ipswich’s relegation was the most surprising, because there was absolutely no sign it was going to happen the previous season when they narrowly missed out on the Champions League the previous season. Same goes for Reading, although it was slightly less of a surprise as they’re a much smaller club and they’d only been in the top flight for one season before. I’d add Sheffield United for similar reasons; getting relegated after finishing midtable is not that uncommon but it was the manner of it that was so unexpected. Generally though, despite the Premier League having a reputation for being a tough and unforgiving league, big declines are not that common - if you finish anywhere between 6th and 14th, you expect to stay up the following season (OK we didn’t but should have and had more than enough opportunities to put right our terrible start) - plunges like Barnsley, MK Dons, Scunthorpe and Notts County in recent years when they went from the play-offs to relegation in one year are virtually unheard off at this level.

Whereas in other cases there are usually signs the previous season - when West Ham finished 7th in 2001/02 it was in spite of a poor defence which became more regularly exposed the next season as teams were less afraid to attack them at Upton Park, and though Leicester finished 8th it flattered them quite a bit (they spent most of the season in the bottom half and didn’t keep many more clean sheets than we did).

 

What is Leicester’s financial situation like @Filbert

Expect to see you guys have a massive turnover of players, but I think you will keep Ward, Iversen, Barnes, Justin, Dewsbury-Hall, Evans, Souttar, Amartey and Thomas. Which for the championship is a solid base of players. There may be a couple more you keep who I can’t think of off the top of my head. Get the manager right in and you should go back up.

 

I do vaguely recall Ipswich going down, I don't remember the previous season though (although in fairness, they went from promotion from Div 1 to 5th in the Prem to relegation in the space of 3 seasons so would it be fair to say that middle season was a flash in the pan like Reading?). Not gonna say for an instant I ever thought Leicester would go down, but you're right that they massively flattered to deceive last season, they racked up the goals against us, but I can't say I was particularly impressed by them either game! Sheffield United went into the Covid-enforced break in 5th (which at the time was good enough for a Champions League spot as City had provisionally been banned), but that seemed to kill them stone dead, and when they picked up one or two key injuries they very soon looked out of their depth at that level, I suppose you could classify them with Reading and Ipswich as a classic case of second season syndrome

 

No way they keep Barnes, and Evans is out of contract (although might not have many better options at his age). Wouldn't be surprised if the others go (apart from the goalies and Souttar they'd never have expected to be playing Championship football at this stage in their careers), but as we so often see, it's never as if anything approaching the entire squad is shifted, there are always a fair number of players who stay on whether they like it or not

 

I expect Vardy will stay also. They have rich owners who will support them next season. I expect Leicester to win the league quite comfortably next year.

They need a new keeper though. The one they’ve been using is hopeless.

 

Barnes is Leicester through and through. We said we wouldn’t keep Sarr and Pedro but we did. They don’t have the same loyalty as Barnes. Barnes in my opinion definitely stays. Leicester will look to shift Maddison, Tielemans, Iheanacho, Daka and a few others that will want out, before selling Barnes.

 

They might keep Barnes but I think the demand and their likely desperate need for money will be more than Sarr + JP. Rumours that Newcastle, Villa and West Ham are already interested. Maddison also linked with Newcastle and Tielemans is off on a free. Some of the bigger money players (Iheanacho, Maddison, Ndidi, Praet) are all out of contract next summer which will likely reduce their value whereas Barnes has an extra year over them so overall reckon he'll get sold to help balance the books a bit

 

We didn't sell Sarr in 2020 because we were determined to get our money back, and then last summer, IIRC we accepted £25m for him from Villa but Gerrard turned the deal down at the death. As for JP, he was something of an unknown quantity even last summer, neither of those apply to Barnes who has performed better than either ever has at the highest level, and didn't cost Leicester a penny

 

I can’t see them keeping Barnes. Been good for several seasons including this one and would walk into most bottom half teams.

 

For three seasons he was getting into a top half team!

 

Sheff Wed promoted with the last kick (header).

 

Congratulations Wednesday. The league looks quite scary next season.

 

Looks like another local game for @Steel City Gold (mind you it would have been pretty local either way!)