[Archived] Automatic promotion

[Tony Rover]

Just now, Bigdoggsteel said:

What 3 games are on Sky? Wigan I presume?

Yes Wigan is the big one, Bradford will be interesting with Grayson there. Other one being Bury, always seem to drop points to teams near the bottom half. 

[Sparks Rover]

I fancy a trip to Wembley 

[philipl]

We have the squad to go up automatically.

We have the team spirit to do it too.

Just need Mowbray to have the belief in the lads which is needed to clinch it.

Win 11 out of 15 and frankly nobody else can do anything about us even if we lose the other 4 to fellow contenders.

[JHRover]

If we continue on the sort of form we've had of late then I expect we'd get somewhere in the region of 6 wins, 7 draws and 2 defeats from our remaining 15.

If that happened we'd have 85 points for the season, which usually would be enough, but this season probably won't be.

[Crimpshrine]

3 hours ago, Sparks Rover said:

I fancy a trip to Wembley 

And why not ?

Winning the playoffs is the most emotional, glorious and lucrative way of getting promotion. The Raos could make a triumphant appearance and we can all live happily ever after.

Go up automatically and we will miss all this excitement.

On second thoughts I'd settle for 2nd place! 

[JamieUK]

Charlton are doing £5 a ticket for their game against Shrewsbury in a couple of weeks. A decent following behind them could do us a favour...

[DE.]

Let's do ourselves favours rather than look for others to do it for us. We were constantly relying on other teams to do us favours at the end of last season, and here we are. All I care about at this point is Rovers doing the business. Get our own house in order and we won't have to look to others for help. 

[Guest]

5 hours ago, DE. said:

Let's do ourselves favours rather than look for others to do it for us.

Well, it's Mowbray's job to do the former, and our job as fans to hope for the latter (oh, and the former)!

[pk1875]

We could yet end up with the nightmare scenario of
16-17 season relegated with one of highest points totals to drop  from the Championship
17-18 miss out on promotion with one of the highest points totals in League 1

That said I do think we will go up this season.......

As the song says "How we get there I don't care"

[Bigdoggsteel]

9 minutes ago, pk1875 said:

We could yet end up with the nightmare scenario of
16-17 season relegated with one of highest points totals to drop  from the Championship
17-18 miss out on promotion with one of the highest points totals in League 1

That said I do think we will go up this season.......

As the song says "How we get there I don't care"

I thought that too, although I believe we will do enough over the next 15-16 games to go up 

[philipl]

Doing the job by winning two on the trot.

Now need to win 9 out of the last 13 if we are going to be certain of insuring ourselves against games in hand. Will reduce it to 8 out of 13 if Shrewsbury lose tonight but I think there is far too much wishful thinking about Gillingham despite the excellent run they are on.

From here on in, 90 is the absolute minimum number of points for automatic promotion but 95 has still to be the target. 

[JacknOry]

1 hour ago, philipl said:

Doing the job by winning two on the trot.

Now need to win 9 out of the last 13 if we are going to be certain of insuring ourselves against games in hand. Will reduce it to 8 out of 13 if Shrewsbury lose tonight but I think there is far too much wishful thinking about Gillingham despite the excellent run they are on.

From here on in, 90 is the absolute minimum number of points for automatic promotion but 95 has still to be the target. 

i dunno, Shrews are wobbling a little bit and the Gils are in a bit of form. Their keeper seems to have lost it since us and is costing them goals now.

I was born in Kent and lived there for the first few years of my life so these lot are always a team I look out for. Would be great if they could slow the Shrews down further and extend our stay at the top.

[Bigdoggsteel]

19 minutes ago, JacknOry said:

i dunno, Shrews are wobbling a little bit and the Gils are in a bit of form. Their keeper seems to have lost it since us and is costing them goals now.

I was born in Kent and lived there for the first few years of my life so these lot are always a team I look out for. Would be great if they could slow the Shrews down further and extend our stay at the top.

Shrewsbury have a tough looking run of games coming up. A real test of their credentials. Will be interesting to see how the table looks after we play Wigan in a few weeks. 

[JacknOry]

7 minutes ago, Bigdoggsteel said:

Shrewsbury have a tough looking run of games coming up. A real test of their credentials. Will be interesting to see how the table looks after we play Wigan in a few weeks. 

Yup, there are some tricky fixtures in there for sure for them. They have done superbly all season but now will be a real test of their mettle with us putting pressure on them and even Rotherham closing in fast.

Personally think Wigan are safe to go up automatically now but not necessarily as champions. Three way fight for second place now in my opinion but might be just a little too late for Rotherham now.

That said anything could still yet happen.  Just nice to be involved in the action at the top of a table for once.

[JHRover]

As I said on Saturday, having done our job last night and re-established a 7 point lead over Rotherham (effectively 8 when factoring GD) then they shouldn't be a threat to us.

If we allow them to become a threat over the next 13 games then we haven't done our job properly as automatic promotion contenders. They can win all the games they like but if we look after ourselves, keep on 2 points a game and maintain course for 90+ points then Rotherham aren't going to be a problem.

If 90 is the minimum aim for automatic then we are going to need at least 24 points from a possible 39 (quite a reasonable requirement given our form since November). If we do that then Rotherham are going to need at least 32 from those games to overtake us. That leaves them with almost no room at all for slip ups, they would need to continue their winning run well into double figures.

 

[47er]

I can't see us finishing as Champions. We've made some ground on them but our current position comes about because they haven't played. And they have a better goal difference by a large margin. Its our performances relative to Shrewsbury that count now.

A 50-50 chance of finishing second and that would do me fine. Playing 2 halves per game would help settle the nerves.

[DE.]

Tactically and in terms of playing style we are still not there and at this point we probably won't ever be this season. That's a failing that Mowbray would probably hold his hands up to. Fortunately we've had the budget to sign some of the best players in the league whilst keeping the likes of Mulgrew and Graham, which has got us out of jail many times over the course of the season. Mowbray has to take some credit for bringing in Dack in particular who has bailed us out of trouble more times than I care to count. We'll basically be relying on our best players to drag us over the line which will make for a nerve wracking last few months.

Pray for Dack to stay fit.  

[Sparks Rover]

35 minutes ago, 47er said:

I can't see us finishing as Champions. 

I know what you mean. We don't seem to be playing well enough to be champions. Wigan at times have played with a swagger that is a bit more champion-like. 

[Tom]

I'm rarely confident but I do fancy us to give Wigan a good pasting.

Need to make sure we play Steele and Emnes, maybe Pedersen to take a corner to himself and throw Santa Cruz and Reid in for good measure.

[K-Hod]

Just now, Tom said:

I'm rarely confident but I do fancy us to give Wigan a good pasting.

Need to make sure we play Steele and Emnes, maybe Pedersen to take a corner to himself and throw Santa Cruz and Reid in for good measure.

And Robbo to win us a last minute penalty by drawing blood for the cause....

[Tom]

Just now, K-Hod said:

And Robbo to win us a last minute penalty by drawing blood for the cause....

Steve Kean / Paul Ince barking orders from the sidelines?

I ruined it didn't I?

[JacknOry]

18 minutes ago, Tom said:

I'm rarely confident but I do fancy us to give Wigan a good pasting.

Need to make sure we play Steele and Emnes, maybe Pedersen to take a corner to himself and throw Santa Cruz and Reid in for good measure.

Better reinforce that net or someone could get killed.

[Mike E]

Didn't Jason Brown save a penalty vs Wigan? Get him in goal!

[Guest]

3 hours ago, Tom said:

Steve Kean / Paul Ince barking orders from the sidelines?

Kean will order another vodka beer shandy for the road, and Ince will order a new team bus to drive him safely home.

[FGS5635]

Don't bring ince into this. Olliver Holt has only just stopped calling us racists for sacking him