When the fixtures came out, the Stacey West team looked down the list and decided that we had a relatively easy start to the season.
Aside perhaps from Peterborough and Barnsley, nothing looked all that taxing, and we hoped to welcome in October in a good position in the league. We have, which vindicates our observation, but was it accurate? Have City had one of the easiest starts?
There’s an easy way to check—leverage the average points per game of our opponents to see if, on average, the teams we have faced have been good-performing sides or poorly-performing sides. If we’re fourth, have we had the fourth-easiest start to the season in terms of the teams we’ve faced?
The answer is no, we have not. Statistically, Mansfield Town have had the easiest start to the season. The Stags are above us in the table, but they have faced opponents with an overall average PPG of just 0.82. Of course, that reflects more on Barnsley and Bolton’s poor start, their opening two fixtures, but other than us, they’ve had Stockport, Cambridge United, Shrewsbury, Northampton and Crawley – that’s four of the current bottom six. They had us as well, the ‘best’ team they have faced in terms of points per game, and they were handed their yellow and blue backsides on a plate.
After that, Bolton Wanderers on 0.96 have the next easiest start, followed by Stockport, Exeter, Birmingham City and Wrexham. In fact, we’re midtable in terms of our opponents PPG – we have faced teams averaging 1.39 points per game. if Cambridge were removed from that equation, we’d actually have had a tough start than all of the current top six.
So, who have had the toughest start to the season? Crawley might be struggling, but the teams they’ve faced have an average of 1.89 points, a nightmare start for them. They’ve had Blackpool, Wigan, Barnsley, Stockport, Wrexham, Bolton and Mansfield so far – four of the current top six. After them, our opponents on Saturday, Leyton Orient have had the next most difficult, followed by struggling Shrewsbury, Charlton and Cambridge United.
The one point to make on the back of this is that it is all relative. For instance, anyone facing Mansfield will have a more difficult start, but as Mansfield have had the easiest start, their points per game is higher than perhaps it should be. In reality, this only begins to even out after ten or 12 matches, rather than eight, when teams have had more of a mix of opponents.
That said, we have a real mix coming up. Orient (0.89), Crawley (0.88) and Northampton (1) are all bottom six for PPG, and we face all of them in October. However Birmingham (2.75) and Stockport (1.88) are both top five for PPG (along with us) and we also face them through October. We were also scheduled to face another top five side, Wrexham, but it has now been cancelled.
There’s another stat here, which is RPI (relative performance indicator) which outlines which teams have performed the best over the course of their opening. This is relevant, because it takes your PPG and multiplies it by your opponents, which gives an indication of who is punching above their weight. This has Mansfield, third in the real table, down in 12th, and Crawley, bottom four in the table, up in 15th. I like this as it has us in third, suggesting we’re actually doing as well as we should be. Birmingham are, obviously, top, but fans of Wycombe, Charlton and Reading can take solace from the fact that they’re top five on this indicator
Of course, purists won’t pay an iota of interest in this, but I find it fascinating.
Team | Played | Pts | PPG | Opponents | RPI | ||
1 | Birmingham | 8 | 22 | 2.75 | 1.07 | 2.94 | |
2 | Wrexham | 9 | 17 | 1.89 | 1.15 | 2.17 | |
3 | Mansfield | 8 | 17 | 2.13 | 0.82 | 1.75 | |
4 | Lincoln City | 8 | 15 | 1.88 | 1.39 | 2.61 | |
5 | Stockport | 8 | 15 | 1.88 | 1.02 | 1.92 | |
6 | Blackpool | 9 | 15 | 1.67 | 1.32 | 2.2 | |
7 | Barnsley | 9 | 15 | 1.67 | 1.34 | 2.24 | |
8 | Wycombe | 8 | 14 | 1.75 | 1.55 | 2.71 | |
9 | Stevenage | 9 | 14 | 1.56 | 1.34 | 2.09 | |
10 | Exeter City | 8 | 13 | 1.63 | 1.04 | 1.7 | |
11 | Bolton | 8 | 13 | 1.63 | 0.96 | 1.56 | |
12 | Reading | 8 | 13 | 1.63 | 1.51 | 2.46 | |
13 | Charlton | 9 | 13 | 1.44 | 1.72 | 2.48 | |
14 | Wigan Athletic | 9 | 12 | 1.33 | 1.51 | 2.01 | |
15 | Huddersfield | 9 | 12 | 1.33 | 1.31 | 1.74 | |
16 | Peterborough | 9 | 11 | 1.22 | 1.34 | 1.63 | |
17 | Rotherham | 9 | 10 | 1.11 | 1.32 | 1.47 | |
18 | Bristol Rovers | 9 | 10 | 1.11 | 1.18 | 1.31 | |
19 | Northampton | 8 | 8 | 1 | 1.58 | 1.58 | |
20 | Leyton Orient | 9 | 8 | 0.89 | 1.78 | 1.58 | |
21 | Crawley Town | 8 | 7 | 0.88 | 1.89 | 1.66 | |
22 | Burton Albion | 8 | 4 | 0.5 | 1.63 | 0.82 | |
23 | Shrewsbury | 9 | 4 | 0.44 | 1.76 | 0.77 | |
24 | Cambridge Utd | 8 | 1 | 0.13 | 1.72 | 0.22 |
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