Strap's Stats 2 - October 1997

Final League Standings...

I have a confession to make. After the first 5 or 6 weeks of the season I was a vociferous member of the group calling for Terry Bullivant's head, among other parts of his body! I'd seen at first hand our dreadful performances against Bradford and Peterborough, as well as the Oxford comeback, and frankly I was appalled. The last straw was the 0-6 at Tranmere. I got back from taking my children swimming just in time to catch the h/t on teletext, and it wasn't pretty!

How long ago THAT all seems! I've driven two round trips to EP in the last 4 days, totalling 400 miles, and I would do it all again tomorrow if it meant witnessing games of the calibre of the Crewe 3-3 and the Wolves 4-2! Last night's game was perhaps the best I've seen the Royals perform since McGhee left, and an 8-2 scoreline would not have flattered us!

Anyway, the point of all this rambling is to review an exercise I did before our recent run started. Looking at the 92 teams in the league last season, I compared their finishing position to the ones they occupied after 5 saturdays of last season. My concern was centred on the startling fact that over 50% of all teams finished no more than 3 places up or down from the position occupied after 5 saturdays! Considering we were second from bottom at the time, the situation looked grim! With the warm glow of a 5 game unbeaten run behind us, I've looked at the same stats over the last 3 seasons, for no other reason than we've been in Div 1 for 3 years.

			1994-5			1995-6			1996-97			Total	
													
No change		8	9%		5	5%		15	16%		28	10%	
1 up or down		17	18%		19	21%		27	29%		63	23%	
2 up or down		30	33%		32	35%		33	36%		95	34%	
3 up or down		37	40%		38	41%		47	51%		122	44%	
4 up or down		44	48%		44	48%		49	53%		137	50%	
5 up or down		58	63%		49	53%		58	63%		165	60%	
6 up or down		62	67%		56	61%		63	68%		181	66%	
7 up or down		66	72%		63	68%		69	75%		198	72%	
8 up or down		71	77%		70	76%		73	79%		214	78%	
9 up or down		77	84%		77	84%		77	84%		231	84%	
10 up or down		82	89%		82	89%		80	87%		244	88%	
11 up or down		87	95%		83	90%		85	92%		255	92%	
12 up or down		90	98%		85	92%		87	95%		262	95%	
13 up or down		91	99%		85	92%		89	97%		265	96%	
14 up or down		91	99%		87	95%		91	99%		269	97%	
15 up or down		91	99%		88	96%		91	99%		270	98%	
16 up or down		91	99%		88	96%		92	100%		271	98%	
17 up or down		92	100%		89	97%					273	99%	
18 up or down					89	97%					273	99%	
19 up or down					91	99%					275	100%	
20 up or down					92	100%					276	100%	

BUT, and it's a big but, it would appear that we tend NOT to be an average team! My first thoughts were to quote Jack Mansell's side of 69-70. At one point we were languishing in 18th place in Div 3, just having been dumped out of the FA Cup at Brentwood, when we went berserk, put together an unbeaten 18 match run, which concluded with us sitting proudly on top of Div 2 for the first time in goodness knows how many years years! However, this may not be our best ever comeback! Next time I'll give you the full run down on a particularly remarkable year, and compare it with Jack Mansell's swansong.

PS Did anyone else notice Adie Williams at the end of the Wolves slaughter? He was the last to leave the pitch, and looked longingly at the South Bank! I'm sure he wished he'd never left!

Strap

Strap's Stats: Reading FC Statistics Archive >>