Championship Play-Off Trends and Tips

We've taken a dive through the play-off results from the past 23 Championship seasons, to identify the most important factors in winning promotion.

League Finish

Q. The Play-Offs are inherently unfair on the team who finishes 3rd. Under old-school rules, they would have been promoted, but do they at least have an advantage once we reach the play-offs?

A. In the past 23 seasons the team finishing 3rd has gone on to achieve promotion nine times (39%), been beaten in the final seven times (30.5%) and failed to make it past the semi-finals just seven times.

The fourth place team have actually made the final in just 11 seasons (missing out in 12) and of the 11 in which they made it through, they only managed to win three times. The numbers for teams finishing 5th are perhaps unsurprisingly pretty similar – reaching the final in 11, missing out in 12, but actually winning in the final six times.

The team finishing sixth have a distinct disadvantage. They have qualified from their semi-finals only 8 times in 23 attempts – 35%. Playing the best team of the four clearly proves a difficult hurdle.

What about Goal Difference?

Q. Goal Difference is a great indicator of how well a team have played during the season. Is this is better predictor than simply looking at where teams finished in the season?

A. Well the team with the best goal difference has reached the play-off final in 16 of the past 23 seasons (70%), while the side with the worst goal difference made the final only 11 times, missing out 12 times. However, that’s precisely the same proportion as the side finishing 2nd, suggesting it’s not a hugely important indicator. Taking all three football league divisions to open up the sample see's a clear correlation - 60% of ides with the best season goal difference making the ginal (and 32% gaining promotion) while just 39% make the final where they have the worst goal difference, with 21% going on to get promoted.

Form is important right?

We looked at how teams have performed over the last six matches prior to the play-offs. Splitting the sides into the following groups, we analysed whether form was important.

• Teams who had won 0-9 points coming into the play-offs

• Teams who had won 10-12 points coming into the play-offs

• Teams who had won 13 or more.

The sample sizes were very similar.

We found that those in Group A (0-9 pts) reached the final 38% of the time, and won promotion just 13.7% of the time.

The performance from Group B (10-12pts) was much better – making the final 66% of the time, and winning promotion 25% of the time.

Those who collected 13+ points in their final six games made the final 45% of the time, but actually had a 78% strike rate in the final, meaning that in total they won promotion 35% of the time. There was certainly an element of small sample variance at work there, and when we included all three divisions in the data, it showed a good correlation, suggesting those in good form win the play-offs around 33% of the time, and those in bad form, closer to 18%.

Putting it all together.

For the Championship, West Brom have to make it as our value pick for the side to prevail. They face a tough semi-final with Aston Villa, but they achieved the best goal difference over the season of each of the four contenders, finished the season in reasonable form (10 points from last six matches) and finished the season in 4th place. Applying a weighted average to the criteria, and seeing no reason to discount them in what looks an open fight this year, we're backing them at 4/1. Our model makes them closer to 11/4 to achieve promotion at this point.

1pt West Brom to be promoted at 4/1

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