Can Leeds hunt down Leicester at the top of the Championship? Computer says no — The Athletic 22/2/24

By Nancy Froston and Thom Harris

Is this the best promotion race we have seen in the Championship?

The underlying numbers, at least in recent history, suggest as much for the breakaway pack of Leicester City, Leeds United, Ipswich Town and Southampton. Four does not go into two — and one of the automatic promotion places looks all but sewn up for Enzo Maresca’s side, further reducing the odds for those in pursuit.

We could be on course to see a team hit 92 points and still finish third, despite that being enough in eight of the last 10 Championship seasons to secure automatic promotion. The margin for error is small. The desire to check another team’s scores while watching your team is high.

With Southampton slipping up in midweek in a 2-1 defeat to play-off chasing Hull City and Leicester City arriving at Elland Road on Friday, every game threatens to shape the outcome of the season. So we have turned to the Opta supercomputer for answers to all the big questions — could we still see a title race? Just how unlikely is it that the four teams get reeled in? And is there a way this gets settled before the final day?

Leicester have been top of the table since September 23 — the same weekend that Southampton lost 2-1 to Middlesbrough before going on their 22-game unbeaten run in the league. With that run from Russell Martin’s side, plus just two defeats in 10 games for Leeds and a recent resurgence from Ipswich, it might feel like there is a better chance than ever for someone else to mount a title charge but the forecast is looking gloomy for all but Daniel Farke’s team.

A win on Friday night would cut the gap from first to second to six points — they were 17 adrift after 25 games — but there is still only a nine per cent chance they will win the title, based on Opta’s predicted table.

The predictions are calculated for a team’s remaining fixtures based on the strength of the respective sides and simulating each of those games thousands of times to calculate an average of their forecasted finishes. Leicester retain a 98 per cent chance of automatic promotion, with the odds decreasing as you go down the table. Southampton’s recent defeats (to Bristol City and Hull) saw them slide from second to fourth, denting their odds to an 18 per cent chance of going up in the top two.

As for projected final points tallies, Opta estimates that Leicester will finish on about 103 points, Leeds on 94, Ipswich on 91 and Southampton on 90. The gap between fourth and fifth, which has been sizeable all season, does not look likely to close in the remaining 13 fixtures, with West Bromwich Albion (on 55 points, 12 points behind Southampton) projected to finish on about 76 points. That leaves them with a 0.1 per cent chance of making the automatic promotion places, with a four-point gap between them and Coventry City in seventh.

The final fixtures of the season will go some way to affecting how the top four finishes. Leeds and Southampton are set to meet on the final day with the potential for the winner to seal promotion. Also worth looking out for will be Leicester against Southampton in March, before Ipswich host Southampton in April — a tough final portion of the season for Martin’s side. That is Ipswich’s only match against another top-four team.

One win in 10 between mid-December and mid-February threatened to derail their chances of pulling off back-to-back promotions but they remain in the mix. Meanwhile, Southampton’s latest wobble after a rock-solid few months has been a test in how quickly they can bounce back from adversity. September’s four successive defeats feel long forgotten at St Mary’s with a team that has rediscovered an identity following relegation as well as developing a taste for late goals. Along with Northampton Town, Southampton have scored more goals after 90 minutes (nine each) than any other side in England’s top four leagues.

The only thing that can stop Leicester is something Marseca’s side are yet to show: inconsistency. They have spent just six matchdays not leading the league and just one — the first game of 2023-24 — outside the top two. Despite tension between fans and their manager over style of play and transfer activity in January, they have the least to fear.

If you believe in momentum then Leeds have it after eight league wins on the spin. The attacking flair of Crysencio Summerville, Wilfried Gnonto and Georginio Rutter is built on a solid defence, with the top two teams boasting the best defences in the Championship, conceding just 26 goals each. If that proves to be the difference as opposed to the risky approaches of Southampton and Ipswich (40 and 44 goals conceded), then the play-offs could make for entertaining viewing.

And for casual fans of the Championship, the pressure is on Ipswich, West Brom and the other play-off-chasing sides to ensure that this is not the year we lose one of English football’s strongest records — that the three relegated teams have never immediately won promotion back to the Premier League. Thankfully, probabilities and numbers count for far less in the play-offs.