20 games: the information giddiness ratio

Our editor calculates the number of games before we can get giddy.

Crooned Alex Turner (not about Sheffield United):

The information action giddiness ratio

Is the place to go

Four stars out of five

And that’s unheard of

You may or may not favour the cosmic offerings of Arctic Monkeys’ 2018 album Tranquility Base Hotel & Casino. Though its best track, Four out Five, is an apt if an unrelated summary of our season thus far.

You may or may not savour the plush strings and Scott Walker-ish momentum of their latest release, but again, There’d Better Be a Mirrorball is a phrase that one might ask of a post-promotion party should we get there.

You may not be an Arctic Monkeys fan at all, in which case, these tangential overtures will greet you like a boring friend. Either way, trust me when I say that since their fifth studio album, Arctic Monkeys have made a beeline for the new, the different, the unexpected.

I intend to do the opposite in this article, in a piece of writing that does little more than state the bleeding obvious. The Blades are in a good position, and I want to say that with the aid of a weighty, number-based buttress.

Four out of five

Like the competitive parent who bought the best Christmas present, Paul Heckingbottom must feel more than a modicum of satisfaction about his tenure at Sheffield United Football Club. A better than four out of five performance thus far, by my reckoning. We are top of the table after ten games, and even inherently pessimistic Unitedites are struggling to disabuse themselves of the sense that this is our year.

Humbug!… This is United we’re talking about, you say.

Forget that for a moment. Our elevation to the Championship’s hilltop is only a good thing. In fact, it is evidently a good thing. In a sport that relies on mathematical advantage, it is plain fact that our advantage is the best going. We’re in prime real estate territory. Every other team in the league would sooner build their season on the lush foundations we currently occupy. We’ve got it all right now: location, location, location.

Still, it’s early days. There are thirty-six games to play. And until the hammer goes down on the second tier’s febrile, ten-month auction, nothing is certain. I heard/saw the fact bandied about the other day that no team has secured more points after ten games than we currently have (23) since QPR in 2010-11 (26).

And this got me thinking… at what point did QPR fans get giddy? When did they know that they were bloody good? Was it ten games? Twenty? What is the appropriate information giddiness ratio, when the data available rationalises the giddiness felt? That’s the equation up for discussion here.

Information giddiness ratio

There has to be a clear relationship between the position a team has secured after ten games and the likelihood of promotion. If you have zero points after ten, automatics are out of the question. If you have thirty points, it’s far more likely. That’s a benign, self-evident conclusion to draw. Of course, the more points a team has after ten games, the more likely promotion is.

And so, does a solid opening ten games give us enough information to get giddy? That’s a question. And my answer, dear reader, is no (with caveats).

What follows is a list of every promoted team in the last six seasons and what the table looked like after ten and twenty games. Next to the name of each promoted club, you’ll notice a tick, a dash, or a cross. These indicate whether the team were positioned in the Top 2, Top 6 or Outside the Top 6 after ten and twenty games.

I posit that twenty rather than ten games is when the information-giddiness ratio allows for rational giddiness. Let me show my working, and then I’ll move on to the relevance.

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I wandered over for a closer look:

Championship 2016-17

Promoted:

1st Newcastle ❌✅

2nd Brighton & Hove Albion ➖✅

Play-off winner Huddersfield Town ✅➖

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Championship 2017-18

Promoted

1st Wolverhampton Wanderers ➖✅

2nd Cardiff City ✅✅

Play-off winner Fulham ❌❌

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Championship 2018-19

Promoted:

1st Norwich City ➖✅

2nd Sheffield United ➖➖

Play-off winner Aston Villa ❌❌

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Championship 2019-20

Promoted:

1st Leed United ✅✅

2nd West Bromwich Albion ➖✅

Play-off winner Fulham ➖➖

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Championship 2020-21

Promoted

1st Norwich City ➖✅

2nd Watford ➖➖

Play-off winner Brentford ❌➖

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Championship 2020-21

Promoted

1st Fulham ➖✅

2nd Bournemouth ✅✅

Play-off winner Nottingham Forest ❌❌

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Data: or the aces up our sleeve

The first point I want to make is more achingly obvious than a broken toe: having the most points after twenty games means you’re more likely to achieve automatic promotion. No shit. You can get giddy. It’s logical at that point.

But after ten? Not so straightforward.

More teams outside the top two after ten games (78%) have been promoted than those who were in the top two in the same period (22%). Obviously, that doesn’t mean we’re in a bad position.

But more compelling is the evidence that a whopping 72% of teams in the play-offs after ten games were eventually promoted, and I think this is more significant because it shows just how important a good start can be. And in contrast, it shows how bad a bad start can be (current tallies virtually rule out West Brom and Middlesbrough from the automatic spots already) - sorry mardy bums.

Here are all the above data crunched into one place:

y-axis = number of teams; x-axis = position after 10/20 games

The Information-giddiness ratio, I conclude, proves that fans of Championship teams can be doubly giddy if their club is in the top two after twenty games as opposed to ten. Or, to put it another way, we should be half as giddy right now as we ought to be if we’re still in pole position in ten games’ time.

Do I wanna know? Why 20 games is where it’s at

With that bit of watertight maths out of the way, here are some of the permutations to consider that lend weight to the importance of the twenty-game mark.

1. Thirteen of eighteen promoted clubs (72%) were in the play-offs after ten games, and that only increases to fifteen (83%) after twenty games, so being in the play-offs all season matters

2. Every team that won the league (100%) were in the top two after twenty games - so, Mr Heckingbottom, we need to stay there to win the Championship

3. Only two teams (11%), Sheffield United and Watford, were automatically promoted despite being outside the top two after twenty games (although both occupied play-off spots) - let’s not test the history books again

4. Every team (100%) with 40+ points after 20 games were promoted - if we reach forty points, I think it’s fair we call the whole thing off

5. Of the eighteen promoted teams, ten (56%) were automatically promoted if they occupied the top two spots after twenty games - there’s a better than 50% chance we get promoted if we’re in the top two in ten games’ time

6. Every team who occupied a top two position after ten games and after twenty games were automatically promoted - they were Bournemouth, Leeds and Cardiff (17%) - prime giddiness real estate if we can do that

7. Two out of three promoted teams, in four out of the six seasons I’ve looked at, occupied a top two position after twenty games - it gives you a huge chance

8. Nottingham Forest, Aston Villa and Fulham all achieved promotion despite being outside of the play-offs after ten and after twenty games - beware of late surgers (possibly Boro and West Brom this season) and don’t settle for play-offs

Finally…

…I can share with you through Bladey skies
Every whimsical thought that enters my mind

What’s the point of all this? The TL;DR is clear: let’s be confident. It would be gambler’s fallacy to think only Sheffield United could F’ it up from here. In reality, there is nothing, nil, zilch, nada, zero evidence that Paul Heckingbottom’s Sheffield United will endure a terrible, trend-bucking slump. Nothing points to that. Nothing.

In fact, everything points to a greater likelihood of us getting out of, rather than staying in, the Championship. But please, let’s wait for the twenty-game mark before we get giddy. Until then, we’ll have to suck it and see.

Over to you again, Mr Turner:

Get the sense that you're on the move

And you'll probably be leaving soon, so I'm telling you

Stop the world, 'cause I wanna, get out with you

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Sam Parry is the co-founder of DEM Blades fanzine and Commissioning Editor of The Pinch. Inside work he writes speeches, and outside of work, he wonders whether he’s ever eaten a truly greasy chip butty.