January- An opportunity to be in the race for the automatics

[Gee SCREAMER !!]

7 hours ago, TheRamOfSwad said:

If I was Paul Warne I'd be looking at January and thinking we should by no means be dropping any points against these sides

If we hoover up these points against some fairly poor teams it will give us a real push for automatics and hopefully and boost in January unlike last year with the additional signings to bolster our chances, whoever comes in will be crucial and they must be better than the players currently in the squad as minimum criteria 

January could be the pivotal part of the season for The Rams 🐏 

Let's believe!

Reading seem to have woke up slightly since we were supposed to play them.  That will be a tricky one.  Burton will play like a team possessed as every trip to Pride Park is like a sugar coated dream for them, so that will be another tricky one. 

[Foreveram]

35 minutes ago, Gee SCREAMER !! said:

Reading seem to have woke up slightly since we were supposed to play them.  That will be a tricky one.  Burton will play like a team possessed as every trip to Pride Park is like a sugar coated dream for them, so that will be another tricky one. 

You can’t underestimate how big a deal it is for some of the smaller clubs in this division to get a result against us.

 Still remember talking to a Fleetwood fan on the tram after they had held us to a 0-0 draw saying it was an unbelievable result for them.

[Comrade 86]

9 hours ago, Ghost of Clough said:

Good to know that you'd be content with dropping points against Fleetwood, Burton, Lincoln and Cheltenham, but I won't be.

Where's he said any of that?

9 hours ago, Ghost of Clough said:

We don't have a divine right to beat those sides, but a side competing for automatics definitely should be beating them.

Like Portsmouth you mean?

 

[BathRam72]

Whilst I would love an unbeaten January with most being wins. The so called stats suggest we shouldn't have too much trouble.

However, trap a rat in a corner and it will go for the throat. Lincoln and Fleetwood are fighting for their league 1 survival and will attack (we are not good when a bullying team attacks) Throw in Burton who are not only struggling just above the drop zone but also see us as the local scalp. So you can throw your stats out of the window I am afraid. Seen it all too often.

 

Having said that I really hope for at least 12 points, but I doubt it will be as easy as 'we are the better team and should be beating all of these'

[Comrade 86]

Sadly, football is played on grass, not paper and as such, 4 wins from our next 5 would make me a very happy Ram indeed.

Edited January 4 by Comrade 86

[plymouthram]

January is an opportunity to gain ground in the promotion race, but so is February, March & April. Agree with Jourdan, one game at a time. But what ever happens, we must stay in contention and be in the mix all through the remaining games. Of course, this transfer window would make a difference to the top 7 teams who currently have the best chance of getting promotion. I can not see beyond the current top 7 teams grabbing the 3 promotion slots.

So I'm looking at the business end of the season, March and April. I'm also looking at the current top 6 that who are in the best position to grab an automatic promotion slot. Going by all teams current League position, Barnsley have the easiest fixtures to play with 11 games out of their remaining 22 to play against teams in the bottom half of the table and in the last 2 months only face Bolton and Portsmouth from the current top 7. But we know it does'nt work in your favour playing teams below you each match and thinking it's going to be 3 pts every time.

March and April is interesting though, Portsmouth have 5 fixtures against the current top 7 teams and only 4 against bottom half teams. Bolton in the last 2 months have 6 fixtures against the current top 7 teams. Peterboro have only 4 fixtures against the top 7 and their last 3 matches of the season is Oxford (a), Bristol R (a) and Bolton (h). Derby only have Bolton (h) and Portsmouth (a) to play in the last 2 months of the season.

If my head was to rule me, I would state Bolton will win the league and 2nd spot would be between Portsmouth, Peterboro and Derby. Stevenage with their style of football will see them drop away(running out of steam). Oxford with a recent change of manager seem to be on a bit of a wobble and best hope is hanging on to a top 6 spot. Barnsley's current form is'nt outstanding, drawing against lower placed teams and all their recent wins have been by the odd goal and have not been dominating. But having stated that, the Tykes could come good and surprise us.

So for now, it's one game at a time, no major injuries, a good transfer window and we will see in the last 11 games of the season if we can do it.

[europia]

Definitely shouldn't be dropping points in those games, but in all likelihood we will. The P'boro game was a good test for us gave a fair indication of where we are this season;  a decent top six team, but not quite at the level of Pompey, Bolton and Peterborough. Hopefully Warney knows his way around the play offs and we can get promoted via a trip to Wembley.  

[sunnyhill60]

3 hours ago, europia said:

Definitely shouldn't be dropping points in those games, but in all likelihood we will. The P'boro game was a good test for us gave a fair indication of where we are this season;  a decent top six team, but not quite at the level of Pompey, Bolton and Peterborough. Hopefully Warney knows his way around the play offs and we can get promoted via a trip to Wembley.  

Yes, and but for a defensive mishap that you are unlikely to see in several seasons, our unbeaten run would have continued. 

It mystifies me what energises posters of negative bile

[MackworthRamIsGod]

On 03/01/2024 at 16:38, TheRamOfSwad said:

Just think if we want to be automatically promoted we should beating these teams, we will have a much harder run in later in the season and this is a opportunity to get a winning run together and set us up to finish strong

Last year after January we fell off and the lack of signings was a factor in that 

I think a lack of signings, or rather a lack of quality of the signing(s) will be a factor this year also, unfortunately.

[Tamworthram]

4 hours ago, sunnyhill60 said:

Yes, and but for a defensive mishap that you are unlikely to see in several seasons, our unbeaten run would have continued. 

It mystifies me what energises posters of negative bile

It’s possible to share reasonable criticism without it being labelled as negative bile. 
 

Defensive mishaps maybe (we may not see exactly the same mishaps in “several seasons” be we, and most clubs, will have several variations every seasons - without trying to hard I can remember Wildsmith’s against Oxford, Ward’s two penalties and a few by Bradley earlier in the season that many seem reluctant to move on from) but there is no denying that Peterborough were noticeably better than us. They may argue that they only conceded due to their own mishaps (being caught cold after 23 seconds and conceding a penalty).

For me, there is little point in trying to sugar coat the Peterborough performance, forget about the what’s, if’s and maybe’s. Our unbeaten run was ended fairly by a much better team (on the day). But, we move on and hopefully start a new run of wins (not just being unbeaten) today. There is no reason we shouldn’t other than the fact that this is football and you can’t take any game for granted.

[Chester40]

In any league 5 games- 10 points is 'decent-ish' form. And has that important 2 points a game outcome.

So - minimum is 3 wins, a draw and a defeat. 

Anything less and we can kiss automatics goodbye. 

To possibly gain ground, 12 points would probably be needed, 11 points (3 wins and 2 draws) keeps the positive vibe going.

Really shows there is very little room for error.

Edited January 6 by Chester40

[Van der MoodHoover]

42 minutes ago, Chester40 said:

In any league 5 games- 10 points is 'decent-ish' form. And has that important 2 points a game outcome.

So - minimum is 3 wins, a draw and a defeat. 

Anything less and we can kiss automatics goodbye. 

To possibly gain ground, 12 points would probably be needed, 11 points (3 wins and 2 draws) keeps the positive vibe going.

Really shows there is very little room for error.

Need a couple of additional points from somewhere to catch up the Peterborough loss. We were on 2 ppg going into that fixture so must be a bit behind now.

[Ghost of Clough]

46 minutes ago, Chester40 said:

In any league 5 games- 10 points is 'decent-ish' form. And has that important 2 points a game outcome.

So - minimum is 3 wins, a draw and a defeat. 

Anything less and we can kiss automatics goodbye. 

To possibly gain ground, 12 points would probably be needed, 11 points (3 wins and 2 draws) keeps the positive vibe going.

Really shows there is very little room for error.

Not quite. On average, we should be getting 10 points for every 5 games for automatics. However, that's an average 5 game spell - sometimes we may get less, others we'll get more. 

In a 5 game spell such as Reading, Bolton, Northampton, Blackpool, Portsmouth, we may find it harder to get those 10 points. Therefore, we'd need to pick up more than that in other spells, such as Fleetwood, Burton, Lincoln, Reading, Cheltenham

[Tamworthram]

55 minutes ago, Van der MoodHoover said:

Need a couple of additional points from somewhere to catch up the Peterborough loss. We were on 2 ppg going into that fixture so must be a bit behind now.

We MIGHT need a couple more points from somewhere but only if Bolton and Portsmouth maintain their current rate of just over 2ppg. 

Win our game in hand today and we'll be level again with Peterborough regardless of the fact that they beat us last Monday. We'll both be on 49 points from 25 games.

Just need to win today (Ideally by 3 goals or more in order to go third). Simples. 

[Returning ram]

So is that Portsmouth out the race then according to our stattos ?

[europia]

On 06/01/2024 at 04:40, sunnyhill60 said:

Yes, and but for a defensive mishap that you are unlikely to see in several seasons, our unbeaten run would have continued. 

It mystifies me what energises posters of negative bile

The majority consensus was that Derby were beaten by a superior P'boro team. Acknowledging that inevitably, points will be dropped isn't negative and it certainly isn't bile. But hey, don't let the reality get in the way of a gross over reaction. By the way, the the forum is essentially a platform which enables posters to freely express their opinions, within guidelines. 

[Barney1991]

On 04/01/2024 at 23:58, plymouthram said:

January is an opportunity to gain ground in the promotion race, but so is February, March & April. Agree with Jourdan, one game at a time. But what ever happens, we must stay in contention and be in the mix all through the remaining games. Of course, this transfer window would make a difference to the top 7 teams who currently have the best chance of getting promotion. I can not see beyond the current top 7 teams grabbing the 3 promotion slots.

So I'm looking at the business end of the season, March and April. I'm also looking at the current top 6 that who are in the best position to grab an automatic promotion slot. Going by all teams current League position, Barnsley have the easiest fixtures to play with 11 games out of their remaining 22 to play against teams in the bottom half of the table and in the last 2 months only face Bolton and Portsmouth from the current top 7. But we know it does'nt work in your favour playing teams below you each match and thinking it's going to be 3 pts every time.

March and April is interesting though, Portsmouth have 5 fixtures against the current top 7 teams and only 4 against bottom half teams. Bolton in the last 2 months have 6 fixtures against the current top 7 teams. Peterboro have only 4 fixtures against the top 7 and their last 3 matches of the season is Oxford (a), Bristol R (a) and Bolton (h). Derby only have Bolton (h) and Portsmouth (a) to play in the last 2 months of the season.

If my head was to rule me, I would state Bolton will win the league and 2nd spot would be between Portsmouth, Peterboro and Derby. Stevenage with their style of football will see them drop away(running out of steam). Oxford with a recent change of manager seem to be on a bit of a wobble and best hope is hanging on to a top 6 spot. Barnsley's current form is'nt outstanding, drawing against lower placed teams and all their recent wins have been by the odd goal and have not been dominating. But having stated that, the Tykes could come good and surprise us.

So for now, it's one game at a time, no major injuries, a good transfer window and we will see in the last 11 games of the season if we can do it.

I don’t think Bolton will win the league. Not the best team we’ve faced and we’re lucky to win it at a time we weren’t even playing that well. I do agree that the top 2 for me is between those four 

[plymouthram]

8 hours ago, Barney1991 said:

I don’t think Bolton will win the league. Not the best team we’ve faced and we’re lucky to win it at a time we weren’t even playing that well. I do agree that the top 2 for me is between those four 

Yes, but they also started off slowly and are currently favourites with the bookies, but I also stated the January transfer window could make a difference. Lets wait and see, lets hope the Rams are right in with a chance of promotion come the back end of April. I for one would take runners-up now (Ipswich got that spot last season, I wonder how they are doing compared with last seasons champs).

[Tamworthram]

8 hours ago, Barney1991 said:

I don’t think Bolton will win the league. Not the best team we’ve faced and we’re lucky to win it at a time we weren’t even playing that well. I do agree that the top 2 for me is between those four 

I don’t think there are any stand out candidates to win the league. Peterborough looked like the best team we’ve played when they came to Pride Park but not when we played them at their place. Portsmouth obviously started strongly but have stuttered a little recently. Maybe they’ll come good again. We’ve been on a good run without looking totally convincing in too many of those wins and Bolton have had the occasional hiccup.

I also think there is too much of the season to rule out the likes of Barnsley for top two.

Everything to play for and it could come down to who is best at recruitment/retaining players in the January window or even down to unfortunate injuries.

Winning the league would be great but I’d be more than happy with top two.

Edited January 8 by Tamworthram

[BatRam]

dont we normally lose to bottom half teams 🤣