Collection of Championship predictions (feel welcome to update as you see more)

First up, Gabriel Sutton of Bet Victor: https://blog.betvictor.com/en-gb/spo...-preview-1-24/

Cardiff City - 17th
"....Moore will be the inspiration if he stays fresh, fit, firing and at the club, but relying on one variable is a dangerous game."

I can see us being a solid mid table club this season, yo-yoing somewhere from between 14th to 8th. How high we actually finish depends on Moore staying fit for for the course of the season.

Gabriel Sutton says how I feel it is with a lot of the other clubs. Not sure if Luton, Blackpool and QPR or the jacks will do as well as he says. WBA will do better than ye says. Can see the teams that he says will struggle, struggling. I'm not often 100% right though. Hence I'm not a gambling man

Thanks for posting, always an interesting read seeing these predictions but there seems to be some very bold ones in this. Barnsley 2nd? Blackpool finishing above both us and West Brom? I just don’t see it, West Brom will be higher, we’ll be mid table and I can’t see Barnsley replicating last seasons form. I think Reading will struggle more than he predicts and not sure Warnock has had the investment he wanted at Middlesbrough to get them into the play offs

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Originally Posted by surge

First up, Gabriel Sutton of Bet Victor: https://blog.betvictor.com/en-gb/spo...-preview-1-24/

Cardiff City - 17th
"....Moore will be the inspiration if he stays fresh, fit, firing and at the club, but relying on one variable is a dangerous game."

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I know I'm having a strange afternoon but if City are relying on just one tactic is it a variable? :sherlock:

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Originally Posted by Don Corleone

Thanks for posting, always an interesting read seeing these predictions but there seems to be some very bold ones in this. Barnsley 2nd? Blackpool finishing above both us and West Brom? I just don’t see it, West Brom will be higher, we’ll be mid table and I can’t see Barnsley replicating last seasons form. I think Reading will struggle more than he predicts and not sure Warnock has had the investment he wanted at Middlesbrough to get them into the play offs

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I’d be astonished if we finished 7th. We haven’t signed a single player in 2021 and lost Olise and Richards with Meite out for most of the season. We have a desperately light squad and go into the new season in the back of one win eleven.
Relegation battle more likely.

I think the arguments for WBA and Blackpool were both good ones but not convinced Barnsley or Reading will finish as high as predicted or Stoke will come in that low.

PNE and Derby fans seem worried so think that's a fair shout for relegation threatened teams.

Not The 20 podcast 1-24 is out today as well so next one I'll be linking to. Am sure there are more out there too others can link in - TLG sometimes references another gambling company as one he rates so hopefully he'll link it in/give us a summary.

It has Bristol City finishing above us.

I think that tells me all I need to know

File under b ollocks.

I'll be surprised if Bournemouth, Fulham, Sheffield United, and West Brom don't all finish in the top six.

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Originally Posted by LeningradCowboy

I'll be surprised if Bournemouth, Fulham, Sheffield United, and West Brom don't all finish in the top six.

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I reckon they will be the top 4.
Stoke, QPR, Boro probably top of the rest which might include us - which is very much dependant ( as is the case for most clubs outside the top 4) on a handful of key players staying fit and on form.

Morrison, Tomlin, Moore being the key 3.. maybe Giles

Big doubt for us !

Sheffield Utd were so bad last year I dont think they will make top 6.

Apart from 3 coming down, I think only Bournemouth likely to challenge for top 3.
Teams like Blackpool may very well have an early season bounce(wish we werent playing them early doors) but I cant see them sustaining it.

Of the other clubs in the Championship last year, I was impressed with Coventry. Nice football, lacking cutting edge. Last season was Barnsley's high water mark. Cant see them replicating that.Blackburn are always solid performers. On the other hand I can see Derby and Swansea struggling.

City will be ok. Solid mid table 10th. Hopefully 1 or 2 youngsters will cement their place in the side.

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Originally Posted by Hilts

Sheffield Utd were so bad last year I dont think they will make top 6.

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Jokanovic knows what he is doing at this level.

Not the 20 podcast Championship predictor: https://podfollow.com/1112915286/epi...74d23001e/view

Pearcey will be happy how negative they are about Reading's chances. They also highlight how bad Swansea are looking behind the scenes which, considering recent parachute payments and play-off runs, asks big questions of their owners and what they've been doing.

Will give time-stamp for City when I hear it.

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Originally Posted by surge

I think the arguments for WBA and Blackpool were both good ones but not convinced Barnsley or Reading will finish as high as predicted or Stoke will come in that low.

PNE and Derby fans seem worried so think that's a fair shout for relegation threatened teams.

Not The 20 podcast 1-24 is out today as well so next one I'll be linking to. Am sure there are more out there too others can link in - TLG sometimes references another gambling company as one he rates so hopefully he'll link it in/give us a summary.

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They have us in 10th, they certainly don't share many of our concerns and seem to consider it the minimum to expect

Attachment 4488

This is from the When Saturday Comes season preview. They ask a fan from each club for their thoughts on their own teams and also a predicted table, then find the average from each. Not sure when everyone was asked though.

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Originally Posted by City123

They have us in 10th, they certainly don't share many of our concerns and seem to consider it the minimum to expect

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Thanks :thumbup: Championship was such a squad game under covid rules and that will be less of a case this year but still the sheer number of games in this league makes it an important factor. No one has been that active in the market though and I felt we had the 8th/9th best squad last year so I don't think we'll have taken too much of a step back from that.

In the Despondency thread I said 10th so am happy to match up with these guys.

Gabriel Sutton has set up a thread where he's going to link to other predictors and someone has mentioned waiting for Loft for Words messageboard which I remember doing a quality one last year. The thread is here but I'm not adding my recommendation yet for any of the others mentioned: https://twitter.com/GabSutton/status...43012176973830

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Originally Posted by surge

Not the 20 podcast Championship predictor: https://podfollow.com/1112915286/epi...74d23001e/view

Pearcey will be happy how negative they are about Reading's chances. They also highlight how bad Swansea are looking behind the scenes which, considering recent parachute payments and play-off runs, asks big questions of their owners and what they've been doing.

Will give time-stamp for City when I hear it.

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On the Apple Podcast version we're 41:25 minutes in.

I think a fast start is is less likely given how disrupted a pre-season though.

Off The Line has us in 8th in this blog post: https://offtheline599656488.wordpres...eason-preview/

I was going to suggest that was too positive until I saw When Saturday Comes's table (thanks Bluebirdman Of Alcathays) which I think is even more too positive :hehe:

I don't know of any more now (will be keeping an eye out for LoftForWords) but please do add any you come across that I've missed.

Here's a more optimistic prediction;-

https://blog.marathonbet.co.uk/champ...p-predictions/

but I think the guy in the first link Surge posted has analysed us pretty well (although I think he's made assumptions about our manager based on his public persona and not much else - our "simplistic tactician" of a manager immediately introduced three at the back, a system which had been a bit of a disaster when tried at Cardiff in Mark Harris and Neil Warnock's time, and improved the time as a result). Seventeenth seems a bit low (although I see FIFA 21 has us finishing twentieth), but I'd say he's right about us struggling to create chances and about us not being as as good as we think we are at preventing them.

I see us finishing in the top 6, I don't think there will be any changes to our style, and it will be interesting to watch 3 or 4 of the youngsters cementing a first team place.
Whatever anyone thinks of Mick, you don't get to manage the amount of games he's been in charge of, if you don't know what you're doing .

Personally I am really looking forward to being able to get down the City again

You have to say that anyone who thinks Barnsley will finish second in the league need their head examining. Barnsley have lost their manager and their best two players and if you look at a Barnsley forum they think they will be lucky to finish in the top half of the table. Fancy Fulham for the title if they sign Wilson and Grimes. Don't think either has gone through yet.

Think the best bet this season is for Ipswich to win league one. They have a very good manager in Paul Cook and unbelievably have spent £2.8 million on players. That sort of money talks in league one.

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Originally Posted by Shrewsbury Blue

You have to say that anyone who thinks Barnsley will finish second in the league need their head examining. Barnsley have lost their manager and their best two players and if you look at a Barnsley forum they think they will be lucky to finish in the top half of the table. Fancy Fulham for the title if they sign Wilson and Grimes. Don't think either has gone through yet.

Think the best bet this season is for Ipswich to win league one. They have a very good manager in Paul Cook and unbelievably have spent £2.8 million on players. That sort of money talks in league one.

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Wilson was confirmed a few days ago

loftforwords "The season preview revisited" column: https://loftforwords.fansnetwork.co....2%80%93-column

They got Derby and Forest wildly wrong but some good shouts otherwise.

Still waiting for this year's version but in the thread on Gabriel Sutton's predictions (https://loftforwords.fansnetwork.co....edictions./#24) one of them suggests 60-70 hours working on theirs so hopefully up soon.

Loftforwords is in: https://loftforwords.fansnetwork.co....%93-contenders

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"Last Season: Highly fancied after a pipping QPR to the summer signing of Kieffer Moore then spending the debt of a small African country for a loan of occasional free kick enthusiast Harry Wilson, but Neil Harris’ spit-on-it-and-call-it-foreplay “style” of football was non-dimensional, predictable and easy to neutralise....

Manager: Mick McCarthy I said to TC get his number up, he said who, I said you know who.

This Season: James Collins is exactly the sort of square-arsed, bruising, experienced centre forward you knew McCarthy would have in here at the first opportunity. Cardiff will, as has been the case for a number of years under Neils Warnock and Harris and now Big Mick, pose a physical challenge to whoever plays for them, with Sean Morrison a persistent threat at set pieces....

Local Knowledge – Gareth Scriven @Scrivs25 “We started last season under Neil Harris, following a successful spell, where we reached the play offs the previous season . We lost out to eventual winners, Fulham. The majority of the fanbase were hoping Harris could continue the good work from the previous season but things didn't go according to plan. The early part of last season was poor, really poor...

What We Said Last Season: 5th Finished 8th, -3.

Prediction: 4th We overrate Cardiff as often as we underrate Swansea. Again, maybe repeating that mistake again here but I like their transfer business."

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I've given a taster above but genuinely worth looking at the whole thing as they go into this sort of detail for each of the expected contenders in the linked thread and more to come.

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Originally Posted by surge

Loftforwords is in: https://loftforwords.fansnetwork.co....%93-contenders



I've given a taster above but genuinely worth looking at the whole thing as they go into this sort of detail for each of the expected contenders in the linked thread and more to come.

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Yes it’s a good read, they certainly put some work into their season preview! I agree it’s hard to predict a top 6 as there seems to be a lot of clubs struggling in the Championship at the moment but the 3 relegated clubs and Bournemouth will be up there leaving 2 play off places very much open to a large number of similar teams , including us

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Originally Posted by Don Corleone

Yes it’s a good read, they certainly put some work into their season preview! I agree it’s hard to predict a top 6 as there seems to be a lot of clubs struggling in the Championship at the moment but the 3 relegated clubs and Bournemouth will be up there leaving 2 play off places very much open to a large number of similar teams , including us

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Not The 20 said we'd need a good start which I thought was far from guaranteed given disrupted pre-season and this has been recognised on Loft For Words. I also like that they've recognised our recruitment has been strong (at least on paper) recently.

The Benjamin Bloom Football Channel (one of those from Gab Sutton's thread highlighting other good predictors) has us in 9th and also comments on positive recruitment process with the relevant time-stamp being 31:00 here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rcl7G-u5JKw This one says a lot will depend on young players stepping up and we've slowly being going backwards in terms of league position even before this year started.

https://upthemightypool.co.uk/2021/0...guide-2021-22/

I contributed to this Blackpool websites predictions article

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Originally Posted by Michael Morris

https://upthemightypool.co.uk/2021/0...guide-2021-22/

I contributed to this Blackpool websites predictions article

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You've said middle third but that could be as high as 9th or as low as 16th. Do you think margins between those sides are too slim to make a more specific prediction?

Good podcast on the Championship here, which has their predictions for the season in three parts;-

https://www.secondtierpod.co.uk/

Their selection of three players to watch in the coming season is interesting.

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Originally Posted by the other bob wilson

Good podcast on the Championship here, which has their predictions for the season in three parts;-

https://www.secondtierpod.co.uk/

Their selection of three players to watch in the coming season is interesting.

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Time-stamp is 11:00.

First comment is comparing us to Mick's title winning Wolves side with good wide players and good strikers and another comment has Ryan Giles as our LB/LWB...err?

Sorry Bob, I like the videos they put up on twitter showing clips of Championship football past but quite frequently don't rate their analysis.

Do like what they're saying about Stoke though so swings and roundabouts.

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1. "Sheff Utd"
2. Fulham
3. Boro
4. Bournemouth
5. Millwall
6. Stoke
7. QPR
8. WBA
9. Forest
10. Luton
11. Brum
12. Cardiff
13. Barnsley
14. Blackburn
15. Swans
16. Reading
17. Blackpool
18. Hull
19. Cov
20. Posh
21. PNE
22. Bristol C
23. Huddersfield
24. Derby

https://twitter.com/thehuwdavies/sta...34963543568389

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From Huw Davies, Freelance sub-editor, writer & copywriter, Wales fan & former managing editor of FourFourTwo.

Some very big shouts there but no reasoning given.