You’ve made it, the end of the UK Football season which seems to have started an eternity ago, and with a World Cup in the middle of the seasons, it feels like it has been non stop football. But that’s just the way you and we like it.
It looks like even teams like Chelsea and Arsenal have had enough as midweek games showed the opposite of excellent seasons with surprise results.
The only thing to play for is the last spot in next year’s Championship between Hull and Newcastle. Hull are the favourites to be playing at Ewood Park, Portman Road and Ashton Gate next year, as they need to beat Manchester United at home to stand any chance. Newcastle can survive if Hull don’t win, but given the turmoil and shambles of the once great club anything can happen and it wouldn’t surprise. Some of this year’s surviving teams argues the case of more than three being relegated every now and again.
So to find some UK Football where the stakes are high, as ever you need to go down to the Football League. This weekend has the three playoff finals spread across Saturday, Sunday and Monday.
First up is the League Two playoff final between Southend and Wycombe. Wycombe were in the top 3 and automatic promotion spots all season fell out in only the last few rounds whilst Southend finished in 5th behind them by one place with the same amount of points.
Working on the theory that teams who were in automatic promotion playoffs most of the year but don’t go up automatically usually struggle to get through the playoff, and Southend manager Phil Brown famously took Hull City into the EPL back in the last decade we’ll plump for the Shrimpers aka Southend United to get through the playoff and into the third tier of League One.
Sunday sees the League One final with the unenviable task of competing with the last day of the EPL. But it is an important step to the hallowed ground of the EPL with many teams in the recent past being promoted to the EPL after a stint in League One within three years of promotion. Momentum can be everything. Examples of recent double ups are Bournemouth, Southampton, Norwich City, Leicester City.
This year’s instalment sees Preston North End (3rd in regular season) play Swindon Town who finished 4th. Preston North End have much more quality, with ex EPL Beckford and goal scoring hotshot Garner. They should win, but they have not gone up through the playoffs in 9 attempts spreading across three decades. Only three of those have been playoff final losses, but that stat is enough to turn The Gurgler away. And Swindon Town looked OK at times in this campaign. We’ll take Swindon Town to go up.
Finally the biggest, richest, most important, whatever game in UK Football aka The Championship playoff is on Monday UK Time. The two teams fight off for the most token of trophies, but the riches of the EPL is the biggest prize that all fans, players, coaches, staff, and phone answering monkeys all want.
Once again, the two teams that finished the season in the two places just below automatic promotion are playing off in the final. Just like all three divisions this year.
Middlesbrough should have gone up given their position before the last 6-8 weeks. They have impressively dealt with Brentford in the semi finals. Norwich meanwhile got two games tougher than they would have wanted in Ipswich Town. It will be interesting to see if that extra toughness turns into a win, as an Ipswich fan who had to suffer last weekends failure they look the goods to go up.
That’s how we tip. Norwich to win promotion.
The multi of all three teams to be promoted comes to around $7 for those keen for a tickle.
For the final time this year, here is the EPL Multi lists.
BETTER MULTI
$1 pays $23
MANCHESTER CITY to beat Southampton
CHELSEA to beat Sunderland
LEICESTER to beat QPR
EVERTON to beat Spurs
SWANSEA to beat Crystal Palace.
BLURST MULTI
$1 pays $123
ARSENAL to beat WBA
STOKE to beat Liverpool
BURNLEY to beat Aston Villa
MANCHESTER UNITED to beat Hull
DRAW – Newcastle / West Ham
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