General 'Championship' Thread 2018 - 2021

He is, his record at this level is excellent. But he will want to shift a number of players and bring in a few trusted faces in January.

Forest's manager was a dead man walking at the end of last season, they should have sacked him then. They obviously had Hughton in mind all along because he's basically passed the other guy as he left his office, the announcements were so close together!

Bonkers.

I wonder if there has ever been a season where after as many as 15 games there are just 2 points covering the top 7 and 3 covering the top 8?

You have to think the lack of atmosphere and congested fixtures is having an even bigger impact on how anybody can beat anybody in this league.

It is a shame we haven't been more consistent and took our chances in recent games, because this season really was an opportunity to move forward.

I was watching the highlights of last nights Championship games and some of the refereeing in those games was atrocious. In one of the games a striker was fouled  in the box and it was a stone wall penalty but amazingly the ref gave a free kick to the other team. I played the incident back a few times to see what I had missed but there was nothing, only the ref knows why he gave the defending team a free kick.

We have also seen some poor refereeing in recent weeks (Barbet getting away with one against Watford and the sending off that wasn't against Brentford). I know that we all make mistakes but there appear to have been some really awful decisions from refs who are supposed to be Championship level.

It's interesting to see how well teams like Luton, Barnsley and Reading who finished below us last season have been doing this season.

Luton have done especially well because they struggled in there first season back in the Championship but seem to have made small tweaks to their defence and attack which has made them a much harder team to beat and as a result they are a respectable 11th with 26 points. Reading didn't do too bad last year but a change of manager to Veljko Paunovic has certainly changed their fortunes and they are now 5th with 33 points.. Barnsley I suspect were in many people's picks to finish in the bottom 3 but have a healthy 25 points and sit 13th.

Apart from those relegated other teams that finished below us last season like Birmingham, Middlesborough, Huddersfield and Stoke have also improved and now sit ahead of us. Only Sheffield Wednesday remain in a lower position than us.

What makes the performances of Luton and Barnsley even more remarkable is that they are doing things on a shoestring. The last available wages figure for the Championship was for 2019/20 but it puts into perspective how they operate. Even teams like Blackburn and Preston seem to be able to recruit good players on a small wage budget.


1: Stoke City £94.2m

2: West Brom £92.2m

3: Swansea City £90.7m

4: Huddersfield £62.6m

5: Fulham £54.3m

6: Middlesbrough £48.7m

7: Cardiff City £48.4m

8: Derby £40.4m

9: Birmingham £38.5m

10: Reading £35.3m

11: Leeds £31.3m

12: Hull £31.1m

13: QPR £30.6m

14: Sheff Wed £29.3m

15: Nottm Forest £27.7m

16: Bristol City £27.2m

17: Brentford £17.1m

18: Balckburn £16.7m

19: Preston £15m

20: Millwall £13.3m

21: Wigan £11.7m

22: Barnsley £10.6m

23: Charlton £10.2m

24: Luton £6.2m

I presume that our figure included the high earners of Wells, Hugill and Eze and whilst it will be lower in 2020/21 it shows that some teams managaers are able to recruit and operate on a much more efficient basis than Warburton.

The figures were produced by Kieran Maguire, a football finance lecturer at Liverpool University.

and £13 million more than Brentford stands out too!

Not quite The Championship, but 7 out of 12 games in League 1 are off due to positive tests.

Man City against Everton was off tonight.

I wonder how much longer we actually play on before there is a pause for a period? I envisage the season being delayed before too long.

I heard on the radio (so it must be true) the COVID testing is costing each PL side £10k - small wonder the lower leagues are waiting to see which players have lost their sense of smell or taste....