In 2019 and 2020 I wrote regular pieces about the progress of Leeds United, the football club that I have supported since childhood. Most of these pieces featured screenshots taken from the BBC website of the top teams in the Championship, the second tier in English football. Leeds were finally promoted from that division to the Premier League in 2020, as recorded here (“The Promised Land”). Last May Leeds were relegated again. I have not posted any pieces about the team’s progress this season, until now.

Here is how the top of the Championship looked this morning, another screenshot taken from the BBC website:

Leeds are back in the top two, so if the season ended now I could look forward to at least one more year of Premier League football. The most notable feature of this graphic, though, is that the top four teams in the Championship are all averaging at least 2 points per game. This is a subject that I originally wrote about in this piece from January 2019, again here (February 2019) and for a third time in this piece over a year later.

The last of these pieces summarized the previous 20 seasons and noted that any team averaging at least 2 points per game had always ended the season in one of the top two places, and had therefore achieved automatic promotion. On four occasions both teams in the top two had achieved an average of at least 2 points per game. In eight seasons neither of the top two teams had achieved it. In the other eight seasons only the top-placed team had achieved it.

This season, each team in the Championship has fewer than 10 games left to play. There has never been a season when the top four teams have had such a high points-per-game average at such a late stage. It looks likely that, for the first time, a team will average 2 points per game and still finish outside the top two.

Today, Easter Monday, the three games that involve the top four teams all kick off at different times: Leicester City v Norwich City at 12.30pm, Ipswich Town v Southampton at 5.30pm and Leeds United v Hull City at 8pm. Leeds are currently managed by Daniel Farke. From 2017 to 2021 he was manager of Norwich and he led them to promotion from the Championship twice. Naturally I am hoping that his former team will do us a favour and deny Leicester a win. That will keep Leeds in the top two heading into tonight’s game. I am also hoping that Southampton maintain their average of 2 points per game, by beating Ipswich, for at least two reasons: it would keep this season’s statistical anomaly going for another game or two. And it would give Leeds the chance to go top again tonight, with only six games left to play.