Part two was an exploration of Gerard Houllier’s first 14 Premier League games in comparison with Dr Jo’s first 14 games in charge of Aston Villa back in 1990. Mainly because their record over the 14 games was so similar, despite Houllier’s program being considerably more challenging, but also because our position after 19 games is exactly the same today as it was 20 years ago.

Ian made the point in the comments that the table around us is not the same though, and he isn’t wrong. Personally, I think it’s easy to fall into the trap of getting hung up on position right now; it’s certainly a problem sitting at the foot of the table at this time of year if you’re falling further behind the rest, but less so if it’s just a few points that are putting you in the red zone.

I understand Ian’s fear of being just a point away from the relegation zone right now, but no one has ever been relegated in December, all that matters is where we are in May.

However, if the bottom of the table is more competitive, and it is; the teams in the red zone have more points, it follows that those points must come from somewhere and it can only come from above them. We’re perhaps fortunate that it’s from the top, more than the middle.

20 years ago, Liverpool sat atop the table as the calendar turned to a new year, separated from Sheffield Utd at the bottom by no less than 35 points. Today, it’s Man Utd at the top, but they’re just 21 points better off than West Ham at the opposite end.

Similarly, while we were three points clear of 18th placed Derby in 1990, we’re just a single point ahead of Fulham this year, but nine points behind Bolton in 6th compared with the 12 point gap to 6th placed Man Utd in 1990.

Is the glass half empty, or half full? That depends on where we go from here.

The tables

The two tables make for an interesting comparison, so I’ll dump them here in full and add a few little factoids at the bottom. This is how the table looked on the last day of 1990 and 2010:-


 1990 Pld W D L GF GA GD Pts
1 Liverpool 19 14 3 2 38 16 22 45
2 Arsenal 20 13 7 0 40 10 30 44
3 Crystal Palace 20 12 6 2 31 18 13 42
4 Leeds United 20 11 6 3 36 18 18 39
5 Tottenham Hotspur 20 9 6 5 33 25 8 33
6 Manchester United 20 9 6 5 30 22 8 32
7 Manchester City 19 7 8 4 30 27 3 29
8 Chelsea 20 8 5 7 33 37 -4 29
9 Norwich City 20 8 2 10 24 33 -9 26
10 Wimbledon 20 6 7 7 29 31 -2 25
11 Nottingham Forest 19 6 6 7 27 29 -2 24
12 Luton Town 20 6 5 9 22 30 -8 23
13 Southampton 20 6 4 10 29 36 -7 22
14 Everton 20 5 6 9 22 24 -2 21
15 Aston Villa 19 4 8 7 18 20 -2 20
16 Coventry City 20 5 5 10 20 24 -4 20
17 Queens Park Rangers 20 4 5 11 26 38 -12 17
18 Derby County 19 4 5 10 17 34 -17 17
19 Sunderland 20 3 6 11 23 32 -9 15
20 Sheffield United 19 2 4 13 12 36 -24 10

2010 Pld W D L GF GA GD Pts
1 Manchester United 18 10 8 0 39 17 22 38
2 Manchester City 20 11 5 4 32 16 16 38
3 Arsenal 19 11 3 5 39 22 17 36
4 Chelsea 19 10 4 5 33 15 18 34
5 Tottenham Hotspur 19 9 6 4 29 23 6 33
6 Bolton Wanderers 20 7 8 5 32 26 6 29
7 Sunderland 20 6 9 5 21 22 -1 27
8 Blackpool 17 7 4 6 26 29 -3 25
9 Blackburn Rovers 20 7 4 9 26 31 -5 25
10 Stoke City 19 7 3 9 23 24 -1 24
11 Everton 19 4 10 5 21 22 -1 22
12 Liverpool 18 6 4 8 21 23 -2 22
13 Newcastle United 19 6 4 9 28 31 -3 22
14 West Bromwich Albion 19 6 4 9 25 34 -9 22
15 Aston Villa 19 5 5 9 20 34 -14 20
16 Wigan Athletic 19 4 8 7 17 31 -14 20
17 Birmingham City 18 3 10 5 18 21 -3 19
18 Fulham 19 3 10 6 19 23 -4 19
19 Wolverhampton Wndrs 19 5 3 11 20 32 -12 18
20 West Ham United 20 3 8 9 20 33 -13 17

Factoids

  • This is not a like-for-like comparison; the 1990 table is the result of 197 matches, the 2010 table 190 matches.
  • 55 (27.9%) matches resulted in a draw in 1990, 60 (31.6%) matches have been tied in 2010. This is one contributing factor to the compactness of the table.
  • In 1990, the top six had registered 68 wins and 235 points between them, in 2010 the top six have won just 58 games and amassed 208 points.
  • In 1990, the bottom three had won only nine games between them and totalled 42 points, in 2010 it’s 11 wins and 54 points.
  • 540 goals had been scored in 1990, an average of 2.74 per game. 509 have been scored so far in 2010, that’s 2.68 per game on average.
  • The 1990 top six had lost 12 games, the 2010 version have lost 23 between them, while the bottom three had lost 34 games in 1990 compared with a total of 26 among the bottom three today.
  • The 1990 top six scored an average of 1.75 goals per game and conceded 0.92 while the 2010 top six scored 1.77 goals per game on average, but conceded 1.03 per game.
  • The 1990 bottom three scored an average of 0.90 goals per game and conceded 1.76 while the 2010 bottom three scored 1.02 times per game on average and conceded 1.52 goals per game.

Ian’s absolutely correct, this 2010/11 league is more competitive than the 1990/91 equivalent (take that “modern football is rubbish” proponents!), we must recognise that we are in an extremely perilous position right now. Extremely perilous.

We’re not too big and we’re not too good to go down, but we must not act like a small club and get all panicky. Let’s be humble though; we need to find 20 points over the next 19 games, but will probably actually need two or three more given the tightness of the league. We’ll also need to do in 16 or 17 games because heading into the last two games (Arsenal and Liverpool) needing points for survival is too scary to contemplate.

But it can be done. Collectively; club, management, players, fans, we’re all in this together.

Part four will show that we’re in a slightly worse position than Newcastle was at this stage two years ago and the slippery slope we’re standing at the top of. The one way I’m absolutely certain will lead to us sliding down the trail they blazed is by acting just like them.

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12 Comments to “The R Word, a study: Part III, it was twenty years ago today”

  1. Stewart Rouleau 31 December 2010 at 3:42 pm #

    Interesting analysis, again. Indeed, everyone is in this together. If you look at the poor performance as a statistical anomaly, just regressing to the mean should be enough. It is hard to imagine as many things going wrong in the second half as have in the first.

    Twenty years ago notwithstanding, no comfort in seeing the Beatles here, those diehard Everton fans and representatives of Houiller’s sentimental home.

    Reply
    • Dan 31 December 2010 at 6:07 pm #

      right now i can only hope it is just a statistical anomaly and not a symptom of the club imploding the way many fans seem to be determined to interpret it as.

      that’s all i’ve got.

      Reply
  2. ian 31 December 2010 at 4:39 pm #

    the problem I have Dan and thanks for the name check !!

    is that down there is not about skill but battling qualities and bottle

    in the games under Houllier we have only seen glimpses of this. At Chelsea we HAVE to see this, to give us hope we can get out. Look at the last lot of fixtures

    we gave up

    Wolves won at Anfield (no matter how poor they were)

    Fulham at Stoke (massive win)

    West Ham and Everton battled all the way

    Blues scored a last minute goal, never gave up

    only one team down there looked like that

    playing well for the next two months is the last of our concerns.

    negative boring clean sheets and 1-0 wins are called for, Houllier indicated this, time ot prove it

    Reply
    • Dan 31 December 2010 at 4:55 pm #

      ironic really. all the qualities that carried us to the heights of the last few seasons (according to many observers), that people said could carry us no higher, are exactly what we need now and have apparently abandoned us.

      it’s like ten thousand spoons…

      Reply
  3. Nanwasafan 31 December 2010 at 4:53 pm #

    The problem is, Houllier has created this mess by trying to play fancy football. So, many claim he is worth backing because the football is changing. But, the only way we survive is if we play percentage football. Men behind the ball blah blah blah. Let’s say we do this and he keeps us up, then what? We try expansive football again, without the personnel for it?

    Houllier is faced with the same dilemma as MON had, you don’t get the players you need until you are in Europe. You don’t get into Wurope without the players. Massive money is the only answer.

    You can employ all the mangers you want, it stays pretty simple: tight team playing to a plan with good players=top 8 finish. Individuals playing fancy football=lower half/relegation.

    It is APALLING that the best case scenario we are facing is survival playing survival football, followed by a rethink next season.

    Somebody, somewhere is responsible for destroying my football club.

    Reply
  4. Nanwasafan 31 December 2010 at 4:55 pm #

    And I do not believe that person was MON.

    Reply
    • ian 31 December 2010 at 5:09 pm #

      and you are thinking Randy ?

      Reply
  5. ian 31 December 2010 at 5:10 pm #

    Dan
    ironic really. all the qualities that carried us to the heights of the last few seasons (according to many observers), that people said could carry us no higher, are exactly what we need now and have apparently abandoned us.
    it’s like ten thousand spoons…

    well it is why he brought those players isn’t it ?

    and Houllier tried to turn them into something else

    Reply
  6. Badger 31 December 2010 at 5:36 pm #

    I’m trying to take heart in your previous comments about us having played a lot of matches against the top sides. That’s definitely a positive.
    But I keep harping back to that performance and the lack of fight against Citeh :-(
    Even Lawrenson said it was the worst he’s seen this season.

    Whatever, those tables are interesting in that Sheff utd at a glance seem to be already on the way down.
    Whereas West Ham have actually rallied of late after being the worst side I can remember at VP for ages.

    The striking difference in our case is the GD.
    It was actually much better than our position at the time, whereas today it’s the worst in the league.
    Another one is draws. Seems to me if you’re drawing loads, it’s not such a bad thing, as at least you’re hard to beat.

    I just worry that even though the teams below us are on paper mostly inferior, we don’t currently seem to be up for a scrap.
    A Citeh fan commented about not one of our players appealing the goal line clearance, almost as though we were resigned to losing.
    I really don’t remember how we looked 20 years ago, due to my fanaticism having had to be put on the back burner temporarily after the second of my kids was born, but I’d bet we didn’t lack for effort.

    And that could make a big difference.

    Looking at the current table purely statistically, I’d say Wolves look pretty certain of going down atm.
    But I know that when we play them, they’re going to at least give us a battle.
    And look at their result at Pool, compared to ours!
    Totally scarey.

    If GH doesn’t sort the bloody defence out……… :-(

    Still, trying to be positive again, a couple of wins shoots us up the table :-)

    Reply
  7. Dan 31 December 2010 at 6:14 pm #

    there’s enough blame to go around everyone folks, it won’t fix this mess right now though.

    Reply
    • Badger 31 December 2010 at 7:00 pm #

      Ha, when I started writing my post, only Stuart had replied.
      And now I’ve refreshed, my post has pretty much all been said already.
      Duh.

      Note to self;
      Must think quicker.

      Reply
      • Dan 31 December 2010 at 7:19 pm #

        as quick as they appeared, the went again. it’s like being mugged without the bruises!

        Reply

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