PL 2021/22 - Fixture Release

[Bert]

Imagine we’ll be at home to start as we were away last season. 
 

There’s so many criteria to meet, certain London clubs not allowed to play on same day, we always play away the weekend of Diwali, clubs request certain games I.e we always request Boxing Day at home. 

[Xen]

5 minutes ago, Bert said:

Imagine we’ll be at home to start as we were away last season. 
 

There’s so many criteria to meet, certain London clubs not allowed to play on same day, we always play away the weekend of Diwali, clubs request certain games I.e we always request Boxing Day at home. 

Yep. Also have to consider other sports as well - afaik ourselves and Tigers won't have home games on the same day, for instance. Even more complicated when you include the lower leagues as well - particularly ground-sharing clubs.

 

Honestly it feels like such a logistical nightmare to accommodate all the various criteria that the thought of it being fiddled to give us such a bad run of draws seems a bit far-fetched. And yet, the numbers almost suggest the opposite.

[Nalis]

9 minutes ago, Bert said:

Imagine we’ll be at home to start as we were away last season. 
 

There’s so many criteria to meet, certain London clubs not allowed to play on same day, we always play away the weekend of Diwali, clubs request certain games I.e we always request Boxing Day at home. 

Is there a reason for that? Thinking most teams would want a home match on Boxing Day given the choice.

[Bert]

8 minutes ago, Nalis said:

Is there a reason for that? Thinking most teams would want a home match on Boxing Day given the choice.

I think it goes back to when we were struggling, tickets were brought as Christmas presents etc. 

[brockmyster]

Considering how we start may aswell have all the cannon fodder early on in the season to make use of our quick starts and we actually might be able to break down those parking the bus for once 

[David Hankey]

5 hours ago, StanSP said:

This Wednesday at 9am.

 

Home games after the EL games is important. 

Always like to have a home game to start, too. 

 

For once can we not have a seriously difficult last 3 as well

 

I think we'll get West Ham at home to start. 

Everton at home on Boxing Day. 

Southampton away NYD.

Norwich on final day of the season. 

Why crystal ball it? We'll know for sure in 48 hours time.

[surrifox]

It'll be palace away first up - I know these things. 

[bovril]

Please Brentford away near the start or end of the season 

[Finnegan]

I assume our last three or four games will be against members of the "big six."

 

You know, for reasons. 

[boots60]

30 minutes ago, bovril said:

Please Brentford away near the start or end of the season 

Near the end please. Will be more chance of going.

[FoxesWalk]

Hopefully we don’t have a concentration of hard fixtures in the last few games of the season again. Think people underestimate this as a factor as to why we lost ground to the likes of Liverpool at the end of last season. 

[Gravel]

1 hour ago, Bert said:

I think it goes back to when we were struggling, tickets were brought as Christmas presents etc. 

When Peter Taylor was in charge many would have preferred novelty socks.

[Corky]

It isn't the new season until someone types out a fixture list on their computer, takes a photo at an odd angle and uploads it to a website for click baiting tabloids to claim as EXCLUSIVE the night before it turns out none of them were correct.

[Xen]

3 hours ago, Xen said:

My first thought was that maybe this was just confirmation bias/short term thinking (not a dig at you, I would've said the exact same). But then actually digging out the fixtures and...

 

20/21: Man U (A) / Chelsea (A) / Spurs (H)

19/20: Sheffield (H) / Spurs (A) / Man U (H)

18/19: Arsenal (H) / Man C (A) / Chelsea (H)

17/18: West Ham (H) / Arsenal (H) / Spurs (A)

16/17: Man C (A) / Spurs (H) / Bournemouth (H)

15/16: Man U (A) / Everton (H) / Chelsea (A)

14/15: Southampton (H) / Sunderland (A) / QPR (H)

 

It's even worse when you look at the figures behind it.

 

The chances of all 3 matches being against the big 6 in any given season is 2%. We've had it twice in 7 seasons (28%)

The chance of at least 2 against the big 6 is 22%. We've had it 6 times out of 7 (86%)

The 14/15 season is the only time we've avoided them all, which should be a 30% chance.

 

We've been painfully unlucky with the fixture scheduling since being promoted. I'd actually be interested to see the statistical significance and whether or not such bad luck could've happened randomly, or if the evidence would actually suggest that something else is at play...

Decided to extrapolate this across all the 'Big 6' to see just how kindly the final 3 fixtures fell for them. Of course there's the slight caveat that there's only 5 'big 6' teams they can face so their totals will be naturally lower but, well, the numbers speak for themselves.

 

Green is a big 6 fixture, Yellow is against us, and Red indicates it was the final match of the season.

 

That first total table is ridiculous in itself - more than twice as many 'tough' fixtures to end the season compared to any 'Big 6' side, but the table below (just final games) is even more nuts. Since we've been in the Prem 5 of our season-closers have been against Big 6 sides, a challenge which those same sides have had to face precisely zero times between them.

 

 

Out of all the non-'big 6' teams featured above, we're top of the pile by some distance, but a couple other sides with fewer seasons had a similar rate of tough final-3 fixtures. Poor Huddersfield were only in the prem for 2 seasons and 5 of their 6 last-3 games were against 'Big 6' sides. Our total here is lower than above as our fixture against Man U in 15/16 was not a final fixture for them as they had a game rearranged.

 

 

I'm not going to speculate about any bias against us in the scheduling, but it certainly seems clear that at the very least we've been woefully unlucky with how our fixtures have fallen...

[Dan]

I can't make our second game. Will be gutted if it's a good away game.

[UniFox21]

20 minutes ago, Xen said:

Decided to extrapolate this across all the 'Big 6' to see just how kindly the final 3 fixtures fell for them. Of course there's the slight caveat that there's only 5 'big 6' teams they can face so their totals will be naturally lower but, well, the numbers speak for themselves.

 

Green is a big 6 fixture, Yellow is against us, and Red indicates it was the final match of the season.

 

That first total table is ridiculous in itself - more than twice as many 'tough' fixtures to end the season compared to any 'Big 6' side, but the table below (just final games) is even more nuts. Since we've been in the Prem 5 of our season-closers have been against Big 6 sides, a challenge which those same sides have had to face precisely zero times between them.

 

 

Out of all the non-'big 6' teams featured above, we're top of the pile by some distance, but a couple other sides with fewer seasons had a similar rate of tough final-3 fixtures. Poor Huddersfield were only in the prem for 2 seasons and 5 of their 6 last-3 games were against 'Big 6' sides. Our total here is lower than above as our fixture against Man U in 15/16 was not a final fixture for them as they had a game rearranged.

 

 

I'm not going to speculate about any bias against us in the scheduling, but it certainly seems clear that at the very least we've been woefully unlucky with how our fixtures have fallen...

If this year comes up with a similar fixture list, you've got to wonder if there are other things going against us than just bad luck. Conveniently the trend begins after we win the league, minus the 2 we had that season. 

[HighPeakFox]

Oh good, baseless conspiracy nonsense already...

[TheLittleBigMan]

I'd like to play each team twice please. 

[Xen]

2 minutes ago, HighPeakFox said:

Oh good, baseless conspiracy nonsense already...

It's not really baseless when there's at least some circumstantial evidence to support it. If it was truly random, there's a minuscule chance of our fixtures falling the way they have. Equally, Man City avoiding any tough fixtures is equally tiny (0.1% that they wouldn't face a single big-6 side in 7 years, so just marginally above that).

 

I'm not claiming that there's some evil bias against Leicester in particular, but it seems fairly clear that those 6 sides are either incredibly fortunate or are being treated somewhat favourably in the fixture scheduling, especially for the final game of each season.

[TheLittleBigMan]

Feel free to change the dates, times and the admission fees. You can even keep all the money I paid in advance for any transport and accommodation I forked out for after you change what is clearly an utterly irrelevant fixture list in the first place.

[StanSP]

3 minutes ago, TheLittleBigMan said:

Feel free to change the dates, times and the admission fees. You can even keep all the money I paid in advance for any transport and accommodation I forked out for after you change what is clearly an utterly irrelevant fixture list in the first place.

But if you know fixtures are destined to be changed, not least because of European participation, why would you book so far in advance without knowing for sure when the actual fixture will be? Not like they've said 'here you go, here's the fixtures' without any disclaimer that they may change (basically, there's always a disclaimer)

[HighPeakFox]

3 minutes ago, Xen said:

It's not really baseless when there's at least some circumstantial evidence to support it. If it was truly random, there's a minuscule chance of our fixtures falling the way they have. Equally, Man City avoiding any tough fixtures is equally tiny (0.1% that they wouldn't face a single big-6 side in 7 years, so just marginally above that).

 

I'm not claiming that there's some evil bias against Leicester in particular, but it seems fairly clear that those 6 sides are either incredibly fortunate or are being treated somewhat favourably in the fixture scheduling, especially for the final game of each season.

Whilst I understand your point, the fact that it has occurred does not make it evidence of deliberate fixture-date rigging - as others have said, putting the whole list together is a complex matter for a number of reasons, and the simple fact is all teams have to be played twice within the season. To suggest it is some machiavellian plot to thwart us, when there's never any guarantee we'll be challenging with 3 games to go, borders on paranoia and/or victimhood. Annoying - sure, but until somebody actually finds some genuine evidence, that's all it is for me.

[TheLittleBigMan]

11 minutes ago, StanSP said:

But if you know fixtures are destined to be changed, not least because of European participation, why would you book so far in advance without knowing for sure when the actual fixture will be? Not like they've said 'here you go, here's the fixtures' without any disclaimer that they may change (basically, there's always a disclaimer)

Tongue in cheek comment regarding fixture changes. I'm slightly out of context to be fair. 

Edited 14 June 2021 by TheLittleBigMan

[AgainstAllOdds]

Home games after the Europa League really are important. But that aside, when we play everyone really doesn't bother me. We'll have to play all 19 teams twice, the order doesn't matter! 

[iancognito]

Be nice if they shuffled the deck this time and didn't give us the same hand for a 3rd season running