Race for top 4 | Finito.

Woziak said:
We have 12 games left , Newcastle 12, Spurs 11, Brighton 13 and Liverpool 12.

We have 6 home, 6 away with Newcastle, Spurs, Brighton, West Ham, Forrest and Bouremouth away. With Fulham, wolves, Chelsea, Brentford, Villa and Everton. If we had a true number 9, Martial fit and reliable , Eriksen, Casemeiro, Sabitzer all available for every game I’d be confident, our GD is shocking and loses the club a point. We need to win 3 away games, Draw 2 and lose 1 preferably to Brighton if anyone then at home we must win 5 out of 6, the saints result was awful and puts us in the mix if we finish with 8 wins, 3 draws and 1 defeat we end on 77 points that’s enough for third place, but if we show recent form of 18/20 points from 12 games plus fatigued play , we will be in trouble as 68/70 points could be 4th but more likely 5th or 6th this season and if we tie on points our GD is a huge issue!

Simple we need 8 wins from 12 games. More importantly we must not lose our next PL game against Newcastle and ideally win it !
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8 wins is madness. We simply do not need 74 points to be top 4.
 
According to betting odds, we are 37.66% of probability to win EL and 80.95% to finish top 4.
1-(1-0.3766)*(1-0.8095)= 0.8812423

So 88.12% of probability we play CL football next season.
Correct me if I am still wrong.
 
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We need eriksen and martial back as additional sources of creativity and goals. Sabitzer is already fit and a very useful option.

Casemiro mindless suspension still grates a lot, given the competitions we are in
 
cyberman said:
8 wins is madness. We simply do not need 74 points to be top 4.
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Then how many because you are massively underestimate the chasing pack and their form, especially Brighton, Newcastle, Liverpool and Spurs.

Liverpool can put a 9 or 10 Game wining run, Conte has a habit of picking up 3 points at any cost and we have difficult away games to all of them bat Liverpool; Brighton, Newcastle and spurs. Are Spurs capable of wining easily at saints today yes, could we get beat by Newcastle in two weeks yes, then what ? We are 5th with 11 games to play and are Brighton capable of wining 8 or 9 from the 13 they have to play, top 4 is far from done and to be absolutely sure we need 8 wins or 7 wins and 3 draws. None of these teams have anything but PL to concentrate on no Thursday Sunday football, no lack of goals.

United have scored less in the PL than all of them with a +6 GD so we can not afford to tie 4th place on 68-70 points as we slip to 5th.
 
Matthew84! said:
All the top teams play each other, people need to stop over reacting again.
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It's also important not to overreact the other way too. No room for complacency at all anymore. Lose to Newcastle away, which is a very possible outcome, and we are back in the chaos of a top 4 scrap. With a tiring squad, terrible goal difference, our best player out for another couple of games, and fighting on multiple fronts, unlike all the other contenders.

Yes the other teams will drop points but our buffer is pretty much gone now and we will drop points also. If you want to be relaxed about it, fine, but it's not supported by the facts.
 
Some of you lack the mentality to be Utd fans. Leave the club. Sign for Everton.
 
Woziak said:
Then how many because you are massively underestimate the chasing pack and their form, especially Brighton, Newcastle, Liverpool and Spurs.

Liverpool can put a 9 or 10 Game wining run, Conte has a habit of picking up 3 points at any cost and we have difficult away games to all of them bat Liverpool; Brighton, Newcastle and spurs. Are Spurs capable of wining easily at saints today yes, could we get beat by Newcastle in two weeks yes, then what ? We are 5th with 11 games to play and are Brighton capable of wining 8 or 9 from the 13 they have to play, top 4 is far from done and to be absolutely sure we need 8 wins or 7 wins and 3 draws. None of these teams have anything but PL to concentrate on no Thursday Sunday football, no lack of goals.

United have scored less in the PL than all of them with a +6 GD so we can not afford to tie 4th place on 68-70 points as we slip to 5th.
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Spurs have 3 wins in 8
Liverpool 2 in 6
Newcastle 2 in 7
Brighton 3 in 5 and I’m not worried about Brighton who have some tough fixtures coming up.
There’s no need to pretend somethings there and isn’t there.
 
Sandikan said:
Just imagine how some of these people are going to be if we actually sit outside the top 4 at any stage!
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Some of us are born worriers. Just continue to ignore us and we'll keep doing our thing. No harm done.
 
With amount of games we're playing (game vs Fulham tomorrow will be our 46th match of the season, with at least 14 more to go) I don't think it's overreacting if we say that top 4 finish isn't guaranteed. Can't take it for granted though we're obviously in best position atm.
 
If any of Liverpool, Spurs, Newcastle or United put a decent run of wins together, they will finish in the top four at the expense of the others. Currently, none of us look like putting such a run together and therefore I'd expect the table to look pretty similar to the current order, when the season ends. The gap between 2nd and 3rd will continue to widen.
 
I know we would have 2 games in hand but Spurs going above us with a win does mean we are in a race I didn't think about a couple weeks ago. Thought top 3 was done but seems not
 
weizxx said:
According to betting odds, we are 37.66% of probability to win EL and 80.95% to finish top 4.
1-(1-0.3766)*(1-0.8095)= 0.8812423

So 88.12% of probability we play CL football next season.
Correct me if I am still wrong.
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I’m definitely not as confident as I was a few weeks ago. We’ve dragged ourselves into a real fight for it now.

I can actually see us losing away at Newcastle. They’ll press us high and intense with the crowd behind them. I can see us being a mess in midfield without casemiro.

Our fixture schedule worries me. Any kind of injury to Rashford and we’re in big trouble.
 
Dr Foo said:
If it was a choice between getting 2 more trophies and top 4 which would you pick?
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You do realise 2 more trophies would include winning Europa league meaning Champions League qualification in the process , making the whole top 4 finish redundant .
 
weizxx said:
According to betting odds, we are 37.66% of probability to win EL and 80.95% to finish top 4.
1-(1-0.3766)*(1-0.8095)= 0.8812423

So 88.12% of probability we play CL football next season.
Correct me if I am still wrong.
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Doubt those odds factor in nuances such as fatigue and handling pressure as we get closer to the finish line. The chances of us being in the CL next season should definitely be in our favour, but I'm not quite as confident as 88%. We're starting to look a bit less convincing in the league and it'll only get harder if we keep progressing in the two cups
 
AndySmith1990 said:
Doubt those odds factor in nuances such as fatigue and handling pressure as we get closer to the finish line. The chances of us being in the CL next season should definitely be in our favour, but I'm not quite as confident as 88%. We're starting to look a bit less convincing in the league and it'll only get harder if we keep progressing in the two cups
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Those odds factor in everything. They are based on large numbers of punters with skin in the game placing bets on what they think the likeliest outcome will be factoring in everything they are aware of. The only thing that might make the betting odds over-state our chances is that there are more United fans than there are fans of other teams. To the extent fans tend to bet there own teams out of loyalty or bias can move the line in favour of the most popular teams.
 
weizxx said:
According to betting odds, we are 37.66% of probability to win EL and 80.95% to finish top 4.
1-(1-0.3766)*(1-0.8095)= 0.8812423

So 88.12% of probability we play CL football next season.
Correct me if I am still wrong.
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The calculation is correct, but the probabilities from the bookmakers include a margin so that they can make a profit. The true probabilities are slightly worse, but we are still in a good spot.
 
Dr Foo said:
If it was a choice between getting 2 more trophies and top 4 which would you pick?
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I would prefer the trophies but could do without the stress. I also think it would take something to go seriously wrong for us not to get top 4 which wouldn’t be great for ETH as the apparent man to bring us forward.
 
Judas said:
I think we will lose to Newcastle but still finish top 4. I’m really not worried as things currently stand.
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Yeah I can see this happening too.

Newcastle have 4 away games out of 5 after they play us and their home game is vs Spurs. It's a very tough run.
 
Judas said:
I think we will lose to Newcastle but still finish top 4. I’m really not worried as things currently stand.
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My thoughts exactly. I think we’ll lose to Newcastle, experience media hysteria about the fact we’d be 5th then we’d win our games in hand and find ourselves in a comfortable position with a handful of games left.
 
Top 4 should still be a formality for us. The only thing that might make it slightly rocky is Casemiro's absence for the next few games. If we beat Newcastle, that should be that as far as I'm concerned.
 
CM10 said:
Top 4 should still be a formality for us. The only thing that might make it slightly rocky is Casemiro's absence for the next few games. If we beat Newcastle, that should be that as far as I'm concerned.
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I know we have easier games after but if we lose to Newcastle we are outside the top 4. That is a massive game.
 
Fully Fledged said:
I know we have easier games after but if we lose to Newcastle we are outside the top 4. That is a massive game.
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We'll have only harder games than Southampton at Old Trafford and we fecked that up. With form, injuries, Casemiro's suspension, we're in trouble - we'll need our rivals to drop a LOT of points.
 
I don't think it's as straightforward as many of you think it'll be but we are obviously still favourites. There are no easy games in the run in, as demonstrated with the amount of points we've dropped recently. It doesn't help we don't have our first choice midfield to rely on for the next month.
 
Siorac said:
We'll have only harder games than Southampton at Old Trafford and we fecked that up. With form, injuries, Casemiro's suspension, we're in trouble - we'll need our rivals to drop a LOT of points.
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I agree the form is what's killing the momentum. The performances have dropped ridiculous levels due to fatigue and injury. Southampton was a disastrous result, draw against the bottom placed team irrelevant of the red card is a poor result. United would have been comfortable this period if the team killed off the palace game by keeping composure and winning a perfectly winnable fixture against Southampton.
 
Siorac said:
We'll have only harder games than Southampton at Old Trafford and we fecked that up. With form, injuries, Casemiro's suspension, we're in trouble - we'll need our rivals to drop a LOT of points.
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We fecked up because be had to play for an hour with 10 men, and still should have had a penalty that might have won it for us.

People need to calm down, just take every game as they come. The other teams will drop points and we should have players back for the final run in.

We should be fine, and if we don't make it then we didn't deserve to be there anyway.
 
Fully Fledged said:
I know we have easier games after but if we lose to Newcastle we are outside the top 4. That is a massive game.
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We also have 2 games in hand on Tottenham. It wouldn't be a true reflection of the table
 
PoTMS said:
I don't think it's as straightforward as many of you think it'll be but we are obviously still favourites. There are no easy games in the run in, as demonstrated with the amount of points we've dropped recently. It doesn't help we don't have our first choice midfield to rely on for the next month.
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It definitely isn't straightforward, as Newcastle and Spurs are creeping up but we are still in pole position. Just need to get our focus right next few home games.
 
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