For a little while I've found it somewhat curious that we should be so high up the table, yet still have a negative goal difference. So I got to thinking, how do we compare with all other teams with negative GDs?

Here is a comparison of the top 4 leagues in England:

Premier League:
11 teams with a negative GD, with the average current placing being 15th (18th if the division had 24 teams)
Championship
12 teams with a negative GD, with the average current placing being 18th
League One
12 teams with a negative GD, with the average current placing being 18th
League Two
12 teams with a negative GD, with the average current placing being 17th

In the four top divisions in England, NEWPORT COUNTY ARE THE HIGHEST TEAM with a negative goal difference.
Hopefully,the away game at Cheltenham will go some way to restoring our GD.
On the other hand, if we lose, it may serve to show some people that our league placing isn't in fact genuine, and as I suspect, we are actually just riding our luck a bit.

Interestingly, in the 76 league games played so far under Mike Flynn, we have a negative GD of (-8)........ so Flynny has some way to go yet to be where he'd want to be.
Admittedly a couple of high losing margins are probably responsible for our GD overall, but we are now right on a GD knife edge as it were, in as much as, if we beat Cheltenham well, we'll find ourselves in a promotion slot with a posiitive GD, which will be a great position to be in.

I wonder what's the highest a team has ever finished with a negative GD?.....

Season 1992/1993 saw Norwich City finish 3RD THIRD in the Premier League with a goal difference of -4 minus four.

reebok0165 wrote:Season 1992/1993 saw Norwich City finish 3RD THIRD in the Premier League with a goal difference of -4 minus four.

Wow!... so there is hope. I had a feeling if anyone would know, it'd be you! Cracking snippet of info ..

Last time we finished with a + goal difference in the football league was 82/83 when we finished 4th in the old Division 3.
Since we got back into the league our record is:
13/14 -3 14th
14/15 -3 9th
15/16 -22 22nd
16/17 -22 22nd
17/18 -2 11th

Come the end of the season the only relevance to a minus goal difference is if we finish on a level number of points with another(s).
Imagine the heartache if we lose out on a promotion/play off place because of it !

OLDCROMWELLIAN wrote:Come the end of the season the only relevance to a minus goal difference is if we finish on a level number of points with another(s).
Imagine the heartache if we lose out on a promotion/play off place because of it !

In our division, currently, the next lowest team with a negative GD is in 13th place..... that's why I would like to see us in the position of a +GD.....
Ideally, I'd like to see Flynny shake off his own -8 at some point this season too. If we have a good December, maybe, just maybe we can really start to believe. That bloody Yeovil game !

Your last sentence hits the nail on the head. It's not really a reflection of the season so far. One disaster has produced the negative figure, that would also be true of the performances, nothing comes close to the disaster against Yeovil.

Goal difference in reality is worth one point

What's with the average placing, surely highest would be more relevant

I'm sure Huddersfield got promoted to the Premier League (via the playoffs) with a Negative Goal difference a couple of years ago.

B0mbshell wrote:I'm sure Huddersfield got promoted to the Premier League (via the playoffs) with a Negative Goal difference a couple of years ago.

Yep, you're right. Scored 56, conceded 58.

No getting away from it our GD is shocking !!

It is , but as a poster above pointed out, Huddersfield got promoted to the Premier League with a negative goal difference, do you think their fans gave a shite? Nope, will we if we get promoted this season? Nope.

Here we go again !!!!!!!!!!!!

Four one goal wins and a five goal defeat is 5 points better than four draws and a one goal win and I'd take the former every time.