C'mon Leeds!

[ARAZI91]

Very true M Monty

Well I'll be Damned (United)
Just noticed that's the Scottish actor Brian McCardie in your avatar there ArkRoyal grabbing at the throat of that great Liverpudlian actor Stephen Graham.

 

[markfinn]

Spurs come in as slight favourites on form, but Leeds are hard to beat and a draw is a real possibility. The match is on Saturday 7 November at Elland Road, kick-off 12:30, live on TNT Sports.

This time last year compared with now

	Leeds	Spurs
Nov 2025 (after 11 games)	16th, 11 pts	5th, 18 pts
Final 2025-26	14th	17th, 41 pts
Now (after 9 games)	12th, 11 pts	9th, 12 pts

What it tells us

• The positions swapped last season: Spurs looked comfortable in November but then collapsed. They had three managers in one season, and only survived on the final day by beating Everton 1-0. Leeds were in trouble in November but recovered to finish safely in 14th.
• Spurs have improved under De Zerbi: Since he arrived in March they have picked up as many points as Liverpool and Villa. They have now won their last three league games: 3-1 against Coventry, 2-0 at Chelsea and 2-0 against Palace.
• Leeds have stalled: They have won just one of their last nine matches, and lost 2-0 at Bournemouth last time out. However, they draw a lot, with 5 draws from 9 games, and they have only conceded 8 goals, which is the second-best defensive record in the division.
• Head-to-head: Spurs won 2-1 at Elland Road in October 2025, and the return game in May finished 1-1.

Team news

• Leeds: James Justin and Gabriel Gudmundsson both picked up knocks at Bournemouth. Joe Rodon and Noah Okafor are also doubts.
• Spurs: Bentancur returns, and they have no fresh injury concerns.

What the previews expect

• Result: Most previews predict a narrow 1-2 Spurs win, and the bookmakers make Spurs favourites.
• Goals: Opinion is split. One analyst expects under 2.5 goals because Leeds create little at home and defend well. Others point out that both teams have scored in five of the last six meetings.

Spurs have the momentum and the bigger squad, so they should be the likelier winners. But Leeds at home are stubborn, and a low-scoring game or a draw would not be a surprise. Last season also showed that Spurs’ early form can fade.

What do you think will happen in Saturdays game?

 

[ArkRoyal]

Last season also showed that Spurs’ early form can fade.

Depends on how you measure form. The way Spurs have been playing this season, ignoring the first game, Spurs have been head and shoulders better than how they played last sesason. Scoring has been difficult but they have created many chances and have generally been the better team without getting the results. The start last season we won games without playing well and it was only a matter of time before we started to the results we deserved

 

[markfinn]

Depends on how you measure form. The way Spurs have been playing this season, ignoring the first game, Spurs have been head and shoulders better than how they played last sesason. Scoring has been difficult but they have created many chances and have generally been the better team without getting the results. The start last season we won games without playing well and it was only a matter of time before we started to the results we deserved

Form ? can it only be expressed in points gained - nothing for classy performances that end in 0 points - that was one of the questions we had earlier do we want entertaining or points ? - I always think back to Kevin Keegan at Newcastle

 

[Monty]

Whatever happened to entertaining football?

I sometimes wonder whether today's Premier League supporters are more interested in three points than actually enjoying watching their team play. Of course, we all want to win, but compare today's game with football 20 or 30 years ago. The financial stakes are enormous, managers are under constant pressure and tactical analysis seems to dominate everything. Pressing, positioning, controlling space and defensive organisation. All very clever, no doubt, but does it make for a great afternoon's entertainment? We've become obsessed with results and league positions. A manager finishing fourth playing dull football is apparently doing a better job than someone finishing sixth playing exciting, attacking football.

And then there's VAR! Even when the ball hits the net, you can't celebrate properly until somebody in a studio has checked three different camera angles and drawn a few lines on a screen. That spontaneous joy of a goal has been taken away from many supporters. A scrappy 1-0 win and 90 minutes of tedium? Three points, job done! An entertaining 3-2 defeat? Absolute disaster!

Perhaps I'm looking back through rose-tinted glasses, but surely winning and entertaining aren't mutually exclusive? Football is supposed to be entertainment, after all. I'd rather watch a team trying to win than one whose first priority is making sure they don't lose a la Farke.

Or am I just remembering things differently?

 

[markfinn]

Or am I just remembering things differently?

Possibly

 

[markfinn]

The First Division averaged about 2.54 goals per game across the 1970s. That’s 11,749 goals in 4,620 matches over the ten seasons from 1970-71 to 1979-80.

Season	Goals	Per game
1970-71	1,089	2.36
1971-72	1,160	2.51
1972-73	1,160	2.51
1973-74	1,107	2.40
1974-75	1,213	2.63
1975-76	1,230	2.66
1976-77	1,183	2.56
1977-78	1,231	2.66
1978-79	1,217	2.63
1979-80	1,159	2.51

Points to note

• The lowest-scoring top-flight season ever: That was 1970-71, at 2.36 goals per game, when Arsenal won the title.
• A sharp fall from the 1960s: As recently as 1967-68 the top flight averaged 3.03 goals per game.
• Today’s comparison: The current Premier League season is running at about 2.70 goals per game (243 goals in 90 matches), which is higher than any season in the 1970s.

winning margin, meaning how many points the champions finished ahead of the runners-up. Across the 1970s that averaged about 3 points. Note that a win was worth only 2 points then.

Season	Champions	Pts	Runners-up	Pts	Margin
1970-71	Arsenal	65	Leeds	64	1
1971-72	Derby	58	Leeds	57	1
1972-73	Liverpool	60	Arsenal	57	3
1973-74	Leeds	62	Liverpool	57	5
1974-75	Derby	53	Liverpool	51	2
1975-76	Liverpool	60	QPR	59	1
1976-77	Liverpool	57	Man City	56	1
1977-78	Nott’m Forest	64	Liverpool	57	7
1978-79	Liverpool	68	Nott’m Forest	60	8
1979-80	Liverpool	60	Man Utd	58	2

Points to note

• Tight title races: Four of the ten titles were won by a single point. In 1971-72 Leeds, Liverpool and Man City all finished one point behind Derby.
• The biggest margins came late in the decade: Forest won by 7 points in 1977-78, and Liverpool by 8 in 1978-79. Liverpool conceded only 16 league goals that season.
• Converting to today’s scoring: A one-point gap with 2 points for a win is roughly equivalent to a gap of one or two points today.

The modern era is clearly more entertaining. Today’s game has more goals, more matches where both sides score, and fewer goalless draws.

Per match	1970s	Last decade*
Goals per game	2.54	2.84
Both teams scored	50%	53%
3+ goals	46%	55%
5+ goals	12%	16%
0-0 draws	9.5%	6.0%
All draws	29%	23%
Avg winning margin	1.75	1.92
Home wins	49%	44%

*Premier League seasons 2016-17 to 2024-25, with 2022-23 missing from the dataset. Adding 2022-23 and 2025-26 from published totals doesn’t change the picture: the decade still averages about 2.83 goals per game.

What it means

• More goals: That’s about 0.3 more goals per match, or roughly one extra goal every three games.
• Far fewer dull games: Goalless draws are down by more than a third. Over half of today’s matches have three or more goals, compared with under half in the 1970s.
• Both ends are busier: Both teams scored in more matches, so goals for and against are both up. It isn’t just the strong sides running up scores.
• The best single season: 2023-24 averaged 3.28 goals per game, with only 2.9% of matches ending 0-0. That beats every season of the 1970s comfortably.

Where the 1970s win

• Closer contests: The average winning margin was smaller, with more draws and more one-goal games, so matches were tighter even if they had fewer goals.
• Less predictable: A league that was more evenly matched overall saw ten title races decided by an average of 3 points.

Main source: the engsoccerdata dataset

• What it is: A free, open archive of every English league result since 1888, compiled by James Curley. I downloaded the full results file from github.com/jalapic/engsoccerdata and calculated every figure myself.
• What it covers: All the match-level stats in my last two answers come from it, including winning margins, draws, both teams scoring, 3+ and 5+ goals, 0-0s and home wins.
• Coverage gap: The file runs to 2024-25 but is missing 2022-23.

Cross-checks

• 1970s goal totals: I checked these against Wikipedia’s season pages for the First Division, for example 1970-71 and 1976-77. All ten seasons matched the dataset exactly.
• 2025-26 total: The figure of 1,045 goals (2.75 per game) is from Wikipedia’s 2025-26 Premier League page.

What I didn’t verify

• 2022-23 figure: I used about 2.85 goals per game for 2022-23, but that came from my own knowledge, not a source I looked up.
• Title-margin table: The champions and runners-up points in the earlier table also came from my own knowledge rather than a lookup. I’m confident in them, but I can check them against the dataset if you’d like.

all created by AI - Claude

Put the 70's teams on todays pitches with todays equipment and diets etc ? well we will never know as all improvements work equally as well for the opposing sides so should cancel each other out

Tonight's game - C'mon the Blue Noses