By Albatross
November 11 2002

Albatross turns Statto for a look at the season so far. How have Pools reached top spot, and stayed there? What's making the difference, nembers-wise? And will it continue? Now Read On.... With 18 games gone, Pools currently lie four points clear at the top of the table. It's been a good start, no doubt about that, and if we continue on the way we have been we'll accumulate something like 94 points - more than enough for automatic promotion, and in most seasons enough to win the title. But when it comes down to it, what is making the difference for Pools at the moment?

There are five teams we have not played yet, and three of those - Kiddy, Cambridge and Scunthorpe - are in the top half - in fact they lie 6th, 7th and 8th respectively. That means we've played eight of the teams currently in the top half of the table. Our record in those eight games may surprise a few people: we've won three, drawn three and lost two for twelve points from eight games - not that great a return, though by no means poor. Add in the fact that the two defeats came against the teams currently lying in 2nd and 3rd, and one of the draws was at 4th place Torquay, and a pattern starts to emerge....

Compare this with our record against teams currently in the bottom half. We've played 10 of them, won eight (four away from home), drawn once, and lost once. 25 points from 10 games is a good record for pretty much anyone.

In terms of the wins against the top half, those three victories came at home to Wrexham (currently 5th) and Lincoln (9th), and at Oxford (11th). Given our record against the top eight to ten clubs is not so hot, you might expect Pools to be a lot lower down.

The reason that we are in fact top is that we are proving to be very good at picking up the wins against the teams we really should be beating. With the exception of the slip ups against Macclefield and Swansea, no other team from the bottom half has been able to stand in Pools' way; and that's why we are where we are. The other clubs around us are losing or drawing some of those games, and Pools' consistency against them is starting to show. Bournemouth have failed to pick up the full three points against Orient, Darlington, Swansea and Boston; Pools have already picked up wins against two of those. Rushden meanwhile missed out against Swansea, Shrewsbury, Exeter and Hull, taking just four points from those games compared to Pools' return of ten against the same clubs.

So what does the future hold? Well, the next six league games will see Pools playing the reamining three top half teams; and so we might find that our form drops a little from the end of November. If we keep beating the lower teams though, we should still be in the top three, possibly even still just top, and then there are four likely wins from five in January that should help us pull away again. So the message is, don't panic - we're still on course.