Barnsley, Sheffield Wednesday and Plymouth Argyle hold this advantage over Ipswich Town: Opinion | OneFootball

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Football League World

·29 March 2023

Barnsley, Sheffield Wednesday and Plymouth Argyle hold this advantage over Ipswich Town: Opinion

Article image:Barnsley, Sheffield Wednesday and Plymouth Argyle hold this advantage over Ipswich Town: Opinion

The last week or so has blown the League One automatic promotion and title race open.

Sheffield Wednesday's two losses on the bounce mean that Plymouth Argyle have regained top spot while Ipswich Town are three points back from the Owls and Barnsley, while sitting three points further off the pace, cannot be written off either.


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We're heading to the business end of the 2022/23 campaign and it looks as though we're set for a thrilling conclusion to the race for the top two and the title.

It's hard to call which two will be sitting at the top of the third tier table after 46 games but Barnsley, Wednesday, and Plymouth do have an advantage over Ipswich - the difficulty of their respective run-ins.

Wednesday are set to play just two sides in the top half of the table - Derby County and Shrewsbury Town - with the remaining seven games coming against sides below 12th. Given Darren Moore's side have lost just one game against bottom-half opposition all season, that's a promising sign for the Owls.

Similarly, Shrewsbury are the only top-half team that Plymouth will face between now and the end of the season while Barnsley have to play Ipswich, the Shrews, Peterborough United, and six teams in the bottom half of the table.

The Tractor Boys, meanwhile, still have five games to play against top-half opposition - Derby, Wycombe Wanderers, Charlton Athletic, Peterborough United, and Barnsley.

It looks tougher still when you consider that four of those are still battling for either automatic promotion or the play-offs.

There is more nuance to the final weeks of the season than just league position but SoccerStats run-in analysis, which looks at the points per game - adjusted for home and away fixtures - of each of a side's remaining opponents, gives us a good idea of who has the toughest run-in.

In this metric too, Ipswich, whose remaining opponents have averaged 1.53 PPG this season, are lagging behind Barnsley (1.13), Wednesday (1.19), and even Plymouth (1.24).

Football is not played on paper but Kieran McKenna's side look to have the hardest run-in of the sides in the automatic promotion race.

The Ipswich boss will hope that can help his side raise their game but on the surface, it certainly looks like a disadvantage.

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