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Ballpark Figures: Last-gasp sickeners
"Yet another late goal conceded robbed us of all three points. It's so unfair!" So spoke the lower-denomination message boards this morning in response to Tony Bedeau's second last Saturday. "We're always conceding late goals. We'd be twelvety points clear by now if it wasn't for that. I blame the players' fitness levels. Slade out!"
And that's what I've set out to investigate this week. Sure, we dropped two points with a late goal conceded last weekend, and did the same at Boston and at home against Oxford. But equally late goals for us added extra points in matches against Bristol Rovers, Wrexham and Mansfield. So on balance, would we be better or worse off if matches ended early, say after 85 minutes?
The chart below shows Grimsby Town's cumulative points scored by match (you're used to this sort of chart from me by now, aren't you?). The two lines show our actual cumulative points series and a theoretical one assuming all matches this season ended after 85 minutes.
So the bottom line is that it pretty much all seems to balance itself out. True, we have lost points with late goals, but we've also gained points with late goals, and on balance if matches ended after 85 minutes we'd actually be two points better off. The messageboards were a tiny bit right, then, but it's only two points, so hardly anything to shout about, right? Hang on just a minute though - 53 points would put us top. Quick, get on to that muppet Blatter and see if he'll change the rules...
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