Bizarre home & away form!

[pete]

Think we guaranteed to have the best home record & might finish unbeaten at home. Thats staggering only dropping 4 points in 12 games!

1. Cork 12 10 2 0 27 - 10 32
2. Bohemians 13 8 4 1 26 - 14 28
3. Shamrock 13 6 3 4 20 - 10 21
4. Derry 12 6 3 3 14 - 10 21
5. Drogheda 12 6 1 5 13 - 15 19
6. Shelbourne 9 5 1 3 15 - 10 16
7. UCD 12 4 3 5 10 - 12 15
8. St.Pats 11 3 5 3 18 - 17 14
9. Longford 11 3 4 4 9 - 12 13
10 Bray 13 2 6 5 17 - 24 12

Now only Derry have worse away form. Eevn Bray have managed to win more than 1 game away.

1. Shelbourne 14 9 2 3 24 - 12 29
2. Bohemians 11 6 4 1 18 - 10 22
3. Shamrock 11 5 2 4 18 - 16 17
4. St.Pats 13 4 3 6 8 - 13 15
5. Longford 11 2 6 3 9 - 13 12
6. UCD 12 2 5 5 11 - 13 11
7. Bray 11 2 1 8 12 - 24 7
7. Drogheda 12 1 4 7 12 - 24 7
9. Cork 11 1 3 7 9 - 20 6
10 Derry 12 1 2 9 13 - 24 5

[patsh]

What might have been, eh??
We have 3 away points from Bray, and 1 each from Bohs, Derry and Drogs which brings our total to
6.
From the teams we have to play away twice this season, we should have reasonably expected to get
6 from Drogheda
4 from LT
1 from Bohs
2 from St Pats
= 13 points.
and we should be capable of at least getting a draw with UCD
= 14
So up to now, we have played LT and St. Pats away only once, but if we allow them as draws = 2,
a draw with UCD = 1
and 2 wins, instead of one draw from Drogheda = 5 more
that would give us an extra 8 points, bringing our total to 46, which would still give us a chance of the title.
If wishes were fishes etc. etc but I do not think it is unreasonable to expect these results for City.

[JDB]

There are 10 teams in this league. 6 of these are from Dublin and if you include Drogheda you've got 7 from The Pale. Since Longford is ony 78 miles from Dublin, that leaves Cork City and Derry to do all the travelling when it comes to away games. For the Dublin based teams a game vs another Dublin team is virtually a home game so in essence they are very few real AWAY games for them. It's no surprise then that City and Derry are bottom of away fixtures table. Having said that, we'll still have to overcome this problem if we're to win the League again.

The composition of the League is a serious advantage to the Dublin teams who barely have to travel all season and City have done very well to be the only non-Dublin team in the top five [and the only non-professional team to boot].

I think the FAI should go some way to redressing this imbalance by making the Dublin teams travel to Cork, Derry and Longford twice each season.

[joe]

Originally posted by JDB

I think the FAI should go some way to redressing this imbalance by making the Dublin teams travel to Cork, Derry and Longford twice each season.

they'll have to next season when we all play each other 4 times

[Gone Away]

Originally posted by JDB


The composition of the League is a serious advantage to the Dublin teams who barely have to travel all season

While I agree with you, if you presented this logic to a jackeen, they would say bollx, as they have so may "tough derbys".

Besides that, City have been travelling to Dublinthat often for a long time now, and have done fine. Its not like this has been sprung on them all of a sudden.

The problem is tactics, end of story.

[niamh]

In all fairness, it is the way it has always been.
And judging by some of City's performances it is not the travelling that is their problem. I don't think City's away form has been that bas in years, if ever.
It is a case of what could have been though considering our home record.

[Hecko]

No Doubt that tactics are part of it but you have to admit that even with being too defensive away from the X, City and Derry are a long way superior to Bray or UCD - Travel must be a part of it.

The real problem is that the FAI hasn't contributed enough to getting Waterford, Galway, Dundalk, Harps developing in the right way. There is a chance, IMO, though of Bray and UCD going down with Galway (or Queenstown??) joining waterford which would even things out a lot. The jackeens still get the derby games without the easy points from the weaker pale teams...

[eoinh]

waterford are going to get promoted (probably) this year.
better than last season anyway.

[pete]

Originally posted by JDB
The composition of the League is a serious advantage to the Dublin teams who barely have to travel all season and City have done very well to be the only non-Dublin team in the top five [and the only non-professional team to boot].

City are as professional as Pats or Rovers so not sure what you saying there.

UCD & Bray haven't got any more help from the FAI than Waterfors, Galway, Harps etc...

Dub teams have to play endless derbies plus more expensive to develop their grounds or purchase training facilites.

IMO both City & Derry are used to playing in front of big home attendances & just not able to cope with playing in front of less than 3k away from home