How many points would be required for promotion?

[Joe Jones]

Notts County continue to impress in League Two and, although there's still half the season to go, I can imagine many fans would now be reassessing their expectations for the season, with safety all but assured.

If we now were to look upwards rather than downwards, how many points do you think it would take for a team to gain promotion this season?

John Watson has made this point on Facebook:

So, looking at the points totals required for the last 11 seasons (06/07 to 16/17, Source Sky Sports) it throws up some interesting facts.

For the last 3 seasons 3rd place in L2 has required 85 points to secure it, the lowest over the 11 seasons for 3rd is 78 points, max is 88. The average to secure 3rd is 83.

Applying the same maths to 7th place the lowest points total required in the last 11 seasons was 69, highest was 78. Average is somewhere between 71/72.

Turning to the current seasons, and typical of Notts, shows currently 3rd down to 9th spot covered by 3 points.

3rd down to 14th, is covered by just 7 points as I write this, which suggests the points total required this season to secure automatic or playoffs is likely to be higher.

My view is we will require around 87 to secure 3rd (which would be the highest since 88 was required in season 07/08) and around 77 to secure 7th.

What do others think?

[Fozzy]

I think it will be less as the division appears to be far more competitive this year with only Luton looking as though they will run away with it. Teams are going to take points off each other, so I think 83 should be enough for 3rd, which would mean averaging around 1.64 points a game from here in. Over the course of a season that would be 75 points, or in other words, playoff form.

With the addition of a new striker and centre half in the new year (and maybe a winger), I can see us achieving that mark as we do appear to be hard to beat. Our downfall will only be drawing too many games.