Relegation Runaround

I know this site has spent an inordinate amount of time talking about the bottom, and not the top, 4, but SurfDad mentioned something to me as we were talking about Tottenham's relegation chances. When we crunched the math, he naturally lost hope, but when he looked it at from the "If we go down, then some two of Bolton, Newcastle, Stoke and Fulham must stay up" that is all that gave me reassurance. What's most interesting about that is that only one of those teams is newly promoted, and between snatching a point at Anfield (I really hope I don't remember that happened come May) and beating Spurs, they've definitely shown enough grit to squeak in. So then I got to thinking, when is the last time, if ever, all three relegated teams had been in the premiership and by effect all three promoted stayed up? Only once, in 2002, when Blackburn, Fulham and Bolton all stayed up. In fact, only once have all three promoted teams gone down (I felt that this was surprising, but I think Reading is as a good a case study of ever of overachievement followed by a sophomore slump) and that was in 98 where Crystal Palace, Barnsley and Bolton all went down.

What I think makes this year more noteworthy is the two weakest teams (thusfar) are Tottenham Hotspur and Newcastle United. Despite how I'm sure this creates tension in the Reale household, those are two titans of history both recent and ancient in English football. They aren't the likes of Ipswich, Leicester and Derby who were relegated in 2002, and none of them had been in the Prem for that long at all. (Leicester was the most at 8 years). Tottenham Hotspur hasn't been relegated since the 70s, and Newcastle (despite a colorful history of relegations and promotions) have been up since Kevin Keegan turned that ship around in the early 90s. Newcastle finished 4th in 02, 3rd in 03, 5th in 04 and 7th in 06. Tottenham came in 5th in 06 and 07; these aren't the Fulhams of the world who live life on the relegation line. If Newcastle and Tottenham (not to mention Everton who are just 16th, but I believe they're far too quality) go down, you could make the case that it would be the highest profile relegation in the history of the Premiership. West Ham going down was huge, but this the equivalent of TWO West Hams going down, and to be honest, it'd be surprising if neither went down at this point.

Also, SurfDad, I'm not purposefully writing one immediately after you do so you're never the first entry, I had wanted to write this since you wrote the inspiration on my wall.