League Championship Latest Projections

Through matches as of March 15th here is my latest projection for the final table:

Pos	Team	P	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts
1	Queens Park Rangers	46	26	16	4	73	28	45	94
2	Norwich City	46	21	18	7	74	55	19	81
3	Cardiff City	46	23	12	11	71	52	19	81
4	Swansea City	46	24	9	13	61	42	19	81
5	Reading	46	20	18	8	77	52	25	78
6	Watford	46	19	16	11	84	66	18	73
7	Burnley	46	18	19	9	67	58	9	73
8	Nottingham Forest	46	17	21	8	56	40	16	72
9	Leeds United	46	17	20	9	83	73	10	71
10	Millwall	46	18	16	12	60	45	15	70
11	Hull City	46	16	18	12	51	46	5	66
12	Leicester City	46	18	12	16	70	69	1	66
13	Portsmouth	46	16	12	18	61	61	0	60
14	Ipswich Town	46	15	12	19	57	61	-4	57
15	Bristol City	46	14	13	19	58	67	-9	55
16	Barnsley	46	13	16	17	55	67	-12	55
17	Middlesbrough	46	13	13	20	58	68	-10	52
18	Coventry City	46	12	15	19	50	61	-11	51
19	Doncaster Rovers	46	12	15	19	61	81	-20	51
20	Crystal Palace	46	13	10	23	45	69	-24	49
21	Derby County	46	12	11	23	56	65	-9	47
22	Scunthorpe United	46	10	6	30	40	81	-41	36
23	Sheffield United	46	8	11	27	40	74	-34	35
24	Preston North End	46	6	13	27	52	82	-30	31

Pretty amazing how close the race is for second place.  Three teams tied on points and goal differential means we go to the third tie-breaker, total goals scored.  Norwich carries this and is currently projected to return to the Premiership for the first time since 2005.  The Canaries average 1.649 goals per game which is the third best in the league.

For the playoff final, I'm still projecting Reading but this time over Watford.  Watford is interesting because they are so strong in away games.  They average 1.778 goals scored against teams that allow only 1.096 giving them a road offensive SRS of 0.682, best in the league.  Their overall away SRS based on MOV and SOS is 0.355 second only to QPR.  However, the final is considered a neutral site game and Reading is a stronger team overall with an SRS of 0.506 compared to Watford's 0.372.