The Championship finished their regular season on Saturday and congratulations to Queens Park Rangers and Norwich City who earned automatic promotions to the Premier League. QPR finished first with 88 points, 4 points ahead of the Canaries. QPR was awaiting word from the Football Association which was ruling on irregularities concerning the economic rights of player Alejandro Faurlin. There was the possibility of a points deduction which could have cost them the title. However, the FA fined QPR instead so the Rangers get to bring home the trophy.
Rangers return to the Premier for the first time since relegation following the 1996 season. For Norwich they last played in the top flight in 2005. Since then they struggled and were actually relegated into League One, one level below the Championship, after the 2009 season. They bounced back and won the League one title in 2010 and then earned a second consecutive promotion this season.
The playoffs are all set. Swansea City will face Nottingham Forest while Cardiff City takes on Reading. Playoffs schedule can be found here. Swansea managed to get third place, finishing ahead of their Welsh rivals Cardiff based on goal differential. Nottingham's win over Crystal Palace gave them the points they needed to stay ahead of Leeds United who beat QPR on Saturday.
The Championship bids farewell to the three relegated teams, Preston North End, Sheffield United and Scunthorpe United. Preston had the longest current tenure at this level of any team in the league, having been here for 11 consecutive seasons. Scunthorpe's stay was brief, just one season as they return back to League One after earning promotion from there last year. Sheffield United ends a four-season run after relegation from the Premier League and will also be returning dropping to League One. Moving up from that level will be champions Brighton & Hove Albion and runner-up Southampton. The third spot will be filled by the winner of the League One playoffs.
After the jump I will review the results of my weekend predictions.
Unlike in the US, Easter Monday is a holiday in the UK. One of the ways they celebrate is by playing soccer. All 24 teams in the Championship played today. Here is how they performed vs my predictions:
Burnley 1 Portsmouth 1 (-10 pts)
Scunthorpe United 1 Millwall 2 (+30 pts)
Preston North End 0 Cardiff City 1 (+15 pts)
Swansea City 4 Ipswich Town 1 (+10 pts)
Bristol City 2 Nottingham Forest 3 (-10 pts)
Leicester City 4 Watford 2 (-10 pts)
Queens Park Rangers 1 Hull City 1 (-10 pts)
Barnsley 2 Doncaster Rovers 2 (-10 pts)
Reading 2 Sheffield United 3 (-10 pts)
Norwich 3 Derby County 2 (+15 pts)
Middlesbrough 2 Coventry City 1 (-10 pts)
Crystal Palace 1 Leeds United 0 (-10 pts)
Overall score was -10 pts and I projected 4 of 12 outcomes correctly.
A victory by QPR would have clinched the title but Hull City held them to a draw. Meanwhile Norwich and Cardiff's wins kept their title hopes alive. Cardiff's victory over Preston North End clinched relegation for the Lillywhites.
After the jump, my updated projection.
Based on the latest round of matches completed 4/12, here are my latest projections for the Championship:
| Pos | Team | P | W | D | L | GF | GA | | GD | Pts |
| 1 | Queens Park Rangers | 46 | 26 | 15 | 5 | 73 | 31 | | 42 | 93 |
| 2 | Norwich City | 46 | 23 | 15 | 8 | 79 | 57 | | 22 | 84 |
| 3 | Cardiff City | 46 | 24 | 11 | 11 | 78 | 53 | | 25 | 83 |
| 4 | Reading | 46 | 22 | 16 | 8 | 80 | 51 | | 29 | 82 |
| 5 | Swansea City | 46 | 23 | 9 | 14 | 65 | 44 | | 21 | 78 |
| 6 | Millwall | 46 | 19 | 15 | 12 | 62 | 46 | | 16 | 72 |
| 7 | Nottingham Forest | 46 | 18 | 17 | 11 | 61 | 48 | | 13 | 71 |
| 8 | Leeds United | 46 | 18 | 16 | 12 | 84 | 76 | | 8 | 70 |
| 9 | Hull City | 46 | 17 | 17 | 12 | 50 | 45 | | 5 | 68 |
| 10 | Watford | 46 | 17 | 15 | 14 | 80 | 68 | | 12 | 66 |
| 11 | Leicester City | 46 | 17 | 12 | 17 | 70 | 69 | | 1 | 63 |
| 12 | Burnley | 46 | 15 | 17 | 14 | 64 | 63 | | 1 | 62 |
| 13 | Portsmouth | 46 | 16 | 13 | 17 | 58 | 61 | | -3 | 61 |
| 14 | Bristol City | 46 | 16 | 13 | 17 | 59 | 65 | | -6 | 61 |
| 15 | Ipswich Town | 46 | 16 | 11 | 19 | 61 | 61 | | 0 | 59 |
| 16 | Middlesbrough | 46 | 15 | 13 | 18 | 63 | 69 | | -6 | 58 |
| 17 | Barnsley | 46 | 14 | 13 | 19 | 56 | 68 | | -12 | 55 |
| 18 | Coventry City | 46 | 14 | 12 | 20 | 54 | 59 | | -5 | 54 |
| 19 | Derby County | 46 | 13 | 11 | 22 | 58 | 69 | | -11 | 50 |
| 20 | Doncaster Rovers | 46 | 12 | 13 | 21 | 57 | 79 | | -22 | 49 |
| 21 | Crystal Palace | 46 | 12 | 12 | 22 | 46 | 69 | | -23 | 48 |
| 22 | Preston North End | 46 | 8 | 14 | 24 | 53 | 79 | | -26 | 38 |
| 23 | Sheffield United | 46 | 9 | 10 | 27 | 39 | 74 | | -35 | 37 |
| 24 | Scunthorpe United | 46 | 11 | 4 | 31 | 40 | 86 | | -46 | 37 |
The biggest winner was Hull City who moved up two spots to ninth. I projected they would draw at Watford and lose at Swansea. Instead they beat the Hornets and drew against the Swans, picking up three points in their projection.
The biggest loser was Portsmouth who dropped three spots to 13th. Their latest projection of 61 points is 5 points worse than previous. They have been struggling against the bottom-half of the table managing a draw against Preston and losing to Coventry.
No change in the playoff zone with the same matchups as before. Again I am predicting that Reading will beat Cardiff in the playoff final.
Let's see how last week's predictions turned out for the Championship:
Middlesbrough 3 Leicester 3
Predicted Boro to win 2-1: -10 pts
Reading 2 Portsmouth 0
Predicted Reading 2-1: +10 pts
Leeds 4 Nottingham 1
Predicted a 2-2 draw. Nottingham's lost point could cost them a playoff spot: -10 pts.
Coventry 2 Watford 0
Pretty impressive result for Coventry. Watford is the highest scoring road team in the league. Predicted a 2-1 win for Watford: -10 pts.
Burnley 1 Ipswich 2
Predicted a 1-1 draw: -10 pts.
Hull 0 Millwall 1
Predicted a 0-0 draw. This is a big win for Millwall. The two points they gain will put them into the playoffs in my next projection: -10 pts for the prediction.
Cardiff 4 Derby 1
Predicted Cardiff 2-1: +10 pts
Bristol 1 Doncaster 0
Predicted a 2-2 draw: -10 pts.
Norwich 6 Scunthorpe 0
The Canaries beat up on the worst team in the league. Predicted a 2-1 victory for Norwich: +10 pts
Preston 2 Swansea 1
The opposite of my prediction: -10 pts
Crystal Palace 2 Barnsley 1
This is exaclty what I predicted: +30 pts.
QPR 3 Sheffield 0
Predicted a 2-0 victory for the Rangers: +10 pts.
Final result: 0 pts so basically broke even. Scored +15 two weeks ago so still ahead overall.
Here is a quick prediction for the April 5th match between Reading and Preston which was rescheduled due to Reading's FA Cup schedule:
Reading 2 Preston 1
Will be back later this week with an updated projection for the table.
