MY PICK: WATFORD, BORO AND DERBY TO GO UP
JUST seven points separate the top eight clubs in this year’s Championship. Incredibly, when Watford play Middlesbrough tomorow in game 41, fourth will go above first if the Hornets win. Now that is excitement for you.
The lure of the Premier League is creating an incredible competition beneath it.
Nobody can possibly predict the dramas that will unfold. Nor could anybody make up the stories that have already been told.
Who would believe, for instance, that Mark Warburton would be leaving Brentford with his side in fifth place at the first time of asking in the Championship?
Or who would believe that a relatively small club like Bournemouth could be sitting on the verge of the top-flight?
Such an intense contest as this one is brilliant for the entire Football League. All 72 clubs benefit from standards rising at the top. In the same way as a chain is only as strong as its weakest link, the ambition and phenomenal performance of these top Championship clubs leads the way and sets the standards for others to follow.
I’m going to have a crack and call it: Watford and Middlesboro automatically, with Derby through the play-offs. That’s my shout. No disrespect to any of the others. That'’ what my instinct tells me.
Let’s be honest, any of the eight could make it. Those that do will most certainly have deserved it.