Championship play-offs: What are my team's chances?

Four teams are on the cusp of reaching the Premier League, and at Oddschecker we’ve crunched the numbers to find out the percentages of each team celebrating at Wembley later this month, based on their finishing positions. 

An often stated ‘opinion’ is that the team finishing in third never end up getting promoted but as you’ll see below, that’s not really the case…

Reaching The Final

In theory, the best side in the play-offs are the side that finishes third, so surely they reach the final the most, right?

Correct. All in all, 65% of teams in third beat their semi-final opponents, compared to 50% of teams in fourth, the same amount of teams in fifth and just 35% of teams in sixth. 

Runners-Up

The teams finishing third and fourth are runners-up 31% of the time, compared to 19% of teams finishing fifth and sixth. The higher number of the former positions can be attributed to the fact that they make the final more often (or equal to) their lower counterparts, indicating that home advantage is crucial in the semi-finals.

Promotion

Nine teams finishing third have been promoted (35% of sides), more than any other position. Surprisingly, fifth place teams have the next best record at 31%, with 19% of fifth placed teams going up, and just 15% of sides in sixth place.

Latest promotion odds:

The odds this season correlate perfectly with the above: Leeds (3rd) are 2/1 favourites, with Aston Villa (5th) 21/10. West Brom (4th) are 4/1 with Derby (6th) 9/2 outsiders.

Interestingly, Derby were in the same position last season (5/1 in 2018) and fell at the first hurdle. With three post-season failures in the last 12 years, can it be fourth time lucky?