Fans of relegated Premier League clubs like to console themselves with the idea that they will be back before long. But stats suggest the promotion record of relegated clubs isn't as good as you'd think
"I look forward to coming to Norwich next season, and hope we bounce straight back up to the Premier League," said John Ruddy.
"The aim for the club is to get straight back up, because Fulham belongs to the Premier League," said Chris David.
"Next season will be about showing character and bouncing straight back," said Cardiff manager Ole Gunnar Solskjaer.
All admirable thoughts. It's the ambition that consoles fans of all relegated teams, but especially Premier League sides. This was a blip. We'll be back, and sooner rather than later.
And why not? The experience of playing at the very highest level, the financial benefits of Premier League football, the parachute payments doled out to all relegated clubs, the hunger to atone for the mistakes of this season: why shouldn't it all add up to an irresistible charge for promotion?
Of course, things don't always work out like that.
The raw numbers
We went back through the last 28 seasons in English football's second tier, through its many incarnations: the Sky Bet Championship, the npower Championship, the Coca Cola Championship, Nationwide Division One, Endsleigh Division One, Barclays Division One, Barclays Division Two, and - for one memorable season in 1986-87 - The Today League Division Two.
Why 28 seasons? That's when play-offs were introduced, giving more teams a chance to vault into the top flight. Yes, it's a bit arbitrary. But as any Proper Football Fan would tell you, football did indeed exist before 1992.
We looked at the records of all the teams that had just been relegated from the Premier League/First Division. How many of them bounced straight back the following season?
In total, 87 teams were relegated from the top division during the period in question. We don't know how Wigan or QPR will do yet - although at the time of writing, Wigan have scored against QPR - so we've left them out. Here's how the rest broke down, based on finishing position the following season.
Only a fifth of teams - 17 out of 85 - achieved automatic promotion the season after being relegated. Another 21 finished in the play-off positions, although only three of those were actually promoted as a result. That means 20 teams promoted, 63 teams staying in the division, and two - Swindon in 1995 and Wolves in 2013 - suffering a second consecutive relegation.
Which means, if your side is relegated to the Championship, there's a very strong chance you're not getting out of it straightaway.
But surely it's easier to bounce straight back now than it used to be.
Well, not really. You would think that with Premier League parachute payments - which have increased from £32 million to £48 million to over £60 million in the space of just four years - teams that are relegated have a greater in-built advantage when it comes to getting promoted again.
In fact, if you count up the number of teams who go straight back up in rolling three-year bunches, there's no clear upward or downward trend. In fact, of the last 12 teams to be relegated from the Premier League, only West Ham have gone straight back up. (Wigan/QPR will have a 50 per cent chance against Derby in the play-off final, so we've assessed them as half a promotion.)
OK, so let's say your team doesn't go up straight away. What then?
Well, you regroup, you consolidate, you probably change your manager five or six times, you've still got the parachute payments coming in, and you go at it a lot harder the second season, right?
Nope. In fact, things are just as likely to get worse.
Not a lot worse, to be fair. The good news is that you've still got about a 14 per cent chance of promotion. Of the 63 teams who didn't get promoted first time (and didn't get relegated either), nine went up in their second season.
The bad news is that it's getting harder. Teams that didn't go up in their first season dropped an average of 1.2 places in their second season. Three of those - Portsmouth in 2012, Charlton in 2009 and Manchester City in 1998 - ended up getting relegated for the second time in three years.
And no slacking if you do go straight back up to the Premier League. Five of the 20 teams who did came straight back down again.
OK, so it's two seasons down the line. This is our year, right?
Well, maybe. Middlesbrough in 1992, Bolton in 2001, Hull in 2013. They all came straight back in their third season after relegation. The trouble is, once you're in the Championship for two seasons, you're twice as likely to be going down another storey.
Teams that didn't get promoted or relegated in either of their first two seasons back in the Championship have an average league position of 13.4 in their third season. In essence, that means that if you're still kicking around two seasons after getting relegated, chances are you're actually worse than the average Championship team.
And here's the killer stat. Twelve of the 85 teams we looked at have won the Championship within three years of relegation. Eleven have suffered a second relegation within the same period. Which means that over a three-year period, you're almost as likely to be relegated again as you are to win the division.
Conclusions
There are two conclusions.
1) If you get relegated, get yourselves back up as quickly as humanly possible. It only gets harder.
2) If you support a Big Team - the sort that doesn't get relegated - then be bloody thankful.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/football/competitions/championship/10826050/How-often-do-relegated-Premier-League-clubs-bounce-straight-back-from-the-Championship.html 
Comments
Copyright Iain Dowie. Draw your own conclusions.
Am steaming into Fulham to go down, especially if Magath remains. Their squad is going to get eaten alive in the hurly Burly of division 2.
Especially with EPPP coming in and PL clubs sweeping the better kids into their systems as well. The cards just keep stacking in the PL clubs favour every time their is a change.
On paper, you'd say they are the 3 favourites to go up, but I predict only Norwich will. I think they'll romp the division - their players (Ruddy, Martin, Turner, Bassong, Olsson, Johnson, Fer, Redmond, Snodgrass, Hooper, etc) are suited to the Championship.