The arrival of 777 Partners was to bring back happy days and the past season, in the wake of Ronny Deila who had given new impetus, enthusiasm had returned… until the departure of the Norwegian technician and the return of problems in edge of the Meuse.
The sporting situation has deteriorated over the course of this season, with a change of coach (Carl Hoefkens replaced by Ivan Leko) which did not bring the expected impact and figures, now, which confirm what was unthinkable two years ago.
A 4 out of 9 to avoid the ugly precedent of 2022
If it is not able to take four points over the next three days, Standard will “do better” than its 2022 record. Having taken 39 points out of 111, Rouches have in fact collected an average of 1,054 points per match while they had taken 1,058 per match two years ago.
This is decided to the thousandth of a point, but since football has become a matter of numbers and details it is not incongruous to take these figures into account. If they reach the honorable total of 43 points on the evening of the tenth day of the Europe playoffs, Ivan Leko's players will have taken 1,075 points per match and they will be able to evacuate the specter of 2022.
777 Partners and the Standard, is it still tenable?
By the way, if they take four points, it will also mean that Standard will have won at least one match during the playoffs, which would almost be a performance given the lamentable state in which they drag themselves during a final round which has looks like a farewell tour.
They lost the advantage three times on the road
This would also mean that they were able to maintain an advantage, something they were unable to do in their last three trips. Because it is as remarkable as it is frightening: Standard led three times, without winning, at Westerlo (from 0-1 to 3-3), at St-Truiden (from 1-3 to 3-3) and at OH Louvain (from 0-1 to 3-1).
They would have wanted to do it on purpose and they wouldn't have done it any other way. Obviously, there are circumstances, and the responsibility is shared between players and coach, but perhaps a little more so for the players, since it is they, after all, who are on the pitch.
Ivan Leko will not always be able to lock them in a locker room after a defeat to make them think about their situation in a form of group therapy, but nothing says either that the Croatian coach will not lock himself in a room at SL16 Campus to think about what he didn't know how to put in place.
Leko: a 7 out of 9 for being in the same waters as Hoefkens
Because if the assessment is the responsibility of the players, the Croatian technician also bears his share of responsibilities, even if he talks about it relatively little, except when he is pushed to his limits or when he cannot do otherwise. Under his leadership, Standard took fewer points (16 out of 51) than with Carl Hoefkens (23 out of 60), and playoffs 2 cannot explain everything.
To finish in the same waters as its predecessor, Leko must therefore take 7 points in the last three meetings. Such a “feat” would allow us to end on a (slightly) positive note. Otherwise, there still remains a risk: doing worse than the 1951-52 version of Standard, which finished the season in thirteenth place, out of sixteen teams, with the equivalent of 30 points taken out of 90, i.e. one point per match
.
If they lose the last three games, including two at home, the Rouches would break the “record” and finish the season with 0.975 points per game. Everything you need to avoid so as not to make this 125th anniversary of the club sadder than it already is…
The victory was worth two points at the time, the conversion to three units was carried out.
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