It could be another testing season for Keegan.
MORE MISERY FOR MAGPIES
By Jonathan Turner
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If the relegation betting is to be believed then Hull and Stoke are booked for an immediate return to the Coca-Cola Championship, with one from West Brom, Fulham, Bolton, Wigan and Sunderland joining them.
Hull are a top-priced 4/11 to go down while Stoke's prospects don't look much rosier according to the layers, with the Potters 4/9 for the drop.
It's easy to trot out the line that the gulf between the top flight and the Championship is getting wider all the time but it's actually been pretty pronounced for a while and hasn't changed markedly in the last five seasons.
Looking back over that period suggests two of the three will go straight back down and it's looking particularly bleak for play-off winners Hull.
For in that timeframe only West Ham have managed to come up via the play-offs and survive in the top flight.
Derby and Watford were the last two to attempt it and both finished rock bottom.
Indeed the more you look into the trends the harder it becomes to construct any sort of case for the Tigers surviving.
Because one of the most revealing patterns is the correlation between away defeats in their promotion season and the chances of avoiding the drop the following year.
The two teams who lost fewest times on their travels in the Championship - Reading in 2005/6 and Portsmouth in 2002/3 both survived with ease, finishing eighth and 13th respectively in the top flight.
But six losses or more on their travels in the Championship spells trouble - with a 66.6% chance of being doomed 12 months later.
Sunderland bucked the trend last season but it's got to be a worry for supporters of both West Brom (eight away defeats last term) and especially Hull (10).
Stoke in contrast suffered just five road reversals and it's hard to understand why Boylesports make them the clear outsiders of three in their special market on which promoted club will fare best.
As we've already suggested Hull look doomed and we're certainly not going to get carried away with West Brom's prospects.
They only pipped Stoke to the Championship title by two points last season and have tried and failed before in the top flight.
Indeed the Baggies have managed the grand total of 64 Premier League points from their last 76 games (in 2004/5 and 2005/6).
And we don't buy into the theory that they played easily the best football in the Championship last season whereas Stoke went for a route one game in which Rory Delap's throws were their chief attacking weapon.
That's far too simplistic and isn't backed up by the stats - the only real difference was that the Baggies were capable of handing out a few drubbings on home turf.
That's unlikely to happen at this higher level and losing top striker Kevin Phillips and key midfielder Zoltan Gera isn't going to help them either.
We're much more impressed with Stoke's transfer dealings over the summer, with Dave Kitson up front, Seyi Olofinjana in midfield and Thomas Sorensen in goal all useful additions to the spine of the team.
They've also been linked with Valencia striker Nikola Zigic and even if that doesn't come off it does underline that they are going into the new campaign with eyes wide open.
The key for the Potters is going to be getting off to a good start as Bolton, Villa, Middlesbrough and a potentially out-of-sorts Everton isn't the toughest quartet of opening fixtures.
Basically we don't expect there to be much between Stoke and West Brom - with Hull well adrift of both of them - so at the prices on offer (10/11 West Brom, 15/8 Hull and 3/1 Stoke) this market looks a no-brainer.
However, having said we expect all three promoted sides to struggle it doesn't leave us a lotof scope to tip anyone else for the drop.
We're therefore going to adopt a slightly different strategy and instead find different ways to get against the sides we're keen to oppose.
And top of that list are Newcastle.
The Magpies polarise opinion more than virtually any other club in the Premier League but the bookies still seem to think they are one of the better sides around.
How can a club which has finished 12th and 13th in the last two seasons be as short as 8/13 for a top-half finish this time around and odds-against to be in the bottom 10?
They managed 43 points last season and exactly the same tally the year before yet the average number of points required for 10th in the last five campaigns has been 50.
And anyone thinking the Kevin Keegan factor should generate the necessary improvement needs to look at a table for the second half of last season.
That shows a bottom three of Newcastle, Derby and Reading.
That pair were relegated and while Newcastle should just have enough to again avoid getting dragged into the scrap at the bottom, they are very much a team to take on at the prices.
They continue to be a shambes at the back, conceding 65 goals last season and they only teams to fare worse were the relegated trio of Reading, Birmingham and Derby. Does anyone see a theme emerging here?
Argentinian defender Fabricio Coloccini looks like being the latest big-money purchase charged with improving the Magpies' defence but they look light all over the pitch and the harsh reality is that, whatever funds they have at their disposal, they are now struggling to attract the biggest names to St James'.
That's another reason not to expect a sudden surge up the table and if you throw in the ongoing Joey Barton situation and the fact that Alan Smith was booed by his own fans in pre-season and it's much easier to see things going the other way.
So in addition to taking the 11/10 about Newcastle finishing 11th or lower we're also going to oppose them in a match bet with north east rivals Middlesbrough.
There's been virtually nothing to separate this pair in the last couple of campaigns - Boro winning two more points in total during that time - yet Gareth Southgate's outfit are rated 15/8 outsiders in a straight match bet which seems bizarre.
Boro may be one of the most inconsistent outfits around but they've at least showed on their day they are more than a match for anyone which is more than can be said about Newcastle.
There were definite signs of improvement from Boro last term too and in Afonso Alves they look to have a striker with genuine claims of scoring 20+ goals a season.
Sticking with match bets, our final piece of advice linked to the teams expected to be occupying the bottom half of the table is to back Fulham at 8/11 to finish higher than West Brom.
We've already suggested the season is going to be a struggle for West Brom but, as we've argued in our 'best of the rest' Premier League preview, it could be a different story for Fulham.
They look a team on the up under Roy Hodgson and shouldn't have any difficulty mustering more points than the Baggies.
Preview posted at 1505BST on 12/08/2008.
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