Supercomputer predicts Portsmouth, Peterborough, Oxford and Burton Albion to make League One play-offs with Ipswich and Sunderland in top two

This is the verdict of a supercomputer which has predicted where every club will finish in the table come May 2020. 

Five Thirty Eight have made the prediction that Pompey will make the play-offs for the 2019/20 season despite a mixed start to the campaign, based on a specific formula which they use to predict the outcome of sporting events around the globe. 

According to the website Ipswich Town will lift the title at the end of the campaign with currently manager-less Sunderland predicted to finish in second. 

Pompey are back to make the play-offs and finish in sixth place by Five Thirty Eight, with the Blues given just a 3 per cent chance of winning League One but they have a 27 per cent chance of making the play-offs and a 16 per cent chance of being promoted. 

The website’s latest predictions were last updated on Monday. 

Here is how the League One table will look at the end of the campaign according to Five Thirty Eight: 

- 1 Ipswich Town – 92 points – +46 goal difference 

- 2 – Sunderland – 80 points – +27 goal difference 

- 3 – Peterborough – 71 points – +24 goal difference 

- 4 – Burton Albion – 71 points – +20 goal difference 

- 5 – Oxford United – 71 points – +24 goal difference 

- 6 – Portsmouth – 69 points – +12 goal difference 

- 7 – Fleetwood Town – 68 points – +10 goal difference

- 8 – Rotherham – 67 points – +15 goal difference 

- 9 – Doncaster – 66 points – +9 goal difference 

- 10 – Coventry City – 66 points – +3 goal difference 

- 11 – Wycombe Wanderers – 65 points – +4 goal difference 

- 12 – Blackpool – 63 points – +3 goal difference 

- 13 – Bristol Rovers – 63 points – +1 goal difference 

- 14 – Lincoln City – 59 points – -2 goal difference 

- 15 – MK Dons – 57 points – -6 goal difference 

- 16 – Gillingham – 57 points – 0 goal difference 

- 17 – Shrewsbury – 56 points – -10 goal difference 

- 18 – Accrington Stanley – 49 points – -17 goal difference 

- 19 – Tranmere Rovers – 47 points – -18 goal difference 

- 20 – Rochdale – 41 points – -31 goal difference 

- 21 – Wimbledon – 40 points – -24 goal difference

 – 22 – Southend United – 35 points – -41 goal difference 

- 23 – Bolton – 23 points – -47 goal difference 

How does it work? 

Founded by Nate Silver in 2008, Five Thirty Eight predicted the outcomes of the 2008 and 2012 Presidential elections in the United States. 

In January 2017 they started to publish predictions for football leagues, starting with six and expanding in the two plus years since. 

The forecasts are based on a substantially revised version of ESPN’s Soccer Power Index (SPI), which was devised by Nate Silver in 2009. 

SPI ratings are the website’s best estimate of a team’s overall strength, including how many goals teams are predicted to score and concede against an average team on a neutral field

These ratings, in turn, produce an overall SPI rating, which represents the percentage of available points — a win is worth 3 points, a tie worth 1 point, and a loss worth 0 points — the team would be expected to take if that match were played over and over again.

Five Thirty Eight update a team’s ratings are adjusted after every match based on its performance in that match and the strength of its opponent.