A good start?

Last updated : 03 September 2011 By Stuart Gillespie

Certainly, compared to previous years it is a pretty good start. Last year we had half as many points by this stage and it's a tally we've only exceeded after six games once in the SPL - way back in 2006.

But such things can be deceiving. For example, a look at the Premiership table would suggest West Brom are awful with no points after three games. However, they opened up with games against Manchester United and Chelsea. Compare to that to near neighbours Wolves, who have seven points - having been handed far easier games against Blackburn, Fulham and Aston Villa.

To start off with, here's a look at how many points we had after six games since promotion in 2006 as well as who we played in those games:

2006/07: 10 points (ICT away, Motherwell home, Celtic away, Aberdeen home, Dundee United home, Hearts away)
2007/08: 6 points (Motherwell home, Rangers away, ICT home, Falkirk away, Celtic home, Dundee United away)
2008/09: 5 points (Celtic away, Kilmarnock home, Hearts away, Aberdeen home, ICT away, Falkirk home)
2009/10: 5 points (Hibs away, Dundee United home, Kilmarnock away, St Johnstone home, Aberdeen away, Celtic home)
2010/11: 4 points (Dundee United home, Celtic away, Hibs home, Kilmarnock away, St Johnstone away, ICT home)
2011/12: 8 points (Dunfermline away, Aberdeen home, Dundee United away, Motherwell home, Hibs away, Celtic home)

So, is the start that much easier? Not really. It's pretty comparable to the one from two years ago. The big difference between those two years and the others is that we haven't faced one of the Old Firm on the road this time around.

Quickly, here is how many games it required us to reach or surpass a tally of eight points:

2006/07: Six games
2007/08: Ten games
2008/09: Eight games
2009/10: Seven games
2010/11: Ten games
2011/12: Five games

Our highest ever SPL points tally after five games? Not bad going, although it's worth noting that in many cases we had more than the eight points mark due to having taken a win in the sixth or seventh game while sitting on 10 points.

Of course, much of this is fairly meaningless because we changed manager after 2009/10 and most of the players have changed since then too. Perhaps a better look would be to compare how we fared in our first meetings with the six teams we started off against this season with our results against them in our first six last year. To make things easier, Dunfermline will become Hamilton for last year!

Dunfermline/Hamilton: 2010/11: 2-2 draw. 2011/12: 0-0 draw. No change.
Aberdeen: 2010/11: 2-1 win. 2011/12: 1-0 win. No change.
Dundee United: 2010/11: 1-1 draw. 2011/12: 1-1 draw. No change.
Motherwell: 2010/11: 3-1 defeat. 2011/12: 1-0 defeat. No change.
Hibs: 2010/11: 1-0 win. 2011/12: 2-1 win. No change.
Celtic: 20010/11: 4-0 defeat. 2011/12: 2-0 defeat. No change.

As an aside, if you compare first home/away fixture rather than take location out of things we are the same - while we beat Dundee United at Tannadice and drew with Motherwell at home, those points are made up by the fact we lost at Easter Road last year.

It would appear that we aren't actually doing better than last year after all - we've had exactly the same results, if different scorelines, against these teams as we did last season. However, the room for improvement will come in the next five matches of this sector - Kilmarnock, St Johnstone, ICT, Hearts and Rangers are all teams we lost to first time around last year so even a draw against one of these sides would put us on for a better opening round of 11 than last year.

To finish with, here are our positions for the last five years after playing our first 11 games

2006/07: 14 points
2007/08: 13 points
2008/09: 12 points
2009/10: 12 points
2010/11: 8 points

Therefore, to make this our best ever start to an SPL campaign, we require another seven points from our next five games. It's possible, but it won't be easy.

It seems we still have a lot of work to do to show the good start will lead to anything other than another year battling the drop. Remember, it's not how you start - it's how you finish.

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