Peterborough United chairman Darragh MacAnthony has declared that Ipswich Town will 'win the Championship by 20 points' next season.
Even after Wednesday night's 2-1 win at Bournemouth, the Blues still need a minor miracle to avoid Premier League relegation with eight games to go.
But if they do drop through the trap door then there's a strong chance Town will start next season as favourites for promotion given the near £150m spend on transfers over the last two transfer windows.
On a Q&A episode of his 'Hard Truth' podcast, it was put to MacAnthony that many Leeds fans don't have confidence in Daniel Farke to lead the club into the Premier League if they get promoted and, with that in mind, he was asked if off-season sackings by promoted Championship sides will to happen more often to give teams the best chance of Premier League survival?
"Yes, I do," he replied. "I think some managers are seen as serial winners at a certain level. I'm not saying that about the Leeds manager, but, yes, that could very much happen.
"If Burnley go up with Scott Parker... At Bournemouth, Scott Parker didn't get any money or backing, he kind of downed tools and then Gary O'Neil went in and kept them up. So would you look at that as Burnley and think, 'He got us up, but is he going to start moaning if he doesn't get to spend £50m in the window? Has he learnt from that?'
"You could look at Daniel Farke and go, 'When he was there (in the Premier League) with Norwich he was awful and they were awful'. Or was that just money?
Peterborough United owner Darragh MacAnthony (left) and director of football Barry Fry. (Image: PA)
"I would argue that Southampton are regretting getting rid of Russell Martin now. Thy should have gone down the Ipswich route and stuck with their manager because Russell Martin would have guaranteed them promotion from the Champ. It's at that point that you then ask, 'Russ, are you still going to try and play like 1970s Brazil or have you learnt that we're going to do things differently?' And if the answer is 'we're going to play the same way' then you change your manager in the summer and not during the season.
"You look at Ipswich and the benefit for them is they're going to win the Champ next year by 20 points, probably, if they don't have some miracle stay up this season. And they had a great win the other night.
"Because they've stuck with the manager and they've got an unbelievable squad. Yes, they'll have to sell some players with release clauses, but they will be up there."
Just two points separate the current Championship top three of Sheffield United (83), Leeds (81) and Burnley (81), with Sunderland in fourth (72) and Coventry further back in fifth (59).
A different release day for @hardtruthpod this week but a 𝐁𝐔𝐌𝐏𝐄𝐑 episode answering many listener questions + discussing & debating some of the hot topics in football ⚽️🗣️
🚨 𝗡𝗘𝗪 𝗘𝗣𝗜𝗦𝗢𝗗𝗘 🚨
🎙 @DMAC102 & @pideson
🚫 @Rovers fans telling owners to stay away
🤪… pic.twitter.com/ZGg7S2t8qm
— Hard Truth: Inside the Football Industry Podcast (@hardtruthpod) April 4, 2025
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