Blues were plunged back into the relegation zone on Sunday after Sheffield Wednesday’s win at Blackburn. To drop into the bottom three so close to the season’s end is naturally a cause for concern, and many Blues fans are pretty despondent just at the moment if comments on social media are anything to go by.

But all is not yet lost. There are still 7 teams who could join Rotherham in being relegated. And with each team having two games left to play, there are multiple possibilities and permutations on who stays up and who goes down.

Theoretically, Blues might survive with one more point. Or, fail to do so with   two more wins. One minor positive is that our goal difference is much better than Huddersfield and Sheffield Wednesday, and on a par with all of the other contenders apart from Plymouth.

To try and untangle what Blues chances are, and what they might have to do to ensure Championship football for another consecutive season, I talked with a football statistician friend of mine who has been studying football odds for over 20 years.

Simulations for the rest of season suggest that we have a 41% chance of staying up overall. But looking at the different points tallies that Blues could achieve paints a more detailed picture on how our chances vary depending on our results.

What this suggests is that although two wins would certainly maximise our chances of staying up, a win and a draw wouldn’t be a disaster. That would still give us a chance of over 90% of staying up.

So there is still a great deal to play for, and if the team that turned up against Coventry City recently reappears then there is every possibility that survival can be achieved. Hopefully, that happens on Saturday and we can start with a win at Huddersfield. But we shouldn’t get too dispirited if we only draw. Clearly though, the match is very important indeed.

Neil Cottrell