It’s absurd that nobody has a clue how many points might be needed to stay up as the two clubs docked points collide
It’s about the points deductions. It couldn’t not be about the points deductions. In another world, in another season, Everton v Nottingham Forest would just be 16th v 17th (at the start of the weekend). Except that in another world, the points deductions wouldn’t have happened and so it would be 14th v 17th but with 17th starting the weekend five points clear of the Premier League relegation zone and so a lot less anxious than Forest actually are. This is the points deduction derby.
At Goodison on Sunday, there will be protests and coloured cards, chants about corruption, perhaps even a sense of fraternity, two clubs united in a brotherhood of outrage. There will be a great sense of the injustice of it all, which is not entirely unreasonable: when you look at what’s happened in football over the past couple of decades – the wage inflation, the absurd sums spent – you can understand why fans might think: “Why us? How come we’re the ones who’ve been done for this?”
