by Chris Allen

Created on: May 21, 2010   Last Updated: September 18, 2010

Kevin Keegan once said that the Premier League was at risk of becoming the most boring and predictable league in the world. While this is not the case, (the Premiership remains one of the most enjoyable and lucrative leagues) if it is pure excitement, unpredictability and value for money you're after, then the football league is the undisputed champion!

At the beginning of every single season, when predictions are made as to what positions each club will occupy come early May, the predictions for the Premier League look roughly the same every year, and are usually pretty accurate. Most predictions are pretty similar to everybody else's predictions and are not far from what actually happens. The Championship however is so much more complex. Before every season, each prediction can be completely different to what some other "expert" predicted, so the general consensus is "we don't have a clue what will happen!". And come the end of the season, the actual table looks like what nobody predicted. And that's good. It's what people get interested in things for. If you knew exactly how your life would plan out, it would seem nowhere near as interesting (once you'd stopped having a fit over knowing when you will die obviously).

While the Championship may not have the quality of players we see in the Premier League, the wealth of talent (mostly young, British talent too) is incredible. A lot of Championship clubs would fit in no problem in most of the top leagues around Europe, and the interest is evidently there, as the Coca Cola Championship has the fourth highest average attendance of any European league, trumping Serie A and Ligue 1. This of course has a lot to do with ticket prices. On average, they are considerably less than you would be expected to pay to see a Premier League game, though the smaller clubs in the Premier League don't enforce to big a difference.

Another reason for the massive level of excitement around the football league is the play off system. Agree or, as I do, disagree with the concept there is no denying that they have huge entertainment value. Take this season's for example. Cardiff and Leicester went to penalties (always a fantastic spectacle) after a great comeback was dramatically halted, and Blackpool, against the odds, put Forest to the sword. Form goes out the window and this seems to set players free, as they play under different circumstances to what they have grown accustomed to.

Okay. I know that given the choice, anybody would rather their club be in the Premier League than the Championship, purely because it spells progress, and the ludicrous sums of money on offer are not to be sniffed out. That said, for a neutral, the thrills and spills of the Championship can not be topped.

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