What changes might we see in the EFL from now until the end of the season?

What have Stoke and Huddersfield got in common? Not a lot so far in the Championship. There could be more from now on.

And what could happen to Stoke and Huddersfield could happen to almost half the other teams in the Championship, League One and League Two.

In the Championship, Stoke are 13th and Huddersfield 22nd. After 39 games Stoke have 51 points, Huddersfield 39. Stoke have 12 points more than Huddersfield. By how many points will Stoke beat Huddersfield over the last seven games?

My suggestion is perhaps none. For such an odd-sounding suggestion you will want a reason. Look at the graph below.

It was compiled with data from every completed season in the three divisions of the EFL from 1995-96 to 2021-22. The numbers along the bottom are positions after 39 games. The numbers up the side are points per game. The blue bars shows what had happened in games one to 39, the red dots show what happened afterwards in games 40 to 46.

The first thing you may notice is that in almost every position from first to 18th teams accumulated points at the same or a slower rate in the last seven games than they had in the first 39 games.

At the top there would have been some teams who secured automatic promotion. Afterwards these tend to ease off. Why not? They have achieved what they wanted. There is no need to push themselves to the limit any more.

Below there would have been some teams who needed every point they could get to stay in or move up to a playoff place. Nearer to mid-table there would have been others with little or no hope of going up or fear of going down. They may have wound down too.

Now move your eyes to the lower positions. If you look closely you will see that the red dots are almost level from 13th to 22nd. Some might argue that the flatness starts even earlier, around tenth. I will be conservative and say it starts at 13th, the highest position in the bottom half of the table.

After 39 games teams in 13th had averaged 12 points more than teams in 22nd. Over the remaining seven games they averaged the same number of points. At the tail-end of a season, teams who started in or around the relegation zone did as well as teams who started around mid-table.

Stoke have12 points more than Huddersfield. They could get the same number on the run-in. Okay, Stoke will play one more home game and one fewer away game. They also face a seemingly easier set of opponents. So perhaps Stoke will do a bit better than Huddersfield.What I really want to get across is that at this stage of a season the past can be little or no guide to the future for about half the teams in every division of the EFL.

And what stage have we reached? Easter. It always feels particularly important in the EFL. There are two games in four days, one on Good Friday and the other on Bank Holiday Monday. It is the beginning of the end, a hurried beginning to the end.

Before kick-off this afternoon most EFL teams have played 39 games, the number I have used so far in my examples. No team have played more than 40 or fewer than 37. Consider just two of many other possibilities for what could happen next.

Fleetwood are 13th in League One. They have 12 points more than Oxford, who are 20th. Oxford have played one game fewer, so I will talk here about ratios rather than totals. I would not be surprised if Oxford gain as many points per game as Fleetwood between now and the first weekend in May.Walsall are 13th in League Two. They have 13 points more than Crawley, who are 22nd.  Both have played 39 games. Could Crawley collect as many points as Walsall on the run-in?

What of teams who were 23rd or 24th after 39 games? They tended to improve in the remaining seven games, but they did not usually reach the same level as others. For some teams who started the final seven games in the bottom two relegation would have been confirmed soon, and before then it might have been accepted as almost inevitable. Across the length of a table, however, fewer than a third of all teams were in the same position after 46 games as they had been after 39 games.

The similarities between the first parts of this and previous seasons

By Monday night Burnley could be promoted from the Championship, Forest Green relegated from League One and Leyton Orient promoted from League Two.

Their results until now have not been that unusual for their positions. Burnley are top with 2.2 points per game, Leyton Orient are top with 2.0 points per game, Forest Green are bottom with 0.7 points per game.

Look at the blue bars on the graph. It shows points per game by position at a comparable stage in previous EFL seasons. Teams who were top had averaged 2.0 points per game, team who were bottom had averaged 0.8 points per game.

If you were to draw a line from the top of the first blue bar to the top of the last it would be smoother than if we were to join the red dots. As we should have expected: it was drawn with data from a larger sample of games.

What strikes me as I look at the EFL now is how closely the distribution of points in each division conforms to historical patterns. Top-of-the-table teams have averaged between 2.0 and 2.2 points per game, bottom-of-the-table teams have averaged between 0.7 and 0.9 points per game.

I gave examples from the ends of tables, but I could have used others from in between. So far, this season has traced fairly accurately over the past..

Sign up to emails from Racing Post Sport and get all the latest news and tips

Today's top sports betting stories

Follow us on Twitter @racingpostsport