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Wales Online
Wales Online
Sport
Ian Mitchelmore

How the promotion battle is predicted to finish for Swansea City, Watford, Brentford and Bournemouth and who is tipped to miss out

Norwich City became the first of three clubs to secure promotion into the Premier League this season.

But six other sides are still jostling it out to ensure they join the Canaries in the top flight next term.

Despite losing to local rivals Luton Town last time out, Watford hold the aces when it comes to clinching the second automatic promotion spot.

However, Swansea City and Brentford still harbour faint hopes of overhauling the Hornets while Bournemouth are not completely out of the running.

Sky Bet still have Xisco Munoz's side as the overwhelming favourites to go up alongside Norwich.

They are offering odds of 1/10 for Watford to secure an immediate return to the Premier League.

Despite Swansea currently being higher up the table, Brentford and Bournemouth are both more fancied than Steve Cooper's side to go up, with the Bees and Cherries at 6/5 and 2/1 respectively to gain promotion.

As for the Swans, they are the 7/2 fourth favourites to be promoted while Barnsley and Reading are at 4/1 and 25/1 respectively.

Watford still have to play Norwich, Millwall and Brentford before welcoming Swansea to Vicarage Road on the final day of the regular season.

But Munoz has called for calm after his side's eight-game unbeaten run was ended by Luton on Saturday.

“I had a big responsibility from the first day I was the head coach of Watford,” said the Spaniard.

“The players have worked very hard for the past three or four months, they work with passion, give their maximum in all the training sessions to get us into this situation.

“Now is the moment to believe in us. We know our responsibility, we also know there will be difficult moments until the final. But we are working hard, we’ll stay together and after we will see if we arrive in our amazing goal.

“We need to stay everyone together. Today is the day. We need to keep going with the same ambition, the same passion, the same power. We spoke about this, we knew we’d have difficult situations in the last games in the Championship and right now is the moment for everyone to stay together, to keep going, for everyone to believe in our important goal and for our team to continue with the same work.”

As for Swansea, they know only too well how quickly the picture can change after securing a play-off place in dramatic fashion last season.

And Swans boss Cooper says his side will continue to battle for runner-up spot over the course of the next four games.

"You can say it's a point closer to Watford, but I also know we're disappointing not to get three points," said Cooper after the draw with Wycombe.

"I've always said, whatever there is to play for, we're going to go for it."

Championship promotion odds

Watford - 1/10

Brentford - 6/5

Bournemouth - 2/1

Swansea City - 7/2

Barnsley - 4/1

Reading - 25/1

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