League Two Predictions 2026-27: The Opta Supercomputer Projections

Who will win promotion to League One? Which clubs are likeliest to be relegated to the National League? We answer all the key questions with our League Two 2026-27 season predictions from the Opta supercomputer.

Some familiar names are back in League Two.

The epic last-day clash in the National League between York City and Rochdale last season ended as dramatically as one could have hoped. With both teams playing for the one automatic promotion spot, Rochdale took the lead in stoppage time, with their fans and players going ballistic. Then minutes later, York equalised, with their fans and players also going ballistic as a draw was enough for them.

The Minstermen secured their place back in the EFL for the first time since the 2015-16 season, but things have taken a bit of a turn since, with manager Stuart Maynard surprisingly leaving the club. That shouldn’t dampen York fans’ enthusiasm too much as they prepare to embark on a League Two campaign for the first time in over a decade.

Rochdale were left heartbroken, but then they won the play-offs and had a lovely day out at Wembley, so it ultimately had a happy ending three years after being relegated from League Two.

The season begins on Saturday with two early games. Rochdale travel to Newport County, while the other 12.30 (BST) kick-off sees Oldham Athletic host a team who didn’t particularly want to be back in League Two this season, Port Vale. All other teams get under way at 15:00.

What does the Opta supercomputer think will happen in England’s fourth tier this season, though?

We thought League One looked like it might be tightly contested this season, but League Two has been even harder to separate for the supercomputer. Across 10,000 simulations, no team earned automatic promotion more than 31% of the time, while each team were promoted at least 68 times. Looking the other way, each team were also relegated at least 60 times in the 10,000 sims.

It is worth remembering that these projections reflect only what the Opta supercomputer knows today. In effect, if every game in League Two was played today, this is how it sees the league finishing. Of course, these projections will change thousands of times throughout the season, based on real-life data powering the seasonal simulations.

Still, for now, they can at least offer a useful indication of what each club can realistically target.

Most other pre-season predictions are based almost entirely on opinion; see this as a projection without opinion and simply powered by data.

Who Will Be Promoted From League Two?

Grimsby Town’s 2025-26 season will live long in the memory, but largely because of their elimination of Manchester United in the EFL Cup second round. They reached the play-offs in the league but were beaten 4-3 on aggregate in the semi-finals by Salford City, as part-owner Gary Neville got a little bit of revenge for that penalty shootout success against his beloved United.

David Artell has done a superb job in Cleethorpes, though, and the Opta supercomputer thinks his team have what it takes to go up this season. They lost star striker Jaze Kabia to Leyton Orient but did at least confirm the permanent re-signing of veteran forward Andy Cook from Bradford City.

Grimsby are the pre-season favourites with the Opta supercomputer to finish in one of the top three places and secure automatic promotion, doing so in 30.5% of simulations.

Port Vale are back in League Two after suffering relegation last season, but like the last time this happened two years ago, they will be hoping to bounce straight back up.

Manager Jon Brady stated that the total of 36 goals scored by his team last season was “not good enough”; he’ll expect the captures of Max Watters from Barnsley and Mo Faal on loan from Wrexham to help find goals in the fourth tier. Port Vale were able to secure automatic promotion back up to League One in 30.1% of sims, winning the title in 11.9%, more than Grimsby (11.6%).

Barnet might be surprise front-runners to some, but Dean Brennan got the Bees flying towards the end of last season. Barnet finished just outside the play-offs but won seven of their last eight games (D1), including each of their last five.

The goals of Kabongo Tshimanga helped after his January arrival from Crawley Town, with the former Chesterfield and Peterborough man firing 12 in 21 league games. Only Callum Stead scored more for the club last season (13), and he played 13 more games than Tshimanga.

Barnet finished top in 10.2% of simulations and earned a top-three finish in 27.7%.

Exeter City finished fourth from bottom in League One last season, comfortably ahead of the three below them, but ultimately could not avoid the drop.

Matt Taylor signed a new deal for the coming season despite initially suggesting his return in March would be short-term. The supercomputer thinks the campaign might end in the play-offs for the Grecians, but they did clinch a spot in the top three 26.0% of the time, while they won the title in 9.3%.

Rotherham United and Northampton Town were the other two to come down, and though the Millers have signed Paul Mullin from Wrexham, they are only given a 21.3% chance of automatic promotion. Northampton finished bottom of League One last season and have a 16.9% chance of going back up via the top three.

Salford City were beaten comfortably in the play-off final by Notts County, and that 3-0 loss was the end for boss Karl Robinson. Peter Cklamovski is in the hot seat now, a former assistant to Ange Postecoglou in Australia and Japan.

As ever, Salford have made big moves in the transfer market to try to finally reach the third tier, with Luke Molyneux and Macaulay Langstaff the headline signings. The supercomputer saw Salford finish in an automatic promotion spot in 22.1% of sims, so greater than a one-in-five chance.

And that’s a theme with our League Two predictions; there are a lot of teams with a credible chance of a top-three finish. Others include Chesterfield (24.1%), Colchester United (15.3%) and Bristol Rovers (14.8%).

Who Is Likeliest to Be Relegated From League Two?

It was certainly a season of two halves for Tranmere Rovers in 2025-26. After 24 games, they had won eight, drawn eight and lost eight in the league. Then, of their next 17 games, they lost 15 (W1 D1), putting them right in the relegation fight. A vital 3-1 win at Cheltenham as well as two draws in their last five helped keep them up, but the Opta supercomputer doesn’t like their chances heading into this campaign.

Darrell Clarke has been installed as manager, but the former Barnsley and Bristol Rovers boss took over a team who, according to Opta’s expected points model, should have been relegated last season. Tranmere earned six more points than they should have, and only Harrogate Town (43.8) earned fewer expected points than Rovers (47.0).

Of course, it’s actual points that count, and Clarke will be eager to earn enough to prove the supercomputer wrong. Bringing in experienced duo Tom Ince and Will Vaulks should help, but as things stand, Tranmere were relegated in 29.1% of simulations, more often than any other team. That means they stayed up in more than 70% of sims, though, so that’s not to say it’s particularly likely they’ll go down, and shows how tight it promises to be.

Another team who survived by the skin of their teeth last season were Newport County. Christian Fuchs was able to keep the Welsh side in the EFL, but the former Leicester City left-back has since left, replaced by Hayden Mullins.

Newport have finished in the bottom half for the last four seasons, and the supercomputer thinks they could struggle again. They were relegated in 21.5% of sims.

Looking at the two promoted teams, York and Rochdale, they are both currently projected to finish in the bottom half, but it should be pointed out that this will largely be due to their Opta Power Rankings, which will have been limited by only playing National League teams last season. Teams promoted from the National League do quite often do well in their first season in League Two. Barnet (8th) and Oldham (10th) both finished in the top half last season.

That said, it also perhaps doesn’t help that neither team have retained their manager over the summer, with Jimmy McNulty (the football manager, not the fictional character from The Wire) leaving Rochdale for Stockport County, with Ian Watson coming in, and Stuart Maynard shockingly exiting York, replaced by former Crawley and MK Dons boss Scott Lindsey.

Should they make good starts, the numbers will obviously change, but for now, the supercomputer has Rochdale going straight back down in 18.4% of simulations, and York in 15.0%.

Gillingham lost 13 of their last 20 games last season (W4 D3), and Gareth Ainsworth will hope he can get more out of his players at the start of the new campaign. The supercomputer rates the Gills as only slightly less likely than Rochdale to go down at 18.3%.

Another team who stumbled towards the end of the season was Accrington Stanley, who lost 11 of their last 17 games (W2 D4). John Doolan’s team have finished in the bottom half in each of his two full seasons there, and the supercomputer thinks it will be another tough campaign. Accrington were relegated in 16.7% of simulations.

Crawley only survived relegation on the final day last season but aren’t considered one of the main candidates to go down this time. Colin Kazim-Richards came in to replace Lindsey towards the end of the campaign and kept the Red Devils up, but it should be mentioned that no team in League Two underperformed against their expected points as much as Crawley (-16.5) over the full campaign, so they were perhaps unfortunate to be in trouble in the first place. The supercomputer only saw them go down this season in 12.9% of sims.

The only other teams with more than a 7% chance of going down are Cheltenham Town (15.1%) and Shrewsbury Town (14.2%).

How Does the Opta Supercomputer Model Work?

• Opta’s League Prediction model estimates the likelihood of teams finishing in each position in the competition. We can therefore see how successful a team’s season is likely to be, whether it’s their relegation or title chances.
  
• The model estimates the probability of each match outcome (win, draw or loss) by using betting market odds and Opta Power Rankings. The odds and rankings are based on historical and recent team performances.
  
• The model considers the strength of opponents by using these match outcome probabilities and simulates the remaining fixtures in the competition thousands of times. By analysing the outcome of each of these simulations, the model can see how often teams finished in each league position to create our final predictions.

*All prediction data is based on Opta supercomputer projections from Wednesday 12 August 2026.

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