West Brom managed to do it in the most dramatic fashion and Sunderland did it entirely in spite of Paolo Di Canio.
Yes, that Christmas Curse held true for teams that were bottom at Yuletide during the first dozen Premier League seasons.
But as the aforementioned clubs proved, it's all a myth that teams bottom at Christmas always go down.
We took a look at how the Baggies and Black Cats extricated themselves from the drop on Team 33 this week, but we also asked - and Joe Coffey answered - another question: How many points do you really need to avoid a place in the bottom three at a bare minimum? It's not 40 points is all I'll say.
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