February Optimism Gauge

[limpid]

This poll will be open for the first week of the month.

[Juju]

I think a terrible transfer window will sink us.

[Raver50032]

Enjoy it while it lasts folks.

[mattyvilla]

Our away form will sink us , if we need a result at west ham on the last day , i don't think we would get it.

[Stevo985]

On 04/02/2020 at 07:59, mattyvilla said:

Our away form will sink us , if we need a result at west ham on the last day , i don't think we would get it.

It's good enough as long as we keep our home form where it is

[sne]

Think we needed to improve (a fair bit) and not just stand still in January to stay up, not sure we did.

Hopefully we are more prepared for the relegation fight than some of the other clubs who didn't expect to be here like Wet Spam and Watford.

Honestly think we are going down but it's still all to play for.

 

Edited February 5, 2020 by sne
Typo

[Stevo985]

I'm surprised by the pessimism to be honest.

We're not in the relegation zone, we're maintaining a PPG that will keep us up, we've got a manager whose teams get better as the season goes on, we've added to the squad in January (maybe not enough but we'll see)

 

It's by no means done and dusted but I think we're in a good position.

[It's Your Round]

Optimism and pessimism generally ebbs and flows according to the last result. We can all be guilty of getting too carried away with a win, and really down with a disappointing loss. A lot depends on your mindset in life, everything is filtered through that and football is no different. I try to be optimistic as it’s a happier mindset for me to be in, logically. It feels better to me, expecting the best. Much better than anticipating the worst case. Take relegation, I’m happy to spend the season believing we’ll stay up and then be gutted when we don’t, as opposed to being fed up all season thinking we’re doing down, and still being fed up when go down. Or, we stay up and I’ve wasted all that time being miserable. 
 

 

[briny_ear]

I think we will just about scrape it. Maybe 17th, by a single point or goal difference.

Mainly think this because Bournemouth, who are a pretty terrible side, have a horrible fixture list from now on, so I think they will sink into the bottom 3 before long (despite our best efforts to save them) and struggle to get out. 

Also, West Ham, despite having an easier fixture list than any of the other relegation sides, start off with a pretty horrendous run of fixtures before ending the season playing Newcastle, Burnley, Norwich, Watford and Villa in their last 5 games. So they may find it hard to get momentum and points that late in the season.

It may go down to the wire - that last fixture against West Ham away starts to look like it could be a final day thriller.

I think anyone who believes we are in a good position right now is underestimating the ferocity of the relegation battle to come. We have played all of the bottom 6 teams apart from that last fixture so the only way we will get nearer safety is to start taking points from teams higher in the table - something we have not been too hot at so far. I sometimes wonder if Smith has (perhaps unintentionally) encouraged an attitude that losing to higher-up teams doesn’t matter, won’t define our season, etc. Well, now it will. So I really hope my judgement is wrong and we can start taking the game a bit more to teams 14th and upwards.

I marked myself as a pessimist because if we stay up narrowly, this will be seen as a vindication of Smith whereas I think we have missed out on points this season due to his inexperience as a coach and would have done better with a manager more used to managing in the premier league.

Edited February 5, 2020 by briny_ear

[HalfTimePost]

Very nervous but Johns back in 5 weeks. He'll make the Newcastle and Wolves games. They're winnable. Win those 2 and Saints and suddenly we are on 34 points with 5 games to play. 

Sheffield United game will be important too. 

I think we'll snatch something from either Spurs, Chelsea or Arsenal but get thumped in the two we don't snatch something out of..

Going to be close. Come on boys.