January Optimism Gauge

[limpid]

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

[Vancvillan]

@Jas10 you think we'll finish top 4 but you're not "very optimistic"?

You have high standards sir.

[Jas10]

57 minutes ago, Vancvillan said:

@Jas10 you think we'll finish top 4 but you're not "very optimistic"?

You have high standards sir.

If I was very optimistic I think we’d win the league

I think and hope we’ll be battling for 4th/5th… but I won’t place any demands on the team or manager…

Too hard to predict anything and whether we’ll have luck with injuries, suspensions and whether we sign any players…

Just gonna try n relax and enjoy the experience… I’ll always be very optimistic about King Unai

[allani]

I love the fact (and I know it is early days in terms of numbers) that no-one has yet to predict us finishing lower than 6th and yet we're only "optimistic" about the season.  That's pretty amazing.

[Villan_of_oz]

10 hours ago, Vancvillan said:

@Jas10 you think we'll finish top 4 but you're not "very optimistic"?

You have high standards sir.

I'm the same as Jas10, I think we'll finish top 4 and I'm optimistic we'll do so.

Very optimistic is for when we can't finish lower than 4th, or if we're playing so unbelievable well there are no cracks to worry about.

I trust the King and will just try and be patient and happy til seasons end...

[Leeroy]

I am generally optimistic, but there is a bit of pessimism which is why I'm thinking we'll finish 5th:

1. January signings - we seem very cautious on them but should be going all out to improve even if it means investing large sums of money, we are in a position of great strength but aren't perfect, with some investment could upgrade right back and our left sided attack (proper competition for Cash and an out of form Ramsey). Meanwhile Spurs are making moves early, Arsenal and Liverpool will almost certainly invest too.

2. Media - they seem to want to put us down and knock our confidence, claim we're overachieving, Neville and Carragher not having one Villa player in the team of the season for example, and will absolutely want Spurs to finish above us because they're their favourite London club. 

3. History - we have been in this position before, top at Christmas in 1998, finished 6th that season in the end (the only club top at Christmas to not finish in the top 4), we were also flying under MON at one stage in 2008 and were in the top 3 in February of that season, again ended up finishing 6th by falling away.

 

I am more confident this time round though, mainly because I think Unai Emery is elite, and also because I think we have a much better squad than we had in 1998 and 2008 and will have players back from injury/suspension soon. I really rate this squad, Kamara, Martinez, Diaby, Watkins, Ramsey, Pau Torres, Konsa, Luiz, McGinn. If we could just add 1-2 quality players to play with them, and help them (i.e. a left sided attacker to allow Ramsey to find form slowly by managing his minutes, which Zaniolo was supposed to do but hasn't worked so far) I'd be confident of 4th, but I just don't think we'll carry out that investment to do so and will finish 5th. Hope I'm wrong though and I often am when making negative predictions.

Edited January 2 by Leeroy

[rubberman]

It is so good to see the general optimism about the club these days. Thought I'd see how the average on these has moved over the last year or so.

Orange line is our average optimism/pessimism against right axis (1 would be all very optimistic, 5 all very pessimistic)

Blue blocks are forecast finishing position against left axis, from 16th in Sept 22 to 4th now.

 

Edited January 2 by rubberman

[TomC]

I assume the poll meant this season, not next/upcoming season?

 

[limpid]

13 hours ago, TomC said:

I assume the poll meant this season, not next/upcoming season?

My mistake, I let my browser auto complete. I'll fix it now.