Twists and turns people Nothing is decided in early February. I've a sneaky feeling we might just sneak it.
Always hoping for the playoffs. Anyone expecting automatic promotion is asking too much of this young squad.
Nothing has been settled, too many points still to play for. My gut instinct is that we will finish where we are and that we will get to Wembley, but there will be twists and turns before the end of the season
I’ve said on other threads that I hardly imbibe these days. But the night of the playoff final watching it on a big screen was just sublime. I woke up the next morning with an horrendous hangover but it was by far the best hangover I’ve ever had.
I've still not given up on automatic promotion - there is far too much time and too many matches left. It would be kinder to our hearts if we could ourselves been out of sight at the top but it wouldn't be Sunderland without a heart stopping run-in? Between matches I can convince myself that I'm going to enjoy the ride and let the destination take care of itself, but then that kind mental philosophy goes out of the window come kick-off time. I can look back at the days of the Chuckle Brothers and see the general upward trend since, but I still feel like **** if we drop points in a game, so come on Lads, go and get us promoted so we fans can moan about VAR!
Best Luton next week, With Sheff it’d playing Boro and Burnley playing hull anything is possible. keep the faith and all that jaaaazzz.
Poor form mate I told the wife months ago that our hols could not be the last week of May. That said I cocked up with the Charlton play off final a few years back when i booked mates stag do for the weekend of the final.
Not given up on automatics at all but we've gotten ourselves in a position to really put ourselves into top two contention over recent weeks and blown it with draws/defeats (Blackburn/Stoke away/ Plymouth/Watford). I get that other sides have tough games, no disagreement there, we also have some tough away games to come, Leeds, Norwich, WBA, Bristol City. In truth, I can see us getting a result against Leeds but I can also see us dropping more points at home. If it’s the playoffs then so be it but, we can still make the autos if we get our act together at home. The last two home games have been massive opportunities missed.
45 points up for grabs, imo it's still all to play for. Still some twists and turns for all. But we have to play better
So did I to be fair. I looked at the table at the time and was terrified of losing to Boro in the final. When she said she day early morning flights to Tenerife I just went for it. Hence the lads better get automatic
Don't think they will be in there but if we do play them we will smash them. Tenerife will be lush I'm sure and there will be plenty bars to watch us do Burnley on pens.
This determination to be first to rule us out has been a really weird element of this season. I’m sure there’ll be plenty to pat themselves on the back for being right all along. Truth is we’d been ruled out by the autumn by a fair few and we’re still in the mix in Feb, so they’re already wrong in my view. It was always gonna be tough and the chances were low. We’re competing against 4-5 teams with FAR greater budgets so any autos run is objectively an excellent performance by the club. So I’m not all that impressed by the ‘foresight’ shown in saying that we’re gonna miss out from October. Got people creating threads to crow about it on RTG. Weirdo behaviour in all honesty.
Some can't wait to have a dig at the club, players, manager, etc ... ... you're right, it's quite weird.
I'm drawn on this one. I've said that we would get in the top 2 but after yesterday I'm wondering whether we've given ourselves too much to do if the other sides drop points. There's still part of me that thinks top 2, dunno just a feeling but part of me would love for the grandson to see the SOL full and totally bouncing in a playoff semi then onto Wembley and the day we all know would be waiting. It would be his first ever trip there
Another conundrum I'm having with myself is do we WANT to go up? The obvious answer is yes as you always want to be playing at the highest level that you possibly can. So I guess that leads me onto another question. Am I looking forward to potentially playing in the premiership? My honest answer there is no. There's no denying it's a huge gap which is constantly growing due to increased tv money and the squads established teams are able to build. My glimmer of hope I'm clinging to is that we will be going up with a squad of young lads who haven't tried and failed up there before like Burnley Sheffield Utd and Leeds all have. Also these lads are only going to improve in the main anyway. Obviously we will also do some recruitment. So I guess a third question is do people think we could compete up there? And by compete I'm meaning put up a fight for 17th.
Welcome to my world. I love the championship, it's a cracking league with most games being close fought affairs. It's curious that the worst games so far have been between those pushing for promotion- see sheff utd v Burnley as an example. My worry is if and when we do get promoted a large percentage of our fan base will expect the impossible. We have already seen this season players labelled "****e", "arse" etc. There's already posts on here that 90% of the team aren't gpod enough for the premier league. Can we get promotion by automatics or the play offs then refuse the opportunity?
