Could it be time for the worm to turn again? Norwich are back in the bottom half of the Prem and if, as likely, Spurs beat them this evening then they can commence the nosedive we often see in the second half of the season. By contrast, is it time for Town to find a new sense of purpose, bolster the squad in January and swap places with our feathered friends come May? Maybe the festive Jack Daniels has something to do with my optimism, or maybe it doesn't....
I suppose 11th is bottom half of the Prem Lancs but not too shabby all the same. I sense your glass of JD is half full tonight
Didn´t see much of a nosedive last season, Hampy, or the season before that, but keep on predicting our demise, it always seems to have the opposite effect whenever others have tried it before. And Happy New Year to you too.
I think Lancs was thinking more of Blackpool last year or Hull the season before that etc rather than anything you lot have been up to, Barclay. Then there was us under John Lyall/Mick McGiven back in the days of yore: first season up, 4th in the table in early February, went into freefall and just avoided relegation. If you can keep hold of Lambert it won’t happen to you, unfortunately.
Yes Jonah - I do see there was that way of interpreting it too, wasn´t made very clear though, and could easily be understood the other way. Certainly no sign of any nosedive here yet, and it looks as if you lot have stopped your downward spiral as well, so who knows it could just be a Happy East Anglian New Year.
Not being churlish RBF but your recent record isn't great against a Wolves team scrapping for survival and admittedly a classy Spurs team that blew you away. Luckily for you however Blackburn, Bolton and Wigan are just plain awful and have relegation written all over them. I reckon you will survive this year in the Premiership but only by the skin of your feathers!
rbf, maybe you can help me out... am i going mad??? one defeat in four games including two tricky away games against everton and wolves, both of which we nearly won, an excellent victory over 7th placed newcastle and a hardly-unexpected defeat to a thoroughly-deserving and outstanding tottenham side, and now we are in free fall somehow? we sit 11th in the table, a whopping 7 points clear of the drop zone (thats more than ipswich sit above the trapdoor in the championship by the way), yet apparently we are now on the slide because we're not in 9th? two positions difference yet we have maintained the points difference between the bottom three and ourselves in that period. as is often the case yorkie you're spouting utter drivel and i think you may have had too much to drink. baffling and frankly nothing more than wishful thinking on your behalf. we are all well aware that some sides drop down the table in the 2nd half of the season, but why does it have to be us? we will have our ups and downs as everyone will but 7 points is a lot to catch up already - not all the teams below us can put together a great run. check out how many sides are involved in the scrap - we are one of probably 10-12 teams - that makes the chances of staying up far greater. its wonderful to see that you've lost none of your bitterness over the festive period! happy new year (bait well and truly taken)
Well in the spirit of the season I wish you well against Fulham! They are no mugs and it will be a tough game for you so soon after the Spuds! As for us i cant see us getting much at Reading but then we have to beat Forest at home in the old fashioned 6 pointer!
warky, as you will well know, fulham are owed one big time after the final day in 2005! they are a typical premier league side. very organised, solid, a couple of flair players and difficult to beat. the league is basically made up of teams like this and so far we've done pretty well against them. i can honestly see this game being 0-0, our first clean sheet and in turn, a shut out for us! did you watch the tottenham game? they were outstanding i have to say - i thought we coped pretty well for 55 minutes but that opening goal killed us. bale got the headlines but it was parker and modric who totally controlled the game, wonderful to watch, even if it was at my teams expense! not sure they will win the league but third is pretty much guaranteed for them on that evidence. as for you, reading seem to have finally gotten over their play off hangover and losing shane long. difficult game for you lot but forest are absolute carp so at least you will pick up three points there! whats happened to all your loanees? are they staying long term or is it more loans coming through the door next month?
Gents I thought it was perfectly clear... The slide has not really begun yet, hence the word 'commence', although your form has been anything but impressive. I was of course referring to the traditional new boy second half nosedive that we see time and again in the Prem and not to your form of last season. Things do not look hopeless for you by any means but my festive Jack Daniels and Coke leads me to believe that points will be hard to come by now, even against the likes of Blackburn, Bolton and Wigan
Warky, that´s absolutely all we need to do! Anyway, just watch us bounce back and pick up 6 pts from the next two Superman - we´ve impressed so much this year so far, that even our Suffolk neighbours call anything less than a win each week, a slump in form and nosediving to disaster, so we must be doing something right.
I think you have called the Fulham game about right although Clint Dempsey has started scoring a few. As for us we are just in a state of flux and confusion as ever. There are now reports that Everton are after Cresswell as a replacement for Leighton Baines and Bullard is off to QPR (Thank God!) We are in the hunt for James Perch, Billy Sharp (fat chance), Scott Loach and Matt Ritchie from Swindon. I cant see Andews or Collins coming back.
yorkie, can you please point out which sides form in the premier league has been impressive? so far, i can find manchester united, manchester city, arsenal (in recent weeks) and tottenham hotspur... after that, i'm struggling. we have won almost as many as we've lost - mid table form - it doesn't need to be impressive so i'm not sure what you are trying to get at other than 'hoping' we suddenly fall apart a la blackpool/hull. personally, i see no reason whatsoever, with a couple of additions, why we won't do a west brom/stoke and finish mid table. its very noticeable that even the loathed motd pundits don't suggest we are likely to slip, even lawrenson! the reason for that is because our manager has made good signings, set the team up to score goals and win games. points are always hard to come by, thats the nature of this league, but it hasn't escaped most peoples notice that when we have a defeat we generally bounce back quickly and thats important. at the beginning of the season, my mate had a bet with an ipswich 'friend' that norwich would secure a higher league placing in terms of 1-24 than ipswich would in the championship. i thought that was a terrible bet at the time as i felt 17th would be a miracle (it still would by the way) but the more the season has gone on, the more likely it is to happen. never trust jack daniels... he knows bugger all about football
Supers you do really hang on my every word... it's not impressive, ten points or so from ten games is there or thereabouts staying up by the skin of your teeth material. Without getting into a long winded debate about the sides who will struggle - there's no need, this is about you guys, as new boys, doing the traditional new boys nosedive in the second half of the season and getting dragged into the scrap. Unlike Hull, Blackpool and many others before them, you have little head start and no big scalps to show for your early season efforts. Jack Daniels knows more about football than Simon Clegg, that much I do know
but thats what i'm saying yorkie. our form doesn't need to be impressive in any way, shape or form! it merely needs to tick along at a steady rate and so far we've ticked along at a far better rate than was necessary. we aren't trying to win the bloody league - we are trying to stay up. 17th is good enough for us and i very much doubt 40 points will be required. five more wins and a couple of draws will probably be enough the way blackburn and bolton are carrying on. both clubs will no doubt put a run together at some point but even then they need to win three games more than us over the rest of the season - that is not going to be easy! we have as big a head start as anyone has before us - 7 points in this league is big and it would require us to lose maybe 7 or 8 on the bounce for us to realistically drop into the bottom three with the current form of teams below us. the majority of teams in this league are a bit like the championship - evenly matched. each will take points off each other and so unless we lose all these matches we will be fine. we've lost 7 games so far and 5 were against the top 5. other than west brom (when we were still adjusting and lets face it, west brom's away form is excellent anyway) and villa away which i feel was our only other really poor result. we aren't losing to the teams we actually NEED to beat to survive. we won't win them all, i'm sure we will lose more games when i think we need to pick up points, but frankly our start has been excellent and means we now can afford a big blip and STILL stay up. the aim was always 17th and that remains the aim. anything above that is merely a bonus. you mention hull but even they survived! you're right about jack and clegg though
