Saints early form like so many clubs that have been promoted recently for example to the Premiership , for instance in recent years Wigan, Reading and Blackpool, saw those clubs rise up the table, beating top 4 Premiership sides ,climbing to heady heights before returning to earth with a bump. It seems that their harder working ethic on the pitch took the established clubs time to deal with, before finally outclassing them. Could the same thing happen to Saints in the Championship, and a loss of form see the club slide back to the lower end of the table as other sides pass them in mid table? As the title says, are Saints currently flattering to deceive? Any thoughts?
Hi Minging, in answer to your polite question I have to say that having watched the team develop over the last two years that Saints are actually getting better as time passes and being a young side, haven't reached it's full potential yet. I can say with full confidence that we will not finish in the lower half of the table. At this present time, there are not six teams that are better than us in the whole league, that may change, but the win ratio since NA took over suggests otherwise.
It's also interesting that you never used the more appropriate examples of Norwich, Leeds and Millwall who all had good seasons after promotion from League One.... so i'll ask you a question, could we be this season's Norwich?
We are a team with quality thoughout and a great manager. Together as one. Are we doing better than we could have hoped? Yes. Will we stay at number one all season? Probably not. Will we be top 6 at end of season? Almost certainly. Will we get auto? Good chance. The League is already sorting into top and bottom halves, although there is still plenty of time for others to enter the fray. We may zig zag a bit, but slide massively down the table..no. You can bookmark that.
If the Press coverage is to be be believed we are just a bunch of over achievers that are threatening to interefere with coverage of other Clubs in the League.
Do you think Pompey are flattering to deceive Minging ? Perhaps your early season good form and managing to stay above the bottom three is OK for now but with all the Bookings and Sending Offs mounting up and suspensions on the horizon, " Do you think you will get relegated with a record lowest points " Any thoughts?
Haven't seen any press reports that actually suggest we are not playing well, but we have never really been a press favourite. We were a long time in the top league and, apart from MLT, they couldn't get an angle on us. If we get promotion, we will be a newbie and may get some attention. Nigel will give them some good quotes, though most of us could provide them already: Manchester United are a good, hard-working group of players who gave us a bit of trouble in the first half.
The Daily Mirror (obviously picked up on a train) usually give our games decent coverage post-match and, to be fair, did so in League 1.
I would suggest that you're looking in the wrong places then, SD13. Plenty of match reports from the Beeb, the Guardian, Observer, Independent, etc.... Where you won't find us is in the tabloids, because they need the room for Manure, Citeh and Arsene Wenger. Although I did see a sizable report squeezed into the pages of a Sunday Mirror last week, that my old Mum had bought. Although Brighton were definitely the Championship darlings of the media, I sense that is starting to change now that they've lost a little ground. I've always thought we've been treated pretty fairly by The Guardian and Observer, of all paper groups, considering they hail from Manchester. Worth the occasional check out of their match reports. EDIT: And NO, we're not flattering to deceive. Even Steve Claridge reckons we're the real deal.
Actually we are flattering to deceive and SB3 is quite correct. We are flattering the opposition by only scoring three or four, when we are creating enough to get six or seven and we ae deceiving the opposition into thinking that we are beatable as we've lost two games
about the same as the last few seasons then lets see if the whole team can score more than rickie this season
The bookies have us second favourites to go up, after West Ham. I`m not a gambler myself, but I`ll go with them.
