I don't really see the relevance of previous results when stating what is and isn't an easy game. By that reckoning Arsenal is an easy game because we'd already beat them? I specifically mentioned home games because it was never going to be possible for us to win an away game that season; I actually said so at the beginning of the season when we lost Turner. You obviously need a defence to win away games and we simply didn't have one so it was obviously not going to happen. That's why I focussed on home games, you're right I did miss Birmingham from the list. So we lost 4 home games (3 against Champions League teams) in what 15ish? under PB and lost 3 out of 5 under Dowie (with not one side of the quality of Arsenal, Tottenham or United who we lost to under PB). That's a pretty massive difference. The Burnley one really took the piss because they were absolute ****e by the end of that season, there was no way we should have let them climb above us but they made us look silly. We were in with a chance all season and never completely gave up until those last few games under Dowie when we were absolute ****e.
brown got us 24 points (a third of them in the november) from 29 games. brown got us 1 win in his last 15 games but suddenly we were going to turn into a winning machine. we would have needed 36 points to stay up. that would have taken another 14.5 matches but we only had 9 left. i was glad to get out the pl anyway. it had been rubbish since bullard arrived and brown opted for negative formation.
