I honestly believe we will stay in the top 2 all season, We are not just beating teams, but slaughtering them. It may be conceived as being a bit naive but there is such an enormous amount of confidence about the club in all areas, not just what we are achieving on the pitch. If we are still in the top 2 come January it will be interesting to see what we do during the transfer window!!
Yeh, that's a very good point. How much thought will go on the Premiership, when Cortese starts thinking about money being spent in January. Top 6 prem team? I hear you say Cortese
To put things into perspective, Saints may only need 12 more wins and 6 draws from their remaining 29 games. 81 points is a total that would have been enough to get automatically promoted in each of the last 4 seasons in the Championship and a massive goal difference is surely worth an extra point.
At the moment it seems eaier to conceive of an auto place than it does to imagine us falling short, but a couple of poor results could quickly change that, especially with a lot of tough away games in the second half of the season. Personally I am still not ready to allow myself anymore than a sneaky moment of optimism before I bury it in an avalanche of caution, after all this is Saints and all too often we have fetched our fathers gun only to let off both barrels into our own foot.
I am optimistic that we will go up, but cannot get the fear of failure out of my head either. However, I have ABSOLUTE AND UTTER 100 PERCENT FAITH in Nigel, Nicola and the players. It is more important that they have the confidence than we do.
Believing is one thing, knowing without a shadow of a doubt is another. I started believing somewhere around late October. It was when I realised that my pre-season mid-table prediction was almost certainly going to be way off. Having gone to the trouble of doing the BBC Predictor [yes I know, get a life..!], and then noticing Saints improve even further over the last few weeks, I believe they can gain auto promotion, probably as champions. There are a couple of stumbling blocks. 1] How Saints will cope if they have to play on suspect Jan/Feb pitches, and 2] the run in for the last few games are probably the toughest run of fixtures they are likely to see all season. I still think they'll have enough though. Nothing is certain.
Disagree POTS, Lallana and Lambert are outstanding but we aint a two man team. NA seems to have the ability to produce a card from his sleeve (Connoly end of last, beginning of this season) Guly and Chaplow weighing with crucial goals at the right the right moment. I acknowledge Lamberts contribution every week is immense but he's had, by his standards, a barrengoal scoring spell for a few weeks, even so we managed to keep winning. I think there is strength in depth, a great team ethic and a manager who can read the game and make positive tactical changes at crucial phases within the match. De Ridder and Barnard waiting on the touchline. I believe.
You ask when can we believe..........believe what? I think there is no doubt everyone excepts and believes that we are after promotion. I don't think there is many people out there that do not believe we are capable of promotion. So in reality you probably do believe already. The final part of course is when will we know we are to be promoted.......answer when no one can get more points than us and we are in first or second spot. Or of course we win the final game of the championship season. Very simple equation I would have thought.
What I do believe is that we are a team that will no longer fold. We can and will lose games because of bad luck, excellent effort from opposition or our shooting boots aren't on, but we will not freefall. The team's confidence is too high for that.
For the past 3 seasons, the team at the top after 18 Games (which we will be) Has gone up as champions... We also have more points already than QPR and Newcastle did after the 18 games.
Apart from Leicester/Cardiff (two defeats) we have played all the top teams at home 1st. You still have to beat them of course but things are not going to get any easier. If the squad can remain fit then we have every chance. I think the clubs confidence and belief will see us through a tricky group of fixtures till the new year. I can't forsee anyone leaving the club in January(of note) and I trust Nigel to make the right decisions to bring players in. March/April is when titles and promotion are won and loss. This is when anxiety can replace confidence, but I believe we will be in the position to fight for the top two till the end. Together as One
I do now finally believe that we could get automatic promotion. Nothing more that just could however - we're still at least another six weeks away, but probably even longer than that, from me potentially starting to believe that we will get automatic promotion (I think you need to have played at least 25 games, but probably more like 30 - 35, until you can start to believe that). I'm still trying my absoloute best though to not look beyond the play-offs just yet. We're currently 13 points clear of 7th place (albeit Birmingham have three games in hand lower down the table) - I'm looking for that gap to be maintained, or even increased, between now and the end of 2011. If we start 2012 say, 15 points clear of 7th, I don't see how we would fail to get a play-off place. We would need one almighty blow-up, and just do not see that ever happening.
I'll bet my life that by the end of the season the top 6 will innevitably find themselves in the top 8
You dont need the permission of people on here to start believing it can happen.. Like me if you believe now that it can happen then dont let a load of forum users tell you you cant.
The Leicester defeat - we deserved at the very least a point, probably to win with the chances in the second half, and would have done if it hadn't been for a brilliant Goalkeeper in Kasper Schmeichel. Cardiff Defeat - Deserved a point, didn't really fall for us. The only bad performance of the season was at Reading, and we still managed to snatch something there. West Ham will be up there come the end and Leicester will start to finally push on but I see no other teams that are really that threatening. I'd associate the play-off quality teams as Cardiff, Middlesbrough, Hull. All 3 of those sides are generally solid at the back and have done well so far. Leeds are a bit inconsistent and erratic, Blackpool similar. I have questions over whether Crystal Palace will keep going with their fairly small and young team and Derby are going through their usual collapse. Birmingham's amount of games may catch up with them but I think they'll make a late play-off charge. Peterborough and Brighton concede too many goals, and the latter is going through really poor form. The rest are no threat.
Im just starting to believe that we can finish top but a little voice in my head says stop. (all together now)
Adkins is record as saying [when we climbed above the Seagulls for 1st Place] that he would not be thinking about promotion until January 2012 - before then it would be taking each game as it comes and see where we are. As usual - very sensible - keeping the pressure off the players and I guess if things are still loolking so positive in January; to bringing in players you want in the team to push us over the line and would stay with us in the Premiership.
I disagree Beddytare. You are answering the question "When will we know?" I already believe we can do it. By February I hope to believe we will do it. By the time we are mathematically sure, I will know (or not, as the case may be)
I think I'm scared of believing. Too many times I've been let down by false dawns. I'll admit it looks very promising and Adkins has already shown he can deliver consistently, but I always have a niggling voice telling me it may still go pear shaped. I think i'll start to believe we will get promoted if we are top in February and have strengthened in January.
