Final league standings?

[cricketsi]

With 3 games to go we're currently in pole position in the race for the final Champions' League spot, 3rd place. How confident are people that we'll see things through and get it? Newcastle have surpassed us as the form team as of late and we've been faltering again, with RvP off form and now Theo out for the season.

We can mathematically finish anywhere between 3rd and 6th. Where do you think we will end up?

The table at present reads:
Pl GD Pts
3 Arsenal 35 24 65
4 Newcastle United 34 11 62
5 Tottenham Hotspur 34 18 59
6 Chelsea 34 18 58

Remaining fixtures:
Arsenal: Stoke (a), Norwich (h), West Brom (a)
Newcastle: Wigan (a), Chelsea (a), Man City (h), Everton (a)
Spurs: Blackburn (h), Bolton (a), Aston Villa (a), Fulham (h)
Chelsea: QPR (h), Newcastle (h), Liverpool (a), Blackburn (h)

Looking at the run-ins it will be extremely disappointing if we don't get 3rd and catastrophically poor if we fail to get top 4. What do you think the final order for 3rd-6th will be? We should get third. I'm finding it hard to pick the others though. Newcastle have some tough games, Spurs have 3 out of 4 teams that will be battling against relegation and Chelsea have the added demands of a CL semi-final against Barca and the FA Cup final against Liverpool.

It keeps messing up the formatting even though I've edited it repeatedly. Might be the shitty work computers - can a mod fix please? Should just need a few taps of the enter key in the right places? Thanks.

[Syn]

The situation was always that Arsenal didn't have much squad depth and a couple of injuries would make life very difficult. Recently we've missed Kos and now Arteta and Walcott are out for the season.

I'm not too confident that we'll do what it takes to finish 3rd, but I'm more confident that we won't have to do what we think we need to do. I fancy Chelsea to get a top 4 spot now.

[cricketsi]

The situation was always that Arsenal didn't have much squad depth and a couple of injuries would make life very difficult. Recently we've missed Kos and now Arteta and Walcott are out for the season. I'm not too confident that we'll do what it takes to finish 3rd, but I'm more confident that we won't have to do what we think we need to do. I fancy Chelsea to get a top 4 spot now.

Chelsea were poor against us and seem to be prioritising the CL though. If (big if) they make it past Barca they might be putting all their eggs in one basket that is the CL final as their route back into the competition next year. But then, you can make arguments against all the teams putting together the required results from their remaining games.

[fakeyank]

I think we will get 4th. We will be playing Stoke at Stoke and thats a place where we always have problems.

[Joker]

I'm not all too confident of finishing 4th, although Spurs' collapse has helped things on that front. However, we're without Walcott for the rest of the season, and whatever you think about his technical qualities, he has contributed a lot of goals to us this season (in fact him and RVP have together contributed over 85% of all our goals). Arteta's form improved significantly in the last two months, and his replacement Ramsey looks totally out of sorts (while you can't expect much from Diaby given that he's been out for so long). The worst thing is that our best player season RVP also looks to have lost his mojo, and nobody seems capable of stepping up. If we lose to Stoke, and Newcastle, Chelsea, Spurs get good results next week, I can see the pressure building, and we've all seen how poorly we cope under pressure. For the past few months Spurs were in the ascendancy, and we didn't have a lot to lose as we were the team doing the chasing. Now that we're in pole position, that old cliche about "mental strength" comes into play, and I don't think we have it in sufficient quantity to keep our heads and stay in the top 4.

[Japan Shaking All Over]

3rd without doubt
We are in pole position for this and just need to keep a high degree compromise.
It will no doubt go to the wire cos as always we hate to things the easy way. . .
Every game is going to be toigh but that goes for everyone. . .Scum have played themselves out of it IMO and Newcastle are our closest rivals but those who are saying that we are saying all is lost because of their game in hand are having a bubble. . .Newcastle have to win that game and then do better than us over the last three because we have the edge in goal difference. . .and do it in a group of games that include Chavs, Citeh and Everton (a team who currently are taking it to Utd)

So come guys I may be a member of MOC so prone to views seen through rose tinted googles but surely some of you share a little of my optimism. . .hello?. . .anyone there?

[Coney]

Citeh will be desperate to beat Newcastle. Newcastle also have to play chavs. If chavs don't get past Barca, they will be desparate to beat Newcastle. I am not expecting Newcastle to nick 3rd. Spuds are more of a worry because they have the easiest run-in. However, we should be able to get 6 or 7 points from our remaining games which I think will be enough to keep us ahead.

If we see Newcastle in 4th, and the way spuds are blowing what should be easy games for them, there is a decent chance chavs will get 5th. I'd settle for that.

[KSE Comedy Club]

We need at least 6 points from our remaining games.

I do think we will finish 3rd but its gonna be a bit of an 'OMG' journey to get there.

[Japan Shaking All Over]

Those saying we will drop out of the top four. . .dont have a Danny

[cricketsi]

I don't have confidence we'll get the 9 points we should be very capable of, but as Coney and Jeebus said, 6 points should be sufficient for third and I can't see any of the other 3 winning all 4 of their remaining games, so we should clinch it.

Joker - you cite mental strength, and although we've imploded on several occasions in the past we've had enough about us to keep CL football in our grasps. What makes you think we're more lacking in mental strength this year?