Top 4 head to head

[Niall_Quinn]

Well yeah but you're saying the City loss should have been a draw (or deserved a draw, not sure there's any difference) and blaming it on the ref and the Chelsea one was unlucky cos it was a 1 in a 100 game and the ref screwed up.

We got hammered by Chelsea and it was in big part to our awful play to give their strikers the space other teams didn't give them, the game was over before the sending off.

City game you can't judge anything because the official were bent. Score could have been the other way with legit officials. Maybe not, we'll never know. but that game can't be used as a demo of anything because it was too random.

Didn't say we were unlucky, I said the fuck-up chavs were lucky, different thing. I think 7/10 we get a result against them even playing as shit as we did. And again, 10 vs 11 is not a good game to use to judge anything.

So I picked the games where is was 11 vs 11 and the dice seemed to roll evenly. Couple of games against Everton, one against pool - who we also beat a couple of times btw. Concluded from those games we have some serious issues. Which is exactly what you are saying but you don't like it when people criticise the chavs and gypos - you are way too defensive of them btw.

[Özim]

City game you can't judge anything because the official were bent. Score could have been the other way with legit officials. Maybe not, we'll never know. but that game can't be used as a demo of anything because it was too random.

Didn't say we were unlucky, I said the fuck-up chavs were lucky, different thing. I think 7/10 we get a result against them even playing as shit as we did. And again, 10 vs 11 is not a good game to use to judge anything.

So I picked the games where is was 11 vs 11 and the dice seemed to roll evenly. Couple of games against Everton, one against pool - who we also beat a couple of times btw. Concluded from those games we have some serious issues. Which is exactly what you are saying but you don't like it when people criticise the chavs and gypos - you are way too defensive of them btw.

I don't care if people Criticise City or Chelsea, what I don't like is people playing down the results against them as if they don't really matter that much. Since these teams are what we're competing against it does matter, the refs thing is bias IMO, there are some bad decisions but they don't win you or lose you games by the margins we lost them, that's just down to poor play of some sort.

As I said before in the past we rarely saw these results, ref or no ref, the reason we're seeing quite a few now is we're not that competitive against the big boys, the amount of games where we haven't turned up in the 1st half is ridiculous, the only reason we haven't lost all those games is that the smaller teams couldn't take advantage.

[Niall_Quinn]

I don't care if people Criticise City or Chelsea, what I don't like is people playing down the results against them as if they don't really matter that much. Since these teams are what we're competing against it does matter, the refs thing is bias IMO, there are some bad decisions but they don't win you or lose you games by the margins we lost them, that's just down to poor play of some sort.

Sigh, didn't say they didn't matter. And your statement about refs is silly. The margin in the gypo game was precisely the result of bad decisions - well corrupt decisions to be accurate. Not complaining about the ref vs the chavs or Liverpool or Everton - so trying to avoid the points I have already made by cooking up a blanket ref statement is just another case of you inventing the opposite side of the debate so you can defeat the argument. Debating is easy when you do it that way.

[Power n Glory]

I said this year City and Chelsea weren't going to run away with the league and it would take time for the managers to settle. We haven't taken advantage of the situation. We were on course to finish the league on 80 odd points and now it's mathematically impossible for us to finish above 79 points. An absolute flop considering we lead the table for so long.

[Niall_Quinn]

I said this year City and Chelsea weren't going to run away with the league and it would take time for the managers to settle. We haven't taken advantage of the situation. We were on course to finish the league on 80 odd points and now it's mathematically impossible for us to finish above 79 points. An absolute flop considering we lead the table for so long.

Does the fact our performances tailed off as we lost more of our better players to injury enter into it? Or is it just a case of flopping without any cause other than, say, being bottlers and the manager being at fault? What I mean is, were there practical factors that could have played a part in us failing to grab maybe 3-6 more points? I guess we all accept we'll lose a few, we surely weren't expected to go the whole season undefeated. So we've dropped some critical points over the course of the season. We know about the failure to do any useful business in January, that's a few points. We know we were too negative in some of the games. More points. Losing players to injury seems to be viewed as an excuse, but I think it's more than safe to say we lost a few points there. And for anyone who thinks the decisions made by officials evened out for us over the season, well they really weren't paying attention, so that's a few points there too. Nothing that can't be remedied with a bit more depth to the squad and a bolder attitude and a slice of luck with the officials. If we've collapsed, then the chav and gypos seasons must be really lamentable. Their excuses? Mega million quid managers who need time to adjust to the billion quid triple teams at their disposal. That's not a valid excuse really , is it? It's a bullshit excuse. But with a much smaller squad in terms of genuine talent, the reason for our failure is analysed to death and collapse is the conclusion. We could well be collapsing to a trophy and a CL spot. Not everything we want but an absolute flop? Not at all. More like a wild exaggeration.

[Power n Glory]

Injuries were a factor but we went into the season short, overplayed key players so the outcome shouldn't be a surprise considering we've had injury problems in the past that have effected our season. Our tough schedule wasn't a surprise and when we had injury problems we signed a player with a back injury so he couldn't help us in the tough run. Incompetence, carelessness an oversight, whatever you want to call it, but we've made rookie mistakes and we're and experienced squad. We should know better.

[Niall_Quinn]

Injuries were a factor but we went into the season short, overplayed key players so the outcome shouldn't be a surprise considering we've had injury problems in the past that have effected our season. Our tough schedule wasn't a surprise and when we had injury problems we signed a player with a back injury so he couldn't help us in the tough run. Incompetence, carelessness an oversight, whatever you want to call it, but we've made rookie mistakes and we're and experienced squad. We should know better.

Making mistakes is not the same as being an absolute flop though, is it? We could have done better in several ways, but there's no point going to the end of the spectrum and saying it was a lot worse than the reality. We still had a good start to the season. The defence improved a lot. We got treated to an incredible development spurt from Ramsey until injury hit. We smacked the spuds around and made them cry. We did okay at home against the clubs above us. There were positives too. And if we end up winning the cup and finishing 4th then in terms of the league there's no real advance, although we haven't dropped off as some of us feared, but certainly a trophy means a better season than the last one. Provided we win the fucking thing.

[Power n Glory]

We flopped in the league. I'm not going to be swayed in that. It's a bitter disappointment.

[Kano]

We may only be a win away from liverpool in this top 4 league but the manner of the three defeats illustrates a wider gap than just three points. That's the most worrying thing.

But generally, I think you have to either win that small group or come very close to it.

http://hitrowz.com/2013/12/26/do-you...omment-page-1/

This only gives a percentage of winning the top four league to winning the title. Not a break down of how many points those who don't win the top four league accrue when they win the title.