The Premier League Thread

You cant judge him in a poor, injury stricken side against City.

I have watched a lot of villa, and he is brilliant. Champions league level player, easily

 

I mostly agree with this except to say that although the current bottom three teams appear to be the most likely at this time only Norwich are adrift. Watford looked certainties at one point and now their current form is as good as.....well ours.

 

There are teams outside the bottom 3 who look vulnerable as well. Burnley and Newcastle in particular.

 

I've still got hope for West Ham. Probably not but .....

 

A month ago us and Watford were in a right mess.

A month ago Newcastle were flying.

Two months ago Bmouth and Burnley were as safe as houses.

You can hardly take a snapshot at a particular point in the season, and conclude that the bottom three at that time are the three to go. Of course they look like the worst three sides in the league at that particular point. But it doesn't mean they will be over the course of 38 games.

Forming a view at this point on Norwich is fair enough. They're 8 points adrift of 17th, and 6 points adrift of 19th. But above them, there's just 4 points between 14th and 19th. Even 6th to 19th is only a 12 points difference - one team has a bad month and another team has a great month, and a 12 point gap between those two sides can be closed. Look at the swing between Bmouth and Watford over the past month - exactly 12 points, I believe.

Villa and Bmouth might be the current two sides in the bottom three. But so what? Villa weren't even in the bottom three 6 hours ago. And until last weekend, I don't think Bmouth had been in the bottom three all season. They are both pretty much averaging one point per game, which is a decent barometer for whether a side has a chance of staying up.

There is absolutely no question that Bmouth in particular are only heading in one direction right now. But there is still almost half a season to go. And it's not even like they need a miracle turnaround. Burnley are heading in that same direction too - even if Bmout barely turn it around, who is to say that Burnley don't become their version of Swansea? No-one can really saved that we saved ourselves back in 2018.

 

Double header week up next by the way, with midweek games following next weekend's games. And there are some right six-pointers.

Norwich v Bmouth
Brighton v Villa
Villa v Watford
Bmouth v Brighton

Burnley have a tricky two matches, at home to Leicester and away to Man Utd. So with points up for grabs in all four of those above matches, they could finish January bang in trouble. Also not brilliant for injury-riddled Newcastle, at home to Chelsea and away to Everton.

 

I feel like newcastle might be in trouble. They started well, but their squad is so bad

 

Newcastle's my "seem safe but could be in the zone before you know it" pick. Everyone crossed them off the endangered species list when they had that long run of good form, and you can certainly excuse their recent results because of their injury crisis, yet I can't help but expect their magnetic attraction to the drop line to show itself.

Edit: I had typed this out but forgot to hit post, and got beaten to it.

 

You're absolutely right of course it's far too early to be sure about final positions but don't you enjoy it when we can discuss the bottom three without including us? At least at the moment anyway.
It's quite remarkable that the points difference between 6th and 17th is only 10 points.

 

If I could hand pick three sides, it would be Burnley, Palace and West Ham. Two of them are horrible to watch, and one of them is just a horrible club right through.

Realistically will I get all three? No chance. Hopefully I'll get one though.

 

It would take a drastic collapse to not stay up now really. As long as Ings stays fit then I really can't fail to see us winning 4 of our remaining 16 matches.

 

One game at a time.
The difference now, we get to enjoy them.
Can see us beating Wolves next week to continue this amazing run.

 

You see, that's the difference between an optimist (you) and a pessimist or more accurately a worrier (me).

 

Agreed! We’ve all got our “favourites “ tho. My son gets lots of work ****e from Bompey & Brighton, so they’d on his list with Spam. I wonder who’d actually be “our” single fav (out of bottom half). Spam for me by a mile.

 

Newcastle - to help remove their owner
Whu - rent free with less money would be fairer
Burnley - always manage to ruin our away day

That would be my pick.

 

I have posted a poll.

 

I would have but haven’t got a clue how to

 

I wouldn't necessarily describe myself as an optimist!

 

I agree about Burnley's poor performances (I think 7 home loses out of 11?) and I think they will probably finish 4th from bottom. Newcastle, West Ham and Brighton are teams I can't imagine getting anywhere near Southampton come May. I am going to go controversial here and suggest that Watford will end up finishing above these four. Bournemouth have a massive injury crisis and they have lost a staggering proportion of their recent matches. They finished poor last season too and I just feel this is the season that will finish them off. Norwich are down already and I sense that we have not heard the end of the Villa saga. I think Smith might be the next managerial casualty and I am waiting for the whole thing to implode for them.

 

Some lovely goals in there, but surely Son's solo effort.
Don't see many of them anymore.