I have to say straight off, I didn’t see it.
It would seem Stoke were the better side and my Stokey mate (who’s very reasonable in his judgement) said we were lucky.
If that’s so, I think this was a decent result, although obviously not the one we wanted.
We all know drawing games is no good if you want to get promoted.
But I looked at the run of games up until Xmas a few weeks back and feared for us.
The reality is that while we haven’t got as many points as we might have wanted, so we we’ve done pretty reasonably too.
Let’s not forget we’re unbeaten in five games.
And after Leeds, I think we have a much easier run of games, which will hopefully lead to a decent accumulation of points.
Will our run-in be good enough to be promoted?
I still firmly believe so, because of our squad depth where it matters.
If you consider that our defence is considered poor, I believe we’re doing better than I expected and Smith will improve us, come the winter window.
I don’t know about you, but I thought Nyland should have saved the penalty, seeing as he dived to the correct side.
He needs replacing, simple. And he surely will be.
I continue to find it disappointing that it seems we were quick to blame Hutton for the other goal, when it wasn’t really his fault.
I agree, he gets caught out far too much postionally, but he also seems to get stick when it’s not totally fair, in my opinion.
Two full backs, a centre back and most importantly, a goalie should sort most of our problems out and we’ll be good to go for the second half of the season.
I’m quite comfortable with where we stand, for what it’s worth, as much as it seems many of us are panicking.
It’s a long, tough season and I suspect that given our squad, particularly up front and in midfield, coupled to some decent aquisitions, we will see us at least challenging.
Is that overly optimistic?
Maybe.
But at least I’m enjoying watching the football.
When I get a chance, that is.
