In a review of the year recorded for BBC radio 5-Live, I was asked my wish for 2008. I replied: “For Norwich to still be in the Championship when it ends…”.
They probably wanted something a bit more profound: something that related to a bigger, sporting picture. But the only thing I care about at the moment is that City are not relegated ? and that is still a real prospect.
Glenn Roeder has done and is doing a truly magnificent job. He has raised the quality of the squad, lifted moral and performance levels and given us all reason to smile again and to hope at last.
But right now, if you offered me the possibility of Norwich City finishing above the relegation positions on goal difference, I'd bite your hand off.
That is because I've seen sufficient of other teams in our division to know that, whatever trading Roeder manages to conduct in January, we are in for a long, hard winter.
There are so many teams who are much better than us. We won't win all our home games and we will have to scrap and skirmish to pick up anything much on our travels.
Put your bias aside for a moment and have a real look at our squad. There are some good players, of course, but not enough of them.
I always remember several years ago when Billy Bonds was winding down his playing career at West Ham. He was 41 and earning rave reviews. But a player ? I won't name him ? who West Ham wanted to sign told me: “Nah, I'm not going to a club whose best player is an old man.”
So we should ask serious questions about City, where Dion Dublin remains a major influence at 38 and where Darren Huckerby is our most creative attacker at 31.
I worship both of them, but when Dion comes back to help at a corner, he needs a taxi to get him back up into attack.
Hucks can still torment defenders and, just as importantly, drag a second defender out wide to cope with him. But his impact on games is becoming less and less marked, more and more sporadic.
And don't expect reinforcements from the reserves or the academy. I thought that one of the most telling assessments of City's current condition was new reserve team boss Paul Stephenson's response to the 5-1 thumping by Ipswich reserves.
He told this website: “We want these boys to pressurise the first team boys, but on that performance they're not going to put pressure on them all season.”
So it is going to be a nerve-shredding second half of the campaign for those of us who care about the Yellows.
But there are straws at which to clutch. I thought, for instance, that there was a big, big moment in the match at Layer Road ? which, for reasons that we needn't go into here, I had to watch, silently, among Colchester fans who, I can confirm, are all… no, better not say it.
After Norwich had conceded that comedy goal, the chaps pushed forward in pursuit of an equaliser, left inevitable gaps at the back and watched in horror as Colchester's Jamie Guy exploited those holes and galloped clear.
He side-stepped David Marshall, cocked his foot to tap in the goal which would have buried us and? Jon Otsemobor appeared, gasping, on his shoulder and toe-poked the ball away.
Now, Otsembor is a fine player. He has pace and good touch and I particularly like the way he links with Lee Croft (when Crofty gets a game).
But there have been moments when he has only made token attempts to close people down, when he has jogged back into the vague area of the threat posed by an attacker, instead of hurling himself into a challenge or really closing down the opponent.
Yet there he was, on that bitterly cold night at Layer Road, defiantly refusing to concede a killer second goal, forcing weary limbs to carry him back with real determination and, eventually, nudging the ball away.
It was just one moment in one match, but it demonstrated so much about the spirit Roeder has sparked, the demands the manager makes from his players and the way they have responded.
It was just the sort of moment which, when you look back at the end of the nine-month season, can be seen as critical.
We can argue among ourselves about how it is that Norwich are in continued and genuine peril of falling into the third tier of English football. My version is very different to those expounded on the Wrath of the Barclay and Pink Un message boards.
But we have to stop fighting old wars and agree what is needed now.
And what is needed is for more players ? all our players ? to dig in and dig deep like Otsembor did at Layer Road and for us fans to show the same level of commitment.
On the ball City. I do mind the danger, but we do have a chance.
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