The week before the season started, a friend asked me how I thought City would fare.
As The World's Most Non-Committal Columnist�, I of course said I had no idea, though I did try to elaborate on that by considering what Donald Rumsfeld would term the 'known unknowns': how long it might take the team to gel, the possibility of injuries, and in particular the occurrence or not of a turning point.
By 'turning point', I mean something happening in a match which has a positive effect lasting way beyond that match � perhaps even for the rest of the season. A moment when something clicks and there's a collective feeling that anything is possible.
You can't predict when it might happen, and you can't make it happen to order, but it's all the more special for that. Magical, even.
Sometimes the turning point can be spectacular, the second-half comeback against Arsenal in the opening game of the 92/93 season being the most obvious and most important example. (I don't believe we'd have had such a brilliant season if that comeback hadn't occurred.)
Marc Libbra's fantastic 11-second goal against Manchester City in 2001 was the catalyst for a campaign which ended with the play-off final.
And I distinctly remember a turning point in a home game against Southampton, which a glance at Canary Citizens pinpoints as the second match of 86/87. From 0-2 down at half-time, we recovered to win 4-3, lost only one of the next nine games and eventually finished fifth in the league.
But a turning point doesn't necessarily occur in a victory. The comeback in the 2-2 draw against Ipswich last season arguably sparked our recovery from the bottom of the league table.
It can even occur in defeat. Years ago, I was part of a Sunday team that was on a rotten losing streak. Five goals down at half-time in one game, we trudged over to the side of the pitch to suck some more � this time on our oranges � and a few of us overheard the opposition crowing that they were going to get double figures.
That did it. We came out in the second half and completely outplayed them. None of the other teams in the division would have guessed from seeing the final score (7-4) that we had experienced a turning point � but we went on to win our next four or five games.
Anyway� the conjecture towards which I am crawling is this: could Arturo Lupoli's two goals last Saturday possibly have been a turning point, for the team as well as for himself?
I guess we'll see on Saturday afternoon.
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Football certainly throws up its fair share of moral dilemmas for a supporter.
Most often, it's a choice between attending a match and some other duty or commitment. (I once missed the wedding of my best friend at college to go to a game. Fifteen years on, I look back and think� that was the day Ekoku scored four at Everton. I definitely did the right thing.)
For City fans, there's the particular difficulty when watching the film Escape to Victory of supporting the team of Allied prisoners when it contains so many Ipswich players.
And now another dilemma is upon us. Our Suffolk neighbours have just signed a thoroughly likeable bloke: Moritz Volz of Fulham.
A visit to his entertaining website will give you a good idea of what he's like, though his tongue-in-cheek tribute to David Hasselhoff regrettably seems to have disappeared recently.
('Being German, I love David Hasselhoff. It's actually the law back in the Motherland. For me the Hoff is almost like some kind of higher spirit. Hoff-ness is everywhere. The Hoff is a big inspiration – in times of trouble I often ask myself, 'how would The Hoff deal with this situation?')
His German phrasebook is still there, though, featuring such gems as 'Wo kann ich mir meine VokuHila Frisur blondieren lassen?' (Where can I get my mullet highlighted?) and 'Ist der Linienrichter russe?' (Is the linesman Russian?)
He reads. He writes for the Times. He studies for A-levels (flying back for the day from watching the World Cup finals in 2006 to take his exams). He cooks. He drives an old VW Golf and rides a folding bike around town. He does a lot of good work for chariddy.
And now he's joined that lot down the road for the rest of the season.
It's most disconcerting. I don't think I'll be able to bring myself to boo him even when he's got that blue shirt on.
Hang on a minute, though. They also signed Ben Thatcher over the summer.
Problem solved, I think.
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And finally� a recommendation. There's a new comedy series on BBC2 on Thursday evenings. Titled 'The Cup', it follows the fortunes of a fictitious under-11 boys' football team and the over-competitive parents who run it.
This, however, is not what I'm recommending. If the first two episodes are anything to go by, it's unsubtle, pedestrian and predictable. Even the title is unoriginal; the writers seem to be unaware of the charming 1999 film of the same name about young football-mad Tibetan monks.
I'd like to point you in the direction of 'You'll Win Nothing With Kids', a chronicle by the sportswriter Jim White about his time as manager of his son's under-14 side. Despite being The Slowest Reader in Christendom�, I whizzed through it in a couple of days on holiday; it's funny, thoughtful and very well observed.
I'm definitely going to read it again � probably when my son starts playing for a team, to remind myself how parents should not behave on the touchline.
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