“We pessimists have everything to gain, whereas optimists
have a 50-50 chance of being disappointed”
I get the reasons to be a pessimist, and sometimes wish I could join them. We were all depressed on Saturday evening after Burton, but pessimists at least had the consolation of feeling justified.
Optimist or pessimist, what we all suffered on Saturday was a big dollop of disappointment.
No getting away from Saturday being a bad one, following the raft of let-downs for Norwich City fans between October and December.
Burton was perhaps even worse than those, because our hopes had been raised by the one-defeat-in-nine run.
The pessimists’ mood was perhaps encapsulated in one tweet:
“Our season is over. FACT”
Saturday was a blow to our rekindled playoff hopes. Question is: was it a fatal blow?
Mathematically, certainly not. There are some 40 points left to play for. Not only do we have the direct opportunity to gain ground on the teams now 2nd to 6th in our games against them, but they’ll automatically drop points in games against each other.
Reading’s next seven games, for instance, include Newcastle, Brighton, Huddersfield, Leeds and Sheffield Wednesday.
So, maths isn’t the issue. The issue is form. Stepping back from the disappointment of the weekend, that’s surely open to different interpretations. Burton was another unsatisfactory day; more performances like that will clearly prove the pessimists right. And unless we improve our away record, we’ll fall short.
On the other hand, our level of performance in other games since the turn of the year presents a different picture. Having decided before Christmas that Alex Neil couldn’t inspire a good run with the players at Carrow Road, I’ve had to put that judgement on hold.
Social media on Saturday night revealed something interesting. Fans of every club above us wrote about their pleasure and relief that Norwich had lost. Some of our own fans may have given up on our chances, but our rivals certainly still fear us.
One thing for sure: we have to get back on track straight away, meaning this coming Sunday and Ipswich. It’s no excuse for Saturday’s performance, but a shame that some of our more combative players – Pinto, Mulumbu, Naismith – weren’t available.
Encouragingly, it sounds as if we’ll have more options for the derby.
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Timing is everything (as my girlfriends used to say).
In the build-up to derby day, I ought to offer you a rabble-rousing piece on the superiority of all things Norwich City. I should be extolling our virtues in contrast to the arrogance and stupidity of other clubs and their fans, especially that lot from down the A140.
That’s all good fun – but this time I’ll leave it to others.
In truth, it’s hard to sustain some of those feelings. Undoubtedly Norwich City has great fans. I had the pleasure of some of their company at last week’s Canaries Trust AGM, where Rob Butler and Chris Goreham gave us a brilliant open forum discussion (also a humbling experience for me – despite the harsh things I’ve said about Rob and Canary Call, he was as friendly to me as to everyone else).
But here’s the thing: other clubs have great fans too. Anyone who reads my fellow MFW columnist Paul Armstrong will recognize a good guy who’s been through with Middlesbrough much of what we’ve been through with the Canaries (in fact, we can learn something about ourselves and our club from Paul’s pieces).
I talked to some Newcastle fans after last Tuesday’s game. Decent people who travel vast distances – as we do – to follow their team. I found plenty of humour and no arrogance.
A recent business contact turned out to be a life-long Leeds supporter. Never thought I’d say this, but I actually feel sympathy for him and (most of) his fellow fans. Whatever we think of arrangements at Norwich, Leeds fans have been let down by truly appalling ownership and management.
I can’t go quite as far as to feel sorry for Ipswich fans. And I’m as fired up as ever to beat their team.
Meanwhile, I’m taking solace from the words of the American science fiction writer Robert A Heinlein:
“A pessimist is correct more often than an optimist is,
but an optimist has more fun”
Evidence based pragmatists…not pessimists.
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Ps. I wasn’t disappointed. This was entirely expected. If the Newcastle game highlighted anything, it was old habits die hard & the players were praised. They were without their goal getter and the second half was embarrassing. Why would you get your hopes up with the same players that have offered nothing but failure since ‘that’ 10 game run under hoots. Hope with this setup defies logic.
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Personally, I dislike the labelling of fans, whether they’re optimistic, pessimistic, happy clappers, flip floppers or MOGS. It just smacks of wanting to pigeonhole everyone into little groups of exclusivity.
As for the season being over, no its not – promotion is still possible, it’s just that most fans are now of the view that City are highly unlikely to get there, especially having regards to our pretty awful away form. That’s a view I have every sympathy with.
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#2 Jeff: I very often agree with you, but I do not feel we were remotely embarrassing in the second half against the Mags.
Coming up short against a better side maybe, but not embarrassing. That’s why so many of stayed on that extra couple of minutes to give our lot the sustained applause they thoroughly deserved.
#3 Gary: pigeonholing is something I dislike too – every supporter with half a brain is surely multi-faceted in their stance at any given moment – but I find it’s all to easy to fall into the trap of doing it myself because it’s so common.
I thoroughly agree with your second paragraph – away form will deny us, unfortunately.
So we’re back to the phrase of the month: It’s the hope that kills you:-)
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Jeff #2: For clarification, are we to consider Alex Neil’s first half season here (49 points from 22 games, best record in the league, promotion) as ‘nothing but failure’?
You’re a rather hard man to please.
Everyone: point taken, entirely, about our away record. It simply has to change if we’re to keep the season alive. I’d only say: we won at Cardiff and did more than enough to win at Brentford and Wigan. Perhaps – just perhaps – the current situation can concentrate minds to deliver better.
Time will tell, of course.
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One part of my job is managing our A/B testing program. This, I believe, has helped me stay focused on data and be more analytical. As a result, I’d consider myself and evidence-based realist.
I take a while to reach an opinion but once I do I need a fair amount of evidence to the contrary to sway me.
So I come to conclusions such as McNally was no longer fit for his role not because of a single result, or a disliking for him. But due to long term patterns such as having no recruitment team, Adams being the best applicant in all of Europe, friendlies against “local select” teams etc..
That’s also why I don’t believe we’ll reach the play-offs. There’s too much data to suggest we’ll struggle against upcoming big teams and at away fixtures.
I don’t consider it pessimism. It’s just that we’d need to show form that’s contrary to the whole rest of the season. It could happen, of course. But if this was an A/B test I’d be leaning towards the original (current 30+ games that sees out outside the playoffs), not the “variation”.
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Dave B #6: I recognise the rationality in your analysis. It’s a pity that you never seem to take enjoyment in the successes of our club – of which there have been a few, even in recent years – but perhaps you do so quietly.
Even including Burton, we’ve got 17 points from the 9 league games of 2017. That rate for the remainder of the season would give us a total of 76 points, a good shout for a playoff place.
You’ll argue – with some justification – that our forthcoming opponents are tougher. And that some of the games we can’t afford to lose are away, where we’ve been ineffective.
I just can’t see that the playoffs – or even Alex Neil’s ability to reach & succeed in them – should be dismissed at this point.
If we do well against Ipswich, might you join me in considering our 2017 record “a fair amount of evidence”?
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#7 Stewart: If we do well against the Binners, I promise I will be the first (or second if #6 Dave B nips in beforehand) to formally agree with you and your evidence:-)
The trouble is, all we can do is wait and see. It’s going to be a long old rest of the week…
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‘Multi-faceted in their stance at any given moment’ I think what you mean to say is ‘fickle’ 😉
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Stewart – Four of the last 4.5 years of this club have seen miserable football and miserable results. Only half a season leading to promotion saw any considerable quality of performance for a sustained period and that was immediately wasted by a lack of recruitment team.
WRT Ipswich. Not really, I had them down for a win anyway. Beating them wouldn’t prove too much buck any trend. When we were beating Nottingham I said I wouldn’t be convinced until we started beating the teams above us.
Five of our last thirteen games are against teams above us. It’s a tough route to promotion (your 76pts) unless we can pick off wins against 2/3 of them.
Again, it’s absolutely possible, but trends will need to be bucked.
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Martin #8: It certainly is.
Dave B #10: Never thought you’d be easily persuaded! My next bid: if we get results against Ipswich and at Sheff Wed, will you see our 2017 record as enough evidence for a review of your convictions?
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@11 Stewart
My convictions are that we probably won’t make the playoffs due to away form and form against poor teams. If I looked only at ’17 then yes, we’d be in with a shot. But the season didn’t start in ’17 and there’s plenty of data to suggest this brief uptick in results (which includes losses to Rotherham and Burton I’ll add) is due to our omission of big teams in our fixtures. Not because our team is suddenly ‘better’.
If we beat Sheffield it certainly adds some interest to the league. But one data point doesn’t make a summer.
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Football is not about data and statistics it is about human endeavour, teamwork and passion to succeed. Successful City teams of the past have been better than the sum of their individual parts because of the way they were motivated and organised by the skills of the manager. The run to promotion last time came about because AN inherited a good team which needed the spur to succeed and the “new manager bounce” provided it. Since then we have steadily slipped down in performance and fitness levels to a point where despite spending large sums of money we have a team which is worse than its individual parts. Unless we can reverse that trend your statistical analysis is worthless. The team will always have our support but this season will not bring promotion.
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Cyprus Canary #13: Spot-on analysis.
My only reason for hope is the flickering signs of endeavour and passion that we’ve seen since the turn of the year. Maybe too little too late, but I won’t give up quite yet.
I have a ticket for Sheffield Wednesday – and a feeling we’ll be clearer after that one.
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@14 Cyprus Canary
“Football is not about data and statistics it is about human endeavour”
Human endeavor can be reflected in statistics. For example fitness levels can end in a pattern of late goals scored or conceded.
To a more extreme degree there are sports statisticians that look at elements of the game to help improve tactics. I saw an interesting documentary on how data was used by big clubs to hone whether to play down the wings and cross vs. play through the center. Measuring how many goals were scored per min with each tactic (crosses won hands down btw.)
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@ Date B I don’t doubt that the statistics are a valuable tool but if I may give an example to explain my point :
Sir Alex won the premiership before he retired with probably the worst Man United team for many years his successors were not so successful. The reasons I believe were that he was so good at man management that he was able to get them performing as a team “better than the sum of their individual skills”. His successors were on a loser from the start. This in my view is the element we have been missing for 12 months.
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