Most people will have been swept away in the grips of a whirlwind transfer window, overdue away wins, cup performances and a good league position that seems to propel us on a crest of a wave since the turn of 2026.
I admit to being one of those people looking at nothing else but the play-off and promotion, when im usually the last person to get carried away.
So not only did Wednesdays thumping at Millwall bring us down to earth with a bump, it kind or re-opened the blinkers to look a little bit harder at what progress has been made since the debacle at Watford 11 games ago.
Losing a football match is never the biggest issue in the grand scale of things, it’s not ideal of course but over recent weeks we have had new players shine, positive talk from Chris Davies including talk of squad rotation and risk taking and talk of a squad that now has all the tools necessary to reach the promise land.
And then came a submissive, battle empty performance, with all the talk and evidence from recent weeks it almost became something what wasn’t even a possibility? The notion of us rolling over under a tiny bit of pressure was something no-one had even considered.
So it became rather sobering to watch that unfold in front of our eyes and really raises the question? Are we ready for promotion?
I thought we were but now i’m just not so sure!
There are many thinks about Wednesdays game that can be discussed, Stan’s poor form, Beadle’s poor distribution, CD bot recognising that Solis was a walking red card, taking off all attaching presence and so on and so on but when push comes to shove the bottom line is that you can possess all the talent in the world, it will count for nothing if the players and management can’t stand up to a level of physicality that really should be a base standard requirement.
It is only one game, we can put this right in the next 6 days with 6 points and win 9 of the last 12 games and we may sneak in – hell we may even sneak up!
But then what? Who out of this squad is ready for the Premier League? Where 38 games would require levels of physicality and aggressive way beyond what we have seen come up against us this season.
We might have the financial clout to recruit but we can’t seriously be talking about replacing a while squad again for the third season running? For all the praise that is heaping on Craig Gardner and his team, we have to remember that we are already talking about players leaving that only signed in the summer just gone?
The recruitment team have done wonders off-loading “dead wood” so to speak. But when it’s dead wood that has only been in the building for five minutes then it just raises questions? What happens when we can’t offload these players? What happens with the next Kyogo on massive wages that sits in the stands week on week?
I know a lot of people will think that these are thinks not to worry about right now and they are probably right, I can’t shake all of these thoughts at the moment ?
Is it sensible now to just focus on winning the division next season with a squad that is settled and capable of being the best in the league on every level? Or is creeping in the back door the best way for the development of this squad and the club?
I will be honest… I really don’t know the answer to this right now.
The quandary of not being promoted is also fascinating. Will the owner see it as failure or re-aline and accept that it was a tall order to achieve with the tools at hand?
Keep Right On
Chris