As the dust settles on what has arguably been the most successful January window since “Le God” walked through the door in 2003, the question now is this…
What is acceptable this season with the players we have at our disposal?
Pressure was certainly mounting on Chris Davies and, although fans on the whole want CD to remain in charge, questions were being asked.
You only have to see Andrew’s comments on previous podcasts to see that this was the case.
Back-to-back away wins have relieved that pressure somewhat, but in reality, does a mid-table finish from this point represent a failure this season?
Under normal circumstances, the answer would be that a 10th-13th place finish in the Championship for a newly promoted team is perfectly acceptable and would also represent our highest league finish since 2015.
These are not normal circumstances, though. Newly promoted League One teams don’t come up with record-breaking 111 points. They don’t come up and sign players such as Neumann, Kyogo, Gray, Doyle and Ducksch. They don’t roll out plans for a £3.7 billion, 62,000-seater stadium with sports quarters, and they don’t get visits from the Chancellor to announce millions of pounds of government investment in local transport infrastructure.
And they certainly don’t back it up even further by investing another £20 million on players such as Vicente, Priske and Solis.
So with all this in mind, has the pressure eased for Davies, or has it very quietly been ramped up to new levels of expectancy from the board while no one is really looking?
Only time will tell, but the owners have been very clear on the objective for this season and, to the credit of Knighthead, they coughed up the money and delivered, holding up every part of the deal from their side.
Chris Davies has everyone’s support for now, but none of us really know whether the delivered promise of a capable squad comes with even harsher failure standards for the manager and his staff.
If Chris Davies is the man to lead us back to the promised land, he may only have 16 games (not including play-offs) to do that. With three very, very tough games coming up in the league, the “silent” pressure is back on straight away.
But one thing is agreed across the board: this has been a very, very successful transfer window for the club.
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Keep Right On
Chris