And if we get something at Sixfields tomorrow, I’m re-using that headline again for the next couple of updates. Whether you like it or not.
Yes, rehashing the same old stuff without any change in ethos or creativity. And with a hint of disdain for anyone complaining. It’s almost as though NA has taken over the running of SW19 😉
On second thoughts, imagine how much more negative this place would be if he was…
Anyway, it’s been one of those weeks. Again. I think we all know we’re in trouble, a lot deeper than some want to admit, although there seems to be a bit of a serene approach to matters since Oxford – almost que sera sera, and all that.
No, we’re not going to Wombley, unless it’s in the ex-JPT final. Although what are the odds on us doing like Coventry did last season?
People have generally accepted that we’re crap. It’s just a case of thinking whether we’re crap but we’ll somehow scrape enough to get by, crap and will remain crap for the foreseeable future, crap but could be better with somebody less crap in charge.
Or just outright fucking shit.
We’ll see tomorrow, and Tuesday, and against Plymuff next Saturday as well. That’s assuming Hurricane Ophelia doesn’t go slightly east and symbolically dump itself over SW London in the meantime.
But to Northampton. I expect us to win tomorrow – seriously – if only because we’re playing a team that is remarkably even more whale wank than we are. At least we haven’t managed to lose games 6-0 (yet), and they might be listening to the Leonard Cohen records even more than ourselves.
That said, it’s a bit of a no-win situation. If we do get a victory, it won’t change much even in the medium term. Sure, it will make for a better weekend, and we might even go into Rotherham with a tiny bit more confidence.
But it is against a side feeding bottoms alongside ourselves. Somebody elsewhere said that it will be a dead cat bounce if we get three points, and given how we’ve performed since even before March, you can see why they said that.
A loss will tell its own story, and even a draw will just make people turn to each other and say “well, that doesn’t help anyone”.
We’ve had the predictable rallying call from Neil Cox on the OS, although I’m sure we’ve been here before with this kind of thing. Unsurprisingly, training has been “excellent”, we’re looking to “roll up our sleeves” and “we have to look at ourselves”. Standard stuff, really. This bit grabbed me, mind you, and by the sound of it plenty of others too:
We’ve worked hard all week and the players are determined to prove that last week was a one-off.
Urm…
Maybe half our current problems are because the management won’t actually admit what is blindingly obvious? Maybe they do genuinely believe the team is playing well, and it is really is just bad luck?
But to quote something a Championship press officer said to your editor a few years ago, when they’re saying that kind of stuff they’re definitely in trouble.
It’s done partly out of bravado, partly out of not giving an impression their ship is sinking, but also an attempt at self-belief – they need to believe it themselves, and they need the players to believe it too.
It’s also done because they think it’s what supporters want to hear. Sadly, you will never get a manager calling his players cunts who are more interested in fucking door knobs for a pre-game interview.
Though I’d love to read that one.
What is said before the game, or even afterwards (unless it’s something that reflects the reality of what’s been true for a while), isn’t particularly relevant at the moment. What goes on between 3pm and 5pm at Sixfields tomorrow is.
Because talk is cheap. And results are expensive…