How confident are you?

[AG7]

Perhaps Baconface will take them away on a golfing trip again to calm their nerves like he did last season that worked for them did'nt it. LOL

They are flying tonight straight after the game from London itself to Qatar for a week of warm weather training ... back just before their FA cup game against Fulham at home ...

[BobbyJ1956]

Confident City will win at O.T., reckon the rags will drop a few points to other teams, but not confident at all of winning at Everton and Spurs. Can see it being won and lost on goal difference again, which is why not putting 4 or 5 past the likes of Fulham is annoying.

[Blue Since 76]

(Obviously I'm expecting us to win at the swamp)

The missing bit before that said we're only 2 points behind.


Just seen that we're 3 points worse off than at this stage last season and they're two points better off. It was about now that we went into a bad run which let them get ahead last season, so if we can avoid that...

[patrickblue]

Never mind how this cashes out statistically, if we start to catch them, they will bottle it.

My view as well.

[feedthegreek]

the gap could be down to 2 if we beat qpr away, we play on the tues, as they play the day after v saints at the swamp.

[AG7]

the gap could be down to 2 if we beat qpr away, we play on the tues, as they play the day after v saints at the swamp.

That's fucked up logic ... at least compare each gameweek on so both clubs have played same no of games ... just like their 10 pt lead for a day before we had played last week meant shit, this 2 pt gap will mean shit nothing unless they drop 3 pts against saints.

[Bridge'srightfoot]

We need to win at Goodison, the Lane and the Swamp.
Do that and we'll win the league.

[ruralblue]

I have no confidence we can do it at all. Its too much of a gap to close in on. Our seasons over. They will walk it by a country mile. ;-)

[feedthegreek]

the gap could be down to 2 if we beat qpr away, we play on the tues, as they play the day after v saints at the swamp.

That's fucked up logic ... at least compare each gameweek on so both clubs have played same no of games ... just like their 10 pt lead for a day before we had played last week meant shit, this 2 pt gap will mean shit nothing unless they drop 3 pts against saints.

the point is it was 10 last sunday before we beat arsenal, and it could be two if we beat qpr, thats a great phsycological advantage to us which could cause another slip up.

[Ajardine]

I said it to a fellow blue in Mary D's, 2-1 down against QPR last game of the title winning season - "BELIEVE!!!"
We are the champions, we have come from behind once and we will do it again.

[Im_Spartacus]

They have dropped 5 points or more in the last 5 games of the season, in 9 of the last 12 seasons.


In some years it has been as many as 8 points. In fact last year was one of their better run ins.

If we are within 5 points come the beginning of April, i'll be pretty confident of overhauling that. The minute the teams around the bottom start scrapping for their lives, we will see them start to drop points. Any team that actually holds their shit together and wins the last 5 games, would have won more titles than they had lost even giving united a 5 point head start.

[john68]

THE RAGS RUN INS (LAST 10 GAMES)
2011-12...Dropped 8pts
2010-11...Dropped 10pts
2009-10...Dropped 5pts
2008-09...Dropped 5pts

So that proves absolutely fucl all then.

[DoomMerchant]

THE RAGS RUN INS (LAST 10 GAMES)
2011-12...Dropped 8pts
2010-11...Dropped 10pts
2009-10...Dropped 5pts
2008-09...Dropped 5pts

So that proves absolutely fucl all then.

Whadyer mean old fart? It proves they drop points on the regular.

[kinkylola]

well, according to some people ... united will not drop any points between now and the end of the season, so it's impossible for us to win the league again anyway. Let's just enjoy the ride.

[john68]

THE RAGS RUN INS (LAST 10 GAMES)
2011-12...Dropped 8pts
2010-11...Dropped 10pts
2009-10...Dropped 5pts
2008-09...Dropped 5pts

So that proves absolutely fucl all then.

Whadyer mean old fart? It proves they drop points on the regular.

On the regular what Mate...bus, train, menstrual cycle?
It means they may...or then again may not drop any number of points between 5 and 10.....but then again...we'll drop some points too.

[ant london]

It's a funny one this, I've been thinking more about it.

When you take a step back, and ignoring what United may do (ie. win every game between now and the end of the season) as that is unlikely to happen....but I think we should have every reason to be confident as we are sitting nicely in second. 5 points adrift and 1 goal off in GD terms (which if we catch the points up will reverse as others have said) but we all know that we have not played as well as we did at points last season.

My very rough view of the most regular players in the squad and their performances vs last season would probably be something like

Worse than last year
Hart
Aguero
Yaya
Kompany
Balotelli


Same
Barry
Dzeko
Silva
Nasri


Better than last year
Zabaleta
Milner
Clichy
Tevez


When you then factor in that of the new arrivals, Maicon has hardly figured due to injury, Sinclair ditto due to not being able to force his way into the team and we've been without Micah and Rodwell for very extended periods as well as having big other injury misses I think there are lots of reasons to believe that if we continue to improve form we can storm to the end of the season. Maybe we won't but am increasingly confident we might

[Im_Spartacus]

On the regular what Mate...bus, train, menstrual cycle?
It means they may...or then again may not drop any number of points between 5 and 10.....but then again...we'll drop some points too.

I dont understand your point John.

The reason I specifically used the last 5 games is that united have a pretty poor record when it comes to the crunch despite what the propaganda machine may tell you. By dragging the games out to 10 there, you are pretty much proving my point......they do very well from January to April, but you will find in those figures you've quoted that the form is still title winning 5-10 games out, its specifically the last 5 that is their weakness, where their defensive frailties and the downsides of living by the sword are exposed.

More often than not (8 years out of last 11), they drop a point or more per game in that short period, on quite a number of occasions dropping upto 1.5 points per game (5 years out of 11)

The whole point of my post being, that if you win all your games at the end of the season, and are within 5 points of united, more often than not (8 out of the last 11 years) you will win the league. Even 7 or 8 points behind would see you still win the league just under half of the time which highlights just how poor they actually are at that stage of the season.

The other factor is that recently, we generally play them in the last 5/6 games which improves our chances still further with a genuine six pointer - essentially a winner takes all game.

It also shows that if we were in front with 5 games to go, we could afford to drop points as they have not won their last 5 games on the spin since 2000/1

I dont see why you would seek to play the historical significance of this down, given the thread is about whther we have confidence or not, and right there is a nailed on historical fact about the weakness of the great rag machine which gives any side who have their shit together in that part of the season every chance even from a weak position more often than not.

Or was winning 5 games on the spin in the run in last year a fluke?

[Beefymcfc]

I mentioned this during the run-in last year. They dropped 8 points, we dropped nowt.

Happy Days!!!

[Blue Since 76]

I dont understand your point John.

The reason I specifically used the last 5 games is that united have a pretty poor record when it comes to the crunch despite what the propaganda machine may tell you. By dragging the games out to 10 there, you are pretty much proving my point......they do very well from January to April, but you will find in those figures you've quoted that the form is still title winning 5-10 games out, its specifically the last 5 that is their weakness, where their defensive frailties and the downsides of living by the sword are exposed.

More often than not (8 years out of last 11), they drop a point or more per game in that short period, on quite a number of occasions dropping upto 1.5 points per game (5 years out of 11)

The whole point of my post being, that if you win all your games at the end of the season, and are within 5 points of united, more often than not (8 out of the last 11 years) you will win the league. Even 7 or 8 points behind would see you still win the league just under half of the time which highlights just how poor they actually are at that stage of the season.

The other factor is that recently, we generally play them in the last 5/6 games which improves our chances still further with a genuine six pointer - essentially a winner takes all game.

It also shows that if we were in front with 5 games to go, we could afford to drop points as they have not won their last 5 games on the spin since 2000/1

I dont see why you would seek to play the historical significance of this down, given the thread is about whther we have confidence or not, and right there is a nailed on historical fact about the weakness of the great rag machine which gives any side who have their shit together in that part of the season every chance even from a weak position more often than not.

Or was winning 5 games on the spin in the run in last year a fluke?

To make anything significant out of dropped points, you'd need to exclude any games once they'd won the league. They've normally had a couple of games to spare and have then played kids etc, so wouldn't be the same if they had something to play for.

However, they have weaknesses and can't be beat. If we keep the pressure on them and win games they expect us not to (Arsenal) they will slip up

[Bridge'srightfoot]

In reality, a point at Spurs was a decent result for them. One of the toughest places to go and a place we will need to win at.
The main damage to them was pyschological. Coming so close to a massive win and being denied in the last minute is a big blow and hopefully the cracks will start to show.