Mad Scientist

My misses is Hungarian. She has a cousin called Norbert, and another cousin called Zoltan - which is an even better name. Hungarian language trivia alert! Zs counts as a single letter in Hungarian (there are 44 letters in total) and is very difficult to pronounce properly - kind of like the long soft sh sound in genre or pleasure. My wife also has a cousin called Zsuzsanna. I can only say it properly when very drunk.

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Thanks for the years of service JAR. Not your fault the team improved so far that you got 'improved' out of it. There's not many that can say they improved the overall quality of a squad both when they arrived and when they left . Another innocent victim of the Rafalution... I think you'll do well in Italy with a bit more time and space on the ball. Hope you find your shooting boots again, except when you're playing us.

The only substantial criticism I have so far is that I think forming a supporters union was a mistake - if the main goal is supposed to be to force out the current owners. I think a single issue pressure group would have been a better way to go. I think the ownership issue will get buried by a whole load of other stuff. There's already been signs of this in the discussion threads on here. Maybe the union could form a specific project or group dedicated solely to the ownership issue (SHS - the Safe Hands of Shankly ). Maybe they already have, I honestly have no idea. I'm saving the rest of my substantial criticism for when there is actually something substantial to criticise. Let's hope this web site will give us all something to really get our teeth into

Yes. I have a feeling he's going to make an impact when he gets his chance.

Gary Ablett talking about one of our reserves: "No, I think he has a lot left to learn... I was lucky enough to play my first five or seven games with Kenny Dalglish - he reminds me a little bit of Kenny with the way he has great balance, likes to back into people. He is a twister and a turner. It is probably the wrong comparison to make for him at such a young age but that is who he reminds me of." And the number 7 shirt is free. Spooky.

I was having a look at the league table for the season just gone, and I was struck by exactly how many points the top four teams had won collectively (for the record, 331 points). This seemed like quite a bit to me, so I had a look back through the previous seasons and found something interesting. Last season's combined points total for the top four teams is the highest since the Premiership got started. (It's even higher than in the first three Premiership/Premier League seasons where there were 42 games each!) I found this quite surprising - given the amount of money spent by teams just outside the top four I was expecting to see the gap between the top four and the other teams just below to narrow this season, whereas it seems to be wider than ever. There has been a rising trend of 'cumulative points' for the top four over the past thirteen seasons (i.e. since the League first dropped down to 38 games). In the first six of these seasons the top four collectively accumulated 300 points or more only once. In the subsequent seven seasons (up to last season), the top four have accumulated less than 300 points only once - and even that was six seasons ago. The fact that the Premier League had three of the four semi-finalists in the Champions League over the last two seasons and three of the four finalists over the same period (5 out of 8 finalists over four seasons) is a pretty good indicator of the strength of Premier League. If we combine this with the cumulative points totals from above, we can come to a couple of reasonable conclusions - the quality of the top four teams in the Premier League is the highest it's ever been (relative to the other teams in the league at least), and these top four teams also rank amongst the best teams in Europe. OK - on to the topic of 'reasonable expectations', the subject of this thread. First of all, it's certainly unreasonable - in my view - to expect any team NOT currently in the top four to challenge for the title. The fact that the top two teams have shared the past four titles, and finished in the top two in the last three seasons, gives them a reasonable expectation to challenge for the title. This is reinforced by a subjective view on the relative strength of the squads of these teams, this opinion itself is backed up by the amount of money that has been spent building up their squads. The other two teams in the top four - i.e. ourselves and Arsenal - fall into a grey area. We have been clearly good enough over the past three seasons (for us, more for Arsenal) to finish in the top four. Both teams have also reached Champions League finals. What we haven't quite managed to do over the past three seasons is to bridge the gap to the top two. Are the reasons to believe that we might be able to do that? Another look at the top four 'mini table' shows a few more interesting things. The amount of points accumulated by the winner of the League has been dropping slightly every season of the last four. Over the same time period, the gap in points between fourth and first has also been narrowing season upon season. The gap between first and fourth this last season (11 points) is the second smallest such gap since the Premier League began. This first-to-fourth gap was 34 points four seasons ago. If this trend continues we should expect to see the top four separated by only 7 or 8 points at the end of next season. To me this indicates a more competitive top four, and gives real reason for hope that either Arsenal or Liverpool (or both!) will make the step up next season. This hopeful feeling is tempered by the issue mentioned above - the amount of money that has been spent on the other two squads, and the quality of those squads. Another point is that we are getting increasingly difficult to beat. We lost only 4 games last season, our lowest number of league losses since Rafa's arrival (we lost 6 in our 82 point season and 10 last season). The downside was that we drew too many games, particularly at home. However, frustrating as draws may be, this can also been seen as a step forward - we converted 6 of our losses from the season before last into draws. The next - and not unreasonable - step is to convert some of these extra draws into wins next season. To do this we need to primarily keep the leads we have been creating. The return of Agger from his long term injury (plus the aquisition of Skrtle) could well help with this. In summary, I think the league is harder to win now than it's ever been, and that there is not much to choose between the top four. The current top two have a slight edge due to the quality and depth of their squads. One of these teams has just fired their manager and may well lose some senior players this summer, and is currently surrounded by uncertainty. So at this point I think we have a reasonable expectation that Liverpool will push Arsenal and Chelsea all the way for that second spot next season. Personally I don't currently expect anyone but Man United to win it. Having said that there were of course a number of seasons (feels like a long time ago now!) when we clearly had the best team in the land and we didn't manage to win the league, so anything is possible. Is it unfair to expect Rafa to win the PL next season? Yes, I think so. I don't think it's unfair to expect a challenge though. And with a bit of luck, who knows?