Sheff Utd Forum

festa5 said:
I've certainly seen teams with "nothing to play for" turn us over often enough to know that there's no guarantee Fulham or Reading will roll over. I'm also expecting Preston to turn up and make it a hard game.

Pressure does strange things to players (and pressure being off can have a positive effect too). Football is also an unpredictable game with a fair amount of luck involved. Players can miss chances, get sent off, dodgy pens etc......

We now have two teams we can realistically catch instead of one and definitely in the case of Luton a draw is no good to them either now, which wasn't the case before they played Fulham.

If we beat Preston, a Sheffield United loss, a Luton loss or a Luton draw sees us in the play-offs. If Fulham hadn't beaten Luton then we'd have been relying only on a Sheffield United defeat (bar us thumping Preston, seems very unlikely).

We now have 3 (technically 4 I suppose) chances to get "lucky" instead of one. I know which I prefer.
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I for one am not saying they will roll over, they wont. There is a difference between rolling over and not putting in the extra yard, the 50/50 challenge, the mental will and strength as you would in say November. Holidays booked, would you risk injury when you have zero gain. Stoke City put effort in but I would say that wasn’t the same Stoke City their fans were hoping to see and have seen. You can be professional but the desire will likely be missing from Fulham and Reading, neither are at home which also potentially takes the edge off.

I am saying that if Fulham or Reading had something tangible to fight for, (like Luton and Sheffield do) they would play with more intensity, passion and desire to win than they are likely to do. Of course it is possible some in the team will, but it only takes a couple of players to think about keeping injury free as their contract is up or a move is beckoning to derail performance levels of the team as a whole. I will be amazed and shocked were we to finish top 6, but delighted. If it doesn’t I will be disappointed on what could and should have been, but at least it wont be like some lows of the past and I will look to next season with greater hope and more expectation than I do of results going our way on Saturday.
 
TeaCider said:
There was absolutely loads of negativity about, plenty of posters saying it had all been over for weeks and it was rose tinted glasses to say otherwise.
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Yes there probably was from the usual suspects. Best ignored is my motto. Better than spending time shouting back.
 
Abel Tasman said:
Yes there probably was from the usual suspects. Best ignored is my motto. Better than spending time shouting back.
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I agree it's best ignored, and I've since put a few of the posters on ignore myself, but you were calling out another poster for reacting to negativity that you didn't see.

It was there.
 
Abel Tasman said:
Yes there probably was from the usual suspects. Best ignored is my motto. Better than spending time shouting back.
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It’s hard to ignore when they are all over you like a rash when you try make a point saying it’s still on. I see nothing wrong with my response with the thread I have made. The thread had nothing to do with Coluka either as he had formerly adopted a more positive approach so it was more aimed at people being ridiculous negative prior to Cardiff game telling me it was over
 
Cuthbert said:
If Fulham score 3 on Saturday, I think that's a team record for the most Championship goals, beating Man City. They might fancy that now?
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Best team in the league brimming with confidence, playing relaxed with noting to lose. Terrifying!

Carvalho was all about the party.. Mitrovic was all about getting back down to business.
 
Diego said:
No idea what age is got to do with it, the posters you are alluding to are late 20’s/ early 30’s not 12. The realism of the situation is now statistically and I also think logically we have a better chance of getting in the play offs now. We are still third favourites but we have more opportunity to nick a place as there is 2 teams we can catch. It’s not about wanting to being proved right it’s just the truth on this one.
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I really do not think the need for sarcasm is warranted, I know your not 12

With age comes experience and learning, you will behave and react differently in life in 30 yrs time to how you do now, your judgement and decision making will be more nuanced on most things as a result of experiences I would expect.

I still wish Fulham needed a point for the Championship. Yes you say we can overhaul two teams, statistics mean nothing. Desire to win is a significant part of the outcome in a sporting contest. You can have all the ability, but if the desire level drops, so does performance and so does personal drive. In a team game everybody has to have that to succeed, if 2 or 3 of the teams players levels drop, so will the performance and the likelihood of success. I don’t doubt Fulham and Reading will approach their games in a professional manner, but I do question the players desire levels and feel that a bigger % will be there with Sheffield and Luton but less so in Fulham and Reading players with little in the game but their pride. I do know Ince will want his team to win, a lot will depend on the character of the players, I hope they prove me wrong and play with as much desire, whatever the outcome.

Like I say, nobody has a crystal ball, I hope you are right and I am wrong, we both call it as we see it. If we miss out, I certainly wont be saying I told you so, we will have missed out because of mistakes throughout the season on the pitch and ultimately finished where performances merit.
 
coluka said:
I still wish Fulham hadn’t won the title tonight. I really believe it was our best chance them having something to fight for. We are now relying on Fulham and Reading playing for pride when in truth, neither team has anything to play for. I think it was the WORST outcome possible 🤷‍♂️
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If Bournemouth lose to Forest tonight then Fulham would've won the title by default and still have nothing to play for against Sheff United. Last night's result was clearly the best we could've hoped for.
 
Humpty said:
If Bournemouth lose to Forest tonight then Fulham would've won the title by default and still have nothing to play for against Sheff United. Last night's result was clearly the best we could've hoped for.
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And if Bournemouth win tonight 😉
 
coluka said:
I really do not think the need for sarcasm is warranted, I know your not 12

With age comes experience and learning, you will behave and react differently in life in 30 yrs time to how you do now, your judgement and decision making will be more nuanced on most things as a result of experiences I would expect.

I still wish Fulham needed a point for the Championship. Yes you say we can overhaul two teams, statistics mean nothing. Desire to win is a significant part of the outcome in a sporting contest. You can have all the ability, but if the desire level drops, so does performance and so does personal drive. In a team game everybody has to have that to succeed, if 2 or 3 of the teams players levels drop, so will the performance and the likelihood of success. I don’t doubt Fulham and Reading will approach their games in a professional manner, but I do question the players desire levels and feel that a bigger % will be there with Sheffield and Luton but less so in Fulham and Reading players with little in the game but their pride. I do know Ince will want his team to win, a lot will depend on the character of the players, I hope they prove me wrong and play with as much desire, whatever the outcome.

Like I say, nobody has a crystal ball, I hope you are right and I am wrong, we both call it as we see it. If we miss out, I certainly wont be saying I told you so, we will have missed out because of mistakes throughout the season on the pitch and ultimately finished where performances merit.
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As Mowbray used to say it is what it is. Fulham smashed Luton and we have a chance to get in the play offs if things go our away. Think we all need to settle our nerves and see what happens comes Saturday. Utb
 
Was the negativity [totally] unwarranted though? It did look like we'd blown it. (We still might have done, even if we win). We went from being in a strong position to getting 2 points in 5 games. (I admit I pretty much thought it was all over when we missed those sitters against Swansea).

We haven't won three in a row since December/Jan... so I'd say the 'evidence' at that point probably was that we'd blown it!

If we pull off three wins and scrape in, it will be a (very pleasant and welcome) surprise!
 
Humpty said:
If Bournemouth lose to Forest tonight then Fulham would've won the title by default and still have nothing to play for against Sheff United. Last night's result was clearly the best we could've hoped for.
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And if Bournemouth win tonight?

Of course it is all ifs and buts and maybe’s when you are chasing. Sorry if my opinion is controversial, I get many take it as being negative, I am not and never will be a rara, but it is simply my opinion that teams with something to play for are more likely to be successful when playing against teams that don’t, that is common sense I’d have thought. We may yet get lucky, I hope we do.
 
coluka said:
And i

And if Bournemouth win tonight?

Of course it is all ifs and buts and maybe’s when you are chasing. Sorry if my opinion is controversial, I get many take it as being negative, I am not and never will be a rara, but it is simply my opinion that teams with something to play for are more likely to be successful when playing against teams that don’t, that is common sense I’d have thought. We may yet get lucky, I hope we do.
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I hate that term rara. Coined by wizened old duffers like me unhappy that younger fans have a glass half full view on life? 😉
 
I don't think any of this really matters - there will be 6 professionals teams (that we care about) playing on Saturday and they'll all want to win. Trying to get into the mindset of each individual team is a pointless exercise and you can make good/bad arguments for every scenario suggested.

We need to win, that's all we should be focussed on, because everything else is meaningless otherwise
 
coluka said:
And if Bournemouth win tonight?

Of course it is all ifs and buts and maybe’s when you are chasing. Sorry if my opinion is controversial, I get many take it as being negative, I am not and never will be a rara, but it is simply my opinion that teams with something to play for are more likely to be successful when playing against teams that don’t, that is common sense I’d have thought. We may yet get lucky, I hope we do.
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Col, I'm hoping that Fulham fancy beating the Championship scoring record (of Man City). It might be that they are not bothered, but HOPEFULLY it's a little something to play for. (They'd needed ten goal in their last two games, so before last night it didn't really look achievable). Fingers crossed!
 
For me the worst case scenario is that Luton or Sheffield Utd slip up, and we fail to take advantage.

If we win and they both win, I'll be slightly disappointed, but the real disappointment came vs Hull and Huddersfield, and I'm largely over that now. It wouldn't spoil my Summer or my enthusiasm for next season.
If they leave the door open and we don't take advantage, I'll be gutted.

So lets just win, and then what will be will be.
 
What’s everyone’s predictions on scores?

Preston 0-2 Boro

Sheff United 1-1 Fulham

Luton 0-0 Reading

That’s mine.
 
Frozen Horse said:
For me the worst case scenario is that Luton or Sheffield Utd slip up, and we fail to take advantage.

If we win and they both win, I'll be slightly disappointed, but the real disappointment came vs Hull and Huddersfield, and I'm largely over that now. It wouldn't spoil my Summer or my enthusiasm for next season.
If they leave the door open and we don't take advantage, I'll be gutted.

So lets just win, and then what will be will be.
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Yeah if we win our game I can accept not getting in there and will get over it as we aren’t the favourites to do so from this position. And I will be very confident next season that we will finish top 6 with a full season of Wilder.
 
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