I expect us to win more than half our games yeah. Which is what we have done so far this season. We have the 5th highest wage bill in the world and regardless of injuries we still walk out there every week with 5 world class players at least. So yeah, that should be enough to beat at least one of Brighton, Newcastle, Southampton, Aston Villa, West Brom or Fulham.
So what's the issue then? We're all gutted when we drop points to teams we should be putting away. This is the Manchester City thread.
You said "we had the chance to put our foot on their throat early" - we essentially did, as we opened up a gap when they dropped points to the exact same calibre of team that you say we should be beating week in week out, it's only this week, into mid January they have managed to catch us.
If you had a crystal ball and were told that we'd have lost Virgil, Gomez, Jota, Matip, Alisson and Trent for a bit, have Keita and Shaq in and out etc and have to deploy 2 of the title winning best midfielders in the world to centre half, would you not have taken our current position -3 points off the current leaders with 20 games to be played and 60 points to fight for? I think I would as we could have been an awful lot worse off given we've had to chuck in Rhys Williams, Kelleher, Nat Phillips, Neco at different times along the way as well. Given what's transpired I think we should be glad that we are still well in contention to be honest.