Might be stating the obvious here but our next two matches will potentially define our season.
Southampton away and Manchester United away.
Southampton lost yesterday at West Ham but that's never an easy place to go. They're a different animal at St Mary's from what I've seen. Just the three defeats there this season - the first was 2-3 to Aston Villa in one of those mad games where one team (Southampton) absolutely battered their opponents but the other team (Villa) took literally every chance they had. Saints got beat 2-3 by Tottenham at home, but I just looked at the Saints team that day and it was down to its bare bones; Gazzaniga was in goal, a big downgrade on Boruc and the left side of their defence, rather than the very impressive duo of Lovren and Shaw was the Championship-standard Hooiveld and Fox. So it's hard to judge them on that. Chelsea won 0-3 there, the only team to win there with real conviction. Either side of that Man City and Arsenal were very fortunate to escape with a point from St Mary's. Oh, and they are our bogey team; we were well beaten there last season, 3-1, and obviously they are the only team to come away from Anfield this season with a victory. I know if you look at the table it might appear that they have nowt to play for and so in theory it shouldn't be as tough but they will likely have their first choice XI back for it and their players and manager will be desperate to complete the double over one of the best teams in the country.
Obviously Man Utd have become a bit of a laughing stock this season especially with some of their results at Old Trafford but they also appear to injury-free at the moment and you can bet your bottom dollar that they raise their game for our visit. Plus they'll see it as a must-win - lose and they know that 4th is absolutely beyond them. So it will be tough, perhaps not to its usual extent but certainly far from the easy game that some may be hoping for.
If we get no points from those two games then the title will be beyond us and one or two teams may be back in the scrap for 4th. One point and the title is probably a foregone conclusion still. Two draws wouldn't be bad by any means, and would certainly give me confidence with regards to our top four ambitions but to maintain any hope of the title we need to win at least one. Win and a draw would be a fantastic return. Win both and I'm in dreamland.
Shame the Sunderland game in between is postponed, but yeah, I'm going to refrain from discussing whether our target should be 1st, 3rd or 4th until after these next two humongous fixtures.