If Barnsley manage to score EIGHT past us in a season then would promotion to the Premiership be a disaster?
Many years ago when TEAB was printed on good old paper, Tim Whelan took a look back to the latter end of the 1987/88 season. Leeds were slumbering towards an upper, mid-table finish, very disappointing following on from the play-off/FA Cup semi season and Tim accused Billy's men of thinking the obvious - if I try to hard and we do go up then I will be replaced!
Back then, Noel Blake, Vince Hilaire, Bobby Davison were not First Division class and it was inevitable. Sometimes you can be a victim of your own success, I found out this week that the job I have been seconded too for the past 18 months is going back to the person who created my opportunity by going sick back in November 2009. It is also being dissolved as a jobshare and for contractual reasons I am barred from applying for it-instead I face a five grand salary drop-but at least I still have a job. This is despite me hitting all my targets and even exceeding them comparably plus sorting out the shocking mess of the filing system.
Rant over, however I do wonder is it going through the minds of some of the Leeds players, if I do bust-a-gut this season and get us promoted then is it likely I will not be seeing much Premiership action and be on my way to Swindon - where most of our "not quite first teamers" end up - Mike Grella being the latest recruit to the land of the magic roundabouts, Billy Piper and the Intel processing chip.
The fact of the matter is, we cannot defend - even a blind man can see it. We are lucky we have regular scorers in Becchio, Gradel and the wonderful Davide Somma. Our midfielders can find the back of the net too, Howson, Johnson, Snodgrass - its just defending which is a bit of a chore and unless we go out and score at least four, I just can't see us holding on to any lead.
Whilst a double-back promotion would be an amazing feat, am I not the only one fearing the worse? If a side like Barnsley can score eight goals against us then what hope do we have against the Premiership big guns? Granted, it would be a brilliant feeling and a kick in the head for the "Your not famous anymore" brigade (who pretend to be apathetic to our decline but turn out in force when Leeds are in town) but the novelty will soon wear off.
I work with a lovely lass who has a season-ticket at Derby. A few years back, they memorably scraped through the play-offs and it was sheer excitement anticipating the likes of Arsenal, Liverpool, Spurs etc coming to Pride Park - however it got massively depressing after the first couple of thrashings and by October she was actually dreading going to matches!
Do we wish that to happen to us? I must admit, I am divided - 1/3rd of me is screaming that we should take any promotion opportunity and be damned. Despite all the points we have chucked away we are still handily placed and surely after all our play-off misery of the past, our turn to win a final is long overdue?
At lets not forget, both ourselves and Notts Forest have gone from losing in the play-offs to relegation in one season. It is a funny old league when you see sides like Preston, Sheffield United, Doncaster and Scunthorpe all down there on the back of recent good seasons.
However, I will stick to my glass half empty mood, we need a couple of decent, Premiership defenders in our ranks on-loan and some serious investment in the summer if we are going to return to our rightful place in the Premiership and stay there.