Sunday's great win against Newcastle United lead some Saints supporters to talk as if staying up was now a formality, Aston Villa's win against Reading showed that is still far from the case.

Saints jumping out of the bottom three on Sunday lead to a rash of posts on internet message boards, many of them giving the impression that the author of the post felt that it was now a mere formality that Saints will stay up and that the starting XI on Sunday was good enough to go anywhere and win.

But Tuesday's results or should I say one of them gave us a quick short sharp reminder that we are up against some experienced teams in the relegation battle and that there is a long way to go yet.

Sunderland's draw against QPR was perhaps the result that we wanted, but Villa's late win against Readng less so and leapfrogged the Midland's club above us, reminding us that if we are to be clear of the bottom three come the end of the season, there are some big clubs and some experienced relegation fighters that we have to overcome.

Of course a win tonight with other results going our way could see us up as high as 14th and above Newcastle, but defeat would keep us in the bottom three and leave us 7 points behind Norwich themselves who many aints supporters would see as one of the club's we need to overtake if we are to survive.

That shows how tight it is at the bottom and in fact even if we did win and shoot up the table, defeat at Liverpool could see us back in the bottom three.

So the lesson to be learned from last night is that we should'nt be at home to Captain Complacency, the league position doesnt lie, we are in the bottom three for one good reason and that is we have less points than 17 other clubs, winning a couple of games in a row is fine, but there is still a long way to go and we have some difficult games yet to play, the last three games have suited our attacking line up, but the big question now is can Nigel Adkins make the right selections to suit occasions when we are not going to be the dominate side, he didnt do that earlier in the season and we paid the price.

On a plus point we now have a decent spirit about us, but spirit alone is not going to be enough, its a squad game and its about using that squad in the right positions at the right times, do that and staying up is a real possibility, get it wrong and a few defeats could drag us right down and even see a change of manager.

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slynch added 09:42 - Nov 28 Norwich are a little Championship/League1 club and they are gonna get trashed just like the Toon. :-D
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SaintIreland added 10:19 - Nov 28 Aweful title- Tuesdays results were pretty much exactly what we needed- a bore draw from Sunderland and QPR meaning neither of them going anywhere fast/at all. Combined with a very evenly contested late winner for Villa meaning they go 2 points ahead, with us having a game in hand, rather then reading go 1 point ahead both having played 13. As for the insightfulness of if you win you go up the league and if you lose you go down?- I thought that was a gimmy. By no means are we home and dry but we are a million miles from where we were a few weeks ago. Players havent become world beaters over night but it is very clear to see that certain introductions to the team have allowed others to play to their strengths rather then their weeknesses. Tonight is a big ask, I think Lambert should start on the bench with JR as the lone striker, he did take a knock on sunday, the is of a tender age and I think we owe it to him to give him a proper run out at anfield. Other than him I would expect for NA to ring some changes and use his subs to rest players if we are in a position come 65/70 mins. We need to rotate to keep it resh and the adage of never change a winning team although it has some millage the game has come on since those days, its now a case of what players can influence our style and distrupt theirs.

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SaintNick added 10:22 - Nov 28 I still stand by the title, Villa have forced the pace a little, if it had been a draw, they would be on the same number as us and Reading would still be a point behind us The game in hand means nothing unless we win tonight, as I said its a little reminder to us that this season has a long way to go
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A1079 added 10:34 - Nov 28 Some people do think a couple of wins means that suddenly everything is alright by the same token a few people after a couple of defeats suddenly think it is armageddon - they are often the same people strangely enough. Most reasoned people would know and appreciate that it will probably be a struggle to the end and we will have some weeks where it will look good and others when we could look seriously in trouble. We are though improving and we can go into games with a bit more self belief. Take each game as it comes........oh heck, I can't believe I said that

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Scummer added 10:59 - Nov 28 Sunderland dropped two points. QPR dropped two points. Reading dropped three points. We need to continue the form from the last few games and capitalise. Nick is absolutely right to warn against complacency, however I trust in NA to make sure the team is prepped right. He has them playing with belief again, and has obviously worked hard with the defence. Cork and Schneiderlin will be key tonight, I feel. We need to maintain the good record we have against the teams around us.

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SaintIreland added 11:07 - Nov 28 Yeah I agree it wasnt the perfect result as a 0-0 would have been ideal but I think your title may have been more appropriate if both Sunderland and Reading had taken big confidence boosting results. It little bit like ours- and that what they are confidence boosters so let give them a little bit of room to do just that. Nick a few weeks back we were saying can we do enough to hold on till January and buy some defenders. Do you still feel the same? If so what defenders would you buy? Dawson would be a quality signing in my opinion but Redkanpp at QPR makes sense for him now.

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stmichael added 11:10 - Nov 28 Not unhappy with the results. I would like to see Reading & QPR cut adrift and I will happily take our chances to finish above 1 other from Villa , Sunderland , Wigan etc Reading have a nasty habit of playing well and losing. if we beat Norwich tonight we will be 11 clear of QPR. All shaping up nicely IMO
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davepid added 19:17 - Nov 28 Nic is absolutely correct to say we are not out of it yet,and we probably wont be -if at all - until well into the new year. We need to accumulate points , get to 40 ,forget the other results and our intermediate league positions. Along the way I will enjoy our football going forward, hold my breathe every time we defend , enjoy the media spotlight on Harry (assuming QPR dont improve much) and speculate if Martin O'Neil is next for the chop.

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