Part two was an exploration of Gerard Houllier’s first 14 Premier League games in comparison with Dr Jo’s first 14 games in charge of Aston Villa back in 1990. Mainly because their record over the 14 games was so similar, despite Houllier’s program being considerably more challenging, but also because our position after 19 games is exactly the same today as it was 20 years ago.

Ian made the point in the comments that the table around us is not the same though, and he isn’t wrong. Personally, I think it’s easy to fall into the trap of getting hung up on position right now; it’s certainly a problem sitting at the foot of the table at this time of year if you’re falling further behind the rest, but less so if it’s just a few points that are putting you in the red zone.

I understand Ian’s fear of being just a point away from the relegation zone right now, but no one has ever been relegated in December, all that matters is where we are in May.

However, if the bottom of the table is more competitive, and it is; the teams in the red zone have more points, it follows that those points must come from somewhere and it can only come from above them. We’re perhaps fortunate that it’s from the top, more than the middle.

20 years ago, Liverpool sat atop the table as the calendar turned to a new year, separated from Sheffield Utd at the bottom by no less than 35 points. Today, it’s Man Utd at the top, but they’re just 21 points better off than West Ham at the opposite end.

Similarly, while we were three points clear of 18th placed Derby in 1990, we’re just a single point ahead of Fulham this year, but nine points behind Bolton in 6th compared with the 12 point gap to 6th placed Man Utd in 1990.

Is the glass half empty, or half full? That depends on where we go from here.

The tables

The two tables make for an interesting comparison, so I’ll dump them here in full and add a few little factoids at the bottom. This is how the table looked on the last day of 1990 and 2010:-

Factoids

• This is not a like-for-like comparison; the 1990 table is the result of 197 matches, the 2010 table 190 matches.
• 55 (27.9%) matches resulted in a draw in 1990, 60 (31.6%) matches have been tied in 2010. This is one contributing factor to the compactness of the table.
• In 1990, the top six had registered 68 wins and 235 points between them, in 2010 the top six have won just 58 games and amassed 208 points.
• In 1990, the bottom three had won only nine games between them and totalled 42 points, in 2010 it’s 11 wins and 54 points.
• 540 goals had been scored in 1990, an average of 2.74 per game. 509 have been scored so far in 2010, that’s 2.68 per game on average.
• The 1990 top six had lost 12 games, the 2010 version have lost 23 between them, while the bottom three had lost 34 games in 1990 compared with a total of 26 among the bottom three today.
• The 1990 top six scored an average of 1.75 goals per game and conceded 0.92 while the 2010 top six scored 1.77 goals per game on average, but conceded 1.03 per game.
• The 1990 bottom three scored an average of 0.90 goals per game and conceded 1.76 while the 2010 bottom three scored 1.02 times per game on average and conceded 1.52 goals per game.

Ian’s absolutely correct, this 2010/11 league is more competitive than the 1990/91 equivalent (take that “modern football is rubbish” proponents!), we must recognise that we are in an extremely perilous position right now. Extremely perilous.

We’re not too big and we’re not too good to go down, but we must not act like a small club and get all panicky. Let’s be humble though; we need to find 20 points over the next 19 games, but will probably actually need two or three more given the tightness of the league. We’ll also need to do in 16 or 17 games because heading into the last two games (Arsenal and Liverpool) needing points for survival is too scary to contemplate.

But it can be done. Collectively; club, management, players, fans, we’re all in this together.

Part four will show that we’re in a slightly worse position than Newcastle was at this stage two years ago and the slippery slope we’re standing at the top of. The one way I’m absolutely certain will lead to us sliding down the trail they blazed is by acting just like them.