Expectation, expectation, expectation.
It’s something that I’ve spoken about a lot recently, and until the Birmingham City fan base calms down and stops calling for him to be sacked, I guess I’ll just have to keep saying it. Hopefully though this will be the last time I talk about it for a while, giving what the manager said recently
Pep Clotet spoke about his assessment of the season so far, but in particular what his aims are for the season:
“I am very happy with ten points by the end of August. We are ten points closer to safety, until we get safety that’s my goal. The team is still gelling and working a lot, we have so many things to improve, obviously, but we keep adding points so everyone should be very positive.”
And it’s that second sentence that grabbed my attention. He’s talking about safety. Not promotion, not mid-table, but safety. He has got his expectations low this season, because he knows there are limitations to what he can do. Given the situation the club found themselves in last season, he was very much behind the eight-ball when it came to making signings this summer, that’s why the club had to make so many signings that were either on loan or on frees.
That’s why I think it’s a little hard for him to face criticism so soon into his tenure. We were never going to get promoted this season, or even be challenging near the top, just look at the moves that the rest of the division have made, we were never going to compete with that. This year is all about safety and stability, then make progress starting next year when we’re further removed from the Financial Fair Play burden.
At the end of the day, just like I said yesterday about Jude Bellingham, let’s keep our expectations low and then be surprised when we accomplish them, rather than set them too high and end up disappointed. If things are the same this time next year, then you’ll be right to complain, but not right now, not this soon.
