Welcome to the middle third of season four.  We ended the first part of the season in eighth place, with a -4 goal difference and as many wins as losses, suffice to say our second season in the Premier League is not going as well as the first.  To add to our misery Ali De Souza injures himself and will me missing for the next six weeks, he’s been one of the few positives this season so it’s a serious blow.

Scully T gets a rare start due to Ali’s injury and it’s another cup match victory, we’ve been shocking in cup competitions up until this season.

After the highs of the cup come the lows of the league, Vern gets a red card, Savio breaks his wrist, and we are well beaten at Molineux.

Vern manages to last three minutes longer in our Champions League match in Rosenborg, fortunately we manage to get a result, in spite of Vern’s insistence to hamper us at every turn.

We manage to get a much needed league win three days later. It’s an even game against Chelsea, but thanks to Johnny Candles MOM performance and not so dangerous anymore Dave’s goal we take home the points.

In an effort to do something I sign Double D, Damien Duff for a cheap £2.6 million, his position is M/FL which I’m not sure is helpful, but I feel desperate!

Double D is straight into the team as we travel to Coventry, however, for the third game in a row we get a man sent off and despite having a few chances, big Magnus is in fine form, we lose 0-1. Always good to see your signings make an immediate impact.

When you can’t beat Coventry, it makes perfect sense that star studded Ajax would cause little to no problems when they visit the Moor!

The win means we qualify with a game to spare, our Champions League form is exemplary!

The confidence we showed dispatching Ajax evaporates three days later as we produce a limp performance against Liverpool.  I don’t really understand what is going on.

We travel to The Lane for our League Cup 4th round tie, for once it’s the opposition getting a player sent off, which doesn’t help us at all, Sir Les pops up with an 83th minute winner for the home side.

After three Premier League losses in a row we just about manage to hold onto our two goal half time lead to beat City at Maine Road.

For good measure and because it is totally unnecessary we beat Monaco in our final group match to continue the European illusion of us being half decent. 

The Quarter Final draw offers us a trip to the San Siro, I guess I would have preferred Brondby or Stuttgart but hey ho. 

We make it two League wins on the bounce with a solid display against Arsenal, Pistol Petko’s goals have been a rare positive this season.

Scully P has been with us from the beginning, but he’s getting on a bit and is now third, or even fourth choice centre back, so £3.7 million from Sunderland is too good to turn down.

As we travel to Filbert Street two days before Christmas, it seems like Champ Man favourite Bengt is going to deny us a third win on the bounce, fortunately Theo Zagorakis scores a 90th minute own goal as we fight back from 0-2 down to an unlikely 3-2 win.

We head to Villa Park on Boxing day in a rich vein of form, however the clash of the Clarets doesn’t go our way, we are outplayed from the start and Villa have another CM Super Keeper between the sticks in Mickael Landreau.

We have a lot of attacking options, but only Pistol has been firing consistently so I splash £9.5 million on David Trezeguet, again I’m not sure this is the answer, but still, he’s interested, so, why not?

I knew signing Savio was a bad idea, he’s always seems to flatter to deceive, and after a few solid performances last season he’s not done too much this season, he’s going to be doing even less now though.

I immediately try to cut my losses but get a slap on the wrist from the board.

The final match of the year 2000 is against Middlesbrough, there are two goals in the first 10 minutes, unfortunately we only score one of them, at least we didn’t lose.

Being dropped straight into the third round of the FA Cup didn’t work too well for us last season, however we are now cup match specialists, so Carlisle pose few problems and Dangerous Dave 2.0 gets his first goals.

A week later and the trip to Gigg Lane doesn’t go as planned.  Jason Euell and Gary Speed do the damage and we lose another close game.

Scully P and Sunderland are our next opponents. Because the season hasn’t been challenging enough we decide to go 1-3 down by half time before rescuing a point thanks to Dangerous 2.0.

In previous years an away match against Southend in the FA Cup would have been problematic, but not anymore. (Took the wrong type of picture).

As is our current modus operandi, we go from the highs of the cup to the lows of the League.  We are woeful against Wiki rivals Leeds and are lucky to lose only 0-1.

Our final game of this episode is at home to Huddersfield, we haven’t won in the League since the 23rd December so what better way to turn things around than go 0-2 in the first 10 minutes.  We get back into the game just before half-time but can’t find a way past Derek O’Connor in the Huddersfield goal.  Fortunately, Mully pops up in the 90th to rescue another point.  That’s no win in six League games!

We’ve now lost more than we’ve won and have a -8 goal difference.  We are 13th in the League but could be 16th if Chelsea, Newcastle and Everton win their games in hand.

So, things are not going well, however we are still in the Champions League and FA Cup.  Join us next week when we look to recover some form, survive in the Premier League and possibly, although seemingly, very unlikely, win a trophy!