As you can see from many places, including here at Bluemoon, the Optimistic/Pessimistic readings shoot off the chart either way after every game, regardless of the result. Lose and it's all 'Typical City' and 'Blame him or him' , but win like we have been doing and it's top 4 here we come!
I do think this is down to years and years of underachievement and poor results, which breeds an environment of expectation of failure. This is a generalisation though - you also always see some sticking up for a player or the team after a bad result, and others reminding us to keep our heads after epic wins, but in general the masses do swing wildly from love to hate.
I personally don't think it has much to do with that lot over the county line much at all. We've kicked ourselves in the teeth enough times that we expect 'typical city;' to turn up. Beat Arsenal then lose the next three against Southampton, Coventry and Bolton. It's happened for years with very few seasons as exceptions - whether it be player quality, coaching quality or whatever, we've never had consistency or gradual progress.
That is totally down to not getting the right manager, right investment, the right players and for constantly expecting too much by changing the goalposts every half a season. Some remember when we were great, others don't but still look around our ground and see it full each week, as the likes of Everton, Fulham and Villa got into Europe and seemed to click year after year, and we wondered 'why not us'?
It's taken a long time for our recent history and it';s implications to sink in with a lot of City fans - partly we still expect to mess it up. Give us a billion to spend, we'll still finish 6th. It's just going to take time to realise that this is the real thing. This isn't a well intentioned but ultimately doomed Franny-like period for the club, and these days there will be no Fowler-esque penalty miss in a game we need to win. Probably.
Even this season, we're looking good for 4th and Champs League, yet we seem cautious sometimes and with good reason - sacking a manger in controversial circumstances just after giving him millions to play about with, and taking a chance on a foreign manager. This latest wave of wins has helped immensely to ease some of our fears - we do actually look capable of being a top 4 side now.
It's just going to take time. As success breeds success, so does underachievement breed fear and cautiousness. Sooner or later we'll have to give up saying 'typical city', unless we're taking about our fifth and sixth goals going in within three minutes of each other ;)
