Is it a season to be jolly?

It's now six games since we won a match which is setting some alarm bells ringing on Tyneside, but if we look at the bigger picture, are things really so bad?

Don't get me wrong, I'm not attempting to cover over any cracks. Quite frankly we all knew we were a couple of injuries away from disaster and that is how it is proving to be. The nightmare before Christmas so to speak.

However we are still sat in 7th place in the league, we're still three points clear of 8th and seven points clear of losing a spot in the top half of the table. Yes we are in the middle of a dip and we've not got the results from the last three games that perhaps we should have done, but overall we're still having a good season, right?

Naturally that could all change in January. We'll be losing Cheik Tiote and Demba Ba to the African Cup of Nations and some fear that we may lose one or two players for a lot longer, ie indefinitely, if this transfer window treads a familiar path once more.

However lets not lose sight of the start we've had to the season. A bit of confidence is all we need. Against West Brom we bossed them for the first 20 minutes until they got that opening goal. Once that goal went in the confidence took a hit and we struggled to get back into it, which we only managed thanks to a Demba Ba thunderbolt. In short, if we'd have scored the opening goal we'd have won that game.

It's all if's and but's of course, but so are the dozens of theories that are whirling about regarding how our season is going to go from now. IF we sell so and so, IF we don't buy in January and so on. How about IF we go on another run that we saw at the start of the season? We've done it once so why not again?

I know things could have been even batter had we got the results in the last few games, but the reality is that we were not going to go on winning game after game. At some point it would end. I'm just as *off as the rest of you but the fact is that we're still in an excellent position to progress.

Some festive food for thought...