Emerging talents in team are the true highlights of City campaign
TWO seasons ago, in our first campaign after relegation, Stoke ended up with 55 points.
Last season, it was 56 and this season we currently sit on 57 points with just one game to play, away at play-off Bournemouth.
It’s stretching a point to claim a one-point progression each season as a sign of any kind of improvement.
And of course, ending up in pretty much the same place in each of the last three years doesn’t even begin to tell the story behind the differences in the campaigns.
This time around, at least, we have the same manager we started the season with, so there is more stability in that sense. But then the good start, which saw us in the play-off places in early December, fell away after the injury to Tyrese Campbell such that Stoke have won just 29 points from the last 29 games. That is relegation form any way you look at it.
It was the other way round last season when Michael O’neill arrived like the new Messiah to drag City by the scruff of their collective necks over the line to pull off a recovery from the almost certain drop.
Of course, two seasons ago we had a bland, disappointing frustrating season under first Gary Rowett and then Nathan Jones, despite the club spending oodles of cash on so-called experienced players at this level.
Ince, Clucas, Mclean, Vokes, the list of players on significant contracts but not contributing much this time around is long, and still includes those out on loan of course.
And we can never get away from injuries costing Stoke dear amidst the most strenuous of schedules this time around.
In this campaign the bright spots have mostly been provided by those young players breaking through from the Academy set up. Campbell is the star who sparkles the most. But then Harry Souttar is now a fixture at the back, despite his mistake costing the opening goal against Queens Park Rangers in this latest disappointing defeat.
Nathan Collins soon will be up there literally and figuratively alongside Souttar, while in flashes Christian Norton has shown promise up front.
And that is really the only thing that sets this campaign apart amidst a trend of five years of significant dross in terms of hope to carry forward into the forthcoming season.
Perhaps that is one key factor behind the surge in season card sales which the club experienced when they went on sale this week. The other, of course, is the desire to be in the ground, meeting mates, watching a game, singing again and, on a very basic level, just feeling something after all this time away.
Because just watching on the screen has gone on long enough and the team’s performances, alongside the experience we have all had, has been alienating enough.
And thank heavens we can think about getting back into the stadium next season, because the players really need our support.
Not solely in a positive way, though.
Because some of the recent performances have been so dreadful, so anodyne, that you can’t imagine a full stadium accepting them without some significant barracking.
Not that I am encouraging or condoning that, but the reality is that there would be merry hell to pay if the players served up displays like those in the last few weeks.
Especially with the pent up frustration that is bound to exist among the 20,000 supporters who will be at the bet365 for the first home game of the 2021/22 season.
Because, for some bizarre reason, even the deathly dirge which has been served up in 2021 doesn’t seem to have put fans off from securing their tickets to see the team play in the flesh for the first time in 18 months from August.
Goodness me we are gluttons for punishment! But I, like you, can’t wait.
Let’s just hope we get something to warm our collective cockles and get our bottoms off our seats, because these last few months have been more likely to force us to click the ‘off’ button.