ok just to put my mind at rest

[Chrono]

The result at OT is irrelevant now. We ended our own league challenge with the constant draws, we can finish second but that is about it. Shame really, still there is next year

[redstaralex]

start of season I hoped for a close 3rd, up till yesterday afternoon I still had hopes of winning it but realistically 2nd isn't too bad and if we ended up a close 3rd I still wouldn't be too gutted

[kris90210]

Yeah second would be a big improvment. We're not far behind - utd have scraped a lot of wins this season as well. We NEED a good transfer window in the summer and we'll seriously push them next year

[dww]

I think that the season has shown a lot of plus sides and for me the two biggest problems for us going forward have been that we have little/no fear factor and that we are giving away control of games and hence silly goals. In terms of final position I think we need to finish second to prove to ourselves that we have improved as much as anything - there are no really meaningful differences per se between being 2nd or 3rd in my view - we do need to be closer on points to the top though than we were last year to claim genuine progress.

I still harbour a faint hope that a win at OT might change things and have me feeling we can win the league again.

[mersey86]

I am at a loss to know how to categorise this season at the moment. We largely blew 40m in the summer, having gained very little from the new players. We have had Torres either injured or returning to fitness most of the season, Babel has gone backwards, Skrtel missed a few months through injury and Agger has missed more (for reasons mysterious). And yet we have lost 1 league game after 2/3 of the season and have been very much involved in the title race all the way (though we are on the borderline of being out right now).
So we can be positive and say that Rafa has cracked the "big 4" obstacle and has adapted to the English game and taken another step forward, in spite of obstacles.
Or we can be negative and state that his summer transfers were dreadful, he continues to make baffling decisions (seemingly to prove a point rather than for the good of the team) and he's blown his best chance at winning the league by being too conservative when it mattered.
There's certainly some truth in both perspectives.
To answer the original question - from this point I want to see some better performances before the end of the season - I would like to win at least 8 of the games .. and we'll see how things look then.