Now that the dust has settled after that defeat to Burnley, it is time to reflect how well our boys have done to put our fate in our own hands. The Burnley performance was disappointing of course, but the more fair-minded of us can see that the Liverpool and Spurs games took a lot out of the players, and the many defensive injuries also affected that performance. Our boys have done tremendous recently to get to 38 points, which most seasons would already see our comfortably safe. When you consider the fixtures we have faced, it is pretty remarkable. The Hull home game is now the pivotal game. If Swansea lose against Everton this Saturday, we are safe anyway. Even if they win or draw, it is still in our own hands, because we would need to win or draw against Hull. Of course this is all based on the fact that we will lose against Man City this weekend!!! Everyone has written this game off already!!! Ignoring our recent results against the top teams. Plus everyone is assuming Swansea will win against Sunderland away, but that could actually be a banana skin for them, because the pressure is now off the Black Cats, and they might start playing better.

Remember how much more difficult it is for Swansea. If they suddenly go a goal down in any of those games, the pressure on them will be immense. They will instantly be in the last chance saloon. That is not the case with us, unless it goes to the last game of the season, which i'm confident it wont. I would still rather be a Palace fan at the moment, than a Swansea fan. Also we cannot ignore Hull, who despite their great run under Silva, are in a similar predicament to Swansea. Their last game is against Spurs, so again (assuming!!) they lost or drew that and won their game against Sunderland, then a draw for us against them would mean they cannot overtake us.

Very good analysis. We are still in the box seat in relation to the two directly below us and a couple above are still sweating as well. The Spammers could still be vulnerable as their next 2 games are the Spuds and Pool with a trip to Burnley to finish, who might also still be sweating.

Edited by Booted Eagle (01 May 2017 9.51pm)

“ [T]here are known knowns; there are things we know that we know.There are known unknowns; that is to say there are things that, we now know we don't know.But there are also unknown unknowns – there are things we do not know we don't know. ”
—United States Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld

You make some fair points. It's easy to get overwrought because we are up and down like a whore's drawers at the moment. One minute, we're 12th, the next minute we are 16th. So it's no surprise people are getting carried away.

The fact is, we need two teams (Hull and Swansea) to basically win all of their remaining games, and for us to lose everything, in order to be relegated. All of those games in April really caught up to us, and it really puts the wins against Chelsea, Arsenal and Liverpool into perspective: we have a great team and a decent manager. We should be okay.

Personally, I will be satisfied if we simply stay up now after the season we've had. We can build on it next year.

Stealing their women and eating their food since 1987.