The fact is that our religation or survival only depends on this season so that is all I care about tbh. we are not losing nearly every game.

of the 15 games we have played so far we have :-
lost 53.3%
Won 26.6%
Drawn 20.0%
Points 15

If our win/loss/draw % stays the same over the season we would finish with

Loose 20 games
Win 10 games
Draw 8 games

we would finish with 38 points which would have us survive in the last 5 seasons.

If we strengthen our defence in Jan and stop the defensive mistakes we have been making our win % should double and loss % should half.

We are not in serious trouble yet.

Nicely put.

We are on target to stay up. That is all we need. We are still a relatively new team in this league. We will not be a consistent top ten team for years yet. If we become a constantly staying in the league club whilst avoiding relegation (or the bottom three, like last year, and this so far) for another year or two, we might be able to move to the next level, which would be mid-table (9th-15th). Some fans want to run before we can walk.

Systematically dragged down by the lawmakers

The pragmatic part of my brain says its a game we couldn' afford to lose and we didn't - tick - that we got done over by a terrible dive / ref - tick - we got an away point, never to be sneezed at - tick.

The emotional side of my brain is screaming - what the hell is going on down back?

Well according to Pardew it was the refs fault today. I think the issue is the excuses rarely have to be made as to why we've won. If you actually think we played well against Southampton then fair enough. We still have the worst record in English football in 2016 and it's December. Not sure what people are missing. Not sure why that stat is irrelevant it's COMPLETELY relevant.

Crystal Palace have the worst record in English football in 2016. Its just utter delusion now

We're the Arthur over ere!

The way to judge Pardew is to ask yourself the question: when we went ahead with Wilf's goal did you have any faith in him that we were going to go on and win the game?

I don't think he is the man to turn around our defense, and he should go.

But I am also not going to slag him off like many on here.

In 111 years we have done better than Pardew's last two years precisely once in terms of league finish and proper cup final appearance.

Our best finishes ever: 3rd, 10th, and 15th (plus a cup final: Steve Coppell); 10th, 15th (plus a cup final: Alan Pardew), and currently 15th; 11th (Pulis); 13th (Venables).

That's pretty much it for 111 years of football. 17 seasons we've played in the top flight, and he has delivered our joint highest second finish, reached only our second ever proper cup final, and delivered our joint 6th highest finish too. Despite our awful form, we sit 15th in the table. If we stay up this year, it will be the single highest achievement of this club's entire history.

Despite the fact that he is the second most successful manager in our entire history, some people are calling him a cnut, brain-dead, scumbag, useless, clueless, etc. What a bunch of narcissistic self entitled poseurs: it's as if the north east has moved to south London.

It is fair enough to criticise, and I have been vocal about our leaky defence since the last few games of the Pulis era. Our form has been dreadful for ages too. But seasons don't follow the calendar year, and we are not in the drop zone. I don't think he can turn our defense around, but I'm certainly grateful he gave us two of the best seasons we may ever have. I am also grateful for the fact that we are still in the PL because of him. If the club does move on to bigger and better things, AP will have played a major role in that and we should thank him.

If you come to a fork in the road, take it.