I hate it when Palace fans get optimistic nearly always brings bad luck. Things could easily go wrong from here. Bookies odds reflects what bets have been placed, just because fans haven't been betting on Palace being relegated doesn't mean circumstances cant conspire against us. We are not a 200-1 chance of going down, realistically true odds are lower than that.

Conversely, I get frustrated when Palace fans overlook what they're seeing on the pitch - which is a solid team blessed with individual flair players of supreme skill, marshalled by a talented tactician and getting result after result after result - and go "but...Oldham!"

If we'd been eking out lucky results or posting points with a series of bore draws, then I could see reason for concern. This team has just recorded 6 wins, 1 draw and 1 loss in 8 games while facing what looked to be a terrifying set of fixtures. This isn't the same type of team that fell to the benefit of Oldham.

It isn't even the same type of team that fell to the benefit of WBA (which is a nightmare that rarely gets mentioned in the same breath as Oldham).

This is a team that has risen from joint-bottom a couple of months ago to 12th in the Premier League. Oldham are languishing in the bottom half of League One.

Edited by Ray in Houston (24 Apr 2017 3.48pm)

You say that like it makes you in the minority. We've all seen it. Most of us, though, choose not to look at what's happening now through the prism of the past.

The current iteration of Crystal Palace is nothing like the cash-strapped, mis-managed, feast or famine club of old. It's a club that has had a decent amount of adversity heaped on it, yet persisted. Think of the sequence that got us here: Pulis bailing the day before the first game of the season; Warnock coming in and failing; Pardew coming in and excelling then falling off a cliff and Allardyce coming in to instigate a dramatic turnaround.

Think of the good fortune that meant that Pulis was available when we needed him, then Pardew, then Allardyce. Think of the results we have had, not just in the last few weeks - impressive as they are - but Crystanbul, beating Chelsea before it became fashionable (then doing it again, and again), beating Man City in style and putting a Clattenberg-sized asterisk next to that FA Cup final loss.

This is a club that is shaking off the demons of the past. You might want to give that a try - it's quite refreshing.

Edited by Ray in Houston (24 Apr 2017 4.42pm)

Apologies in advance for trying to bring a balanced agrument to Hol, I know it's against everything these forums stand for.

It seems like fans get crusified on here for having reasonable expectations or when they are simply trying to advise others to keep their feet on the ground.

After beating Stoke 4-1 earlier in the season there were posts about us getting into Europe.

After narrowly losing 1-0 to Chelsea, 2-1 to Man U, and 2-1 to Man City there were people having an absolute meltdown about how disastorous it was.

We've now pulled off an astonishing run of results which not even the most optimistic among us would have predicted and now people are coming out to gloat.

The close defeats earlier in the season showed there was only a small margin between sucess and failure. The january signings have made that marginal difference but now isn't the time to put our feet up and relax.

Whilst it will take a crazy series of events for us to get religated it could still happen.

Swansea have still got Man U, Everton, Sunderland, and West Brom. The last 3 have got nothing to play for. Man U have just lost Zlatan and Rojo for the season and are still distracted by the Europa League. If we lose Benteke, we will only be left with Campbell up front.

On the other hand, we could very well push for a top half finish.