We will all find our natural level eventually

[davieG]

If this WHU blog is correct:

Football is a funny game. It seems to me that there is a certain equilibrium hidden in the inner workings of the game. Clubs have their ups and clubs have their downs, but an omnipotent force ensures that, in time, things return back to how they should be. In the short term, clubs like Hull, Wigan, Reading and Wimbledon are allowed a stint in the top division, but we all know that they will sink back to where they belong over time. Clubs like Leeds, Forest, Wolves and Leicester may fall on hard times, but the passion of the support and the history of the club somehow inspires recovery, no matter how massive the problems.

Look at Leeds. They are on the way back. If we play them in the Championship next season, who would you fancy to win at Elland Road? The ghosts of Bremner, Clark, Gray, Lorimer, Giles, Charlton and Hunter would be at the shoulders of the current crop of players in all white and our own Bobby Moore would shrug and say, I could never win at Elland Road anyway! Look at Leicester. They sank into Division 3 for the first time in the club's history, crippled by debts. And look at their response, immediate promotion and now chasing a place in the Prem via the playoffs. Look at Forest, like Leeds and Leicester, dumped down into Division 3 but now chasing promotion with a team of nearly men who are playing exciting football under Billy Found Out And Found Wanting Davies. Look at Southampton under our very own Alan Pardew. Despite the points deduction, they are chasing a playoff place and playing with verve and confidence. They will be back, happily. Even Aldershot and Accrington Stanley have rediscovered their true level.

So, although relegation will feel like an absolute catastrophe, it needn't be. Financially, it would be a disaster of course, but if it means administration, then let's take the points deduction sooner rather than later - and tell Shafting United to go whistle for the outstanding £20m. Who knows, relegation may just focus the minds of Straumur and persuade them to set a realistic figure for buying the club, a figure that would allow new owners to invest in the team to ensure we bounce back quickly.

West Ham belong in mid table in the Prem, somewhere between 8th and 16th. Our mistake was hubris, believing we could over achieve, believing that we could disturb the natural order. That is the classical recipe for a tragic hero. But in all tragedy there is catharsis. Sooner or later, we will stop screaming "We are a club more sinned against than sinning" and accept our destiny. It may be on Boxing Day with a defeat at home to Portsmouth when another line from Shakespeare would then be more appropriate, "Et tu Pompey? Then fall West Ham." But as soon as we accept our fate, the recovery will begin. It is clinging desperately to the edge of the ledge that destroys the soul. Let go, fall, and the angels will break your fall and help you back to where you belong over time.

If we go down, we will be back; the gods of football may play with us as they have played with Leeds and Forest but the natural order will be restored; sooner or later. It will be painful but don't forget the joy of that play off victory over Preston.