In the days following the Burnley match, anything seemed possible but something changed at the club in those five days between Easter Monday and the following Saturday that saw the Preston humiliation because the difference in belief, commitment and ability in the side since then has been incredible.
As to what has caused the wheels to come off, I, like everyone else on here, cannot say for certain, but there are a few theories being knocked around that I don't believe;-
1. The players are too tired - that might have been the case at this time in previous seasons under Dave Jones, but we have more depth to the squad now and would a team that is out on it's collective feet have been able to come up with such a strong last fifteen minutes against Burnley when they were playing their fourth match in eight days?
2. The players don't want promotion because they know they would lose their place in the side if it went up - surely that applies to any team chasing promotion? Are those who argue this line really saying that there is not one set of players anywhere in the country who really want promotion? Also, why score all the late winners and equalisers that we have been lately - wouldn't our players just have sat back and accepted defeats or draws if they didn't want to go up?
3. There has been talk of a bust up between players (I have seen Purse and Roger Johnson mentioned), but I don't see how any disagreement between two players (something which must go on at any football club all the time) would have such a profound effect on the whole team - now, if the team as a whole has split into two distinct camps, then that may be a different matter.
I also don't buy it that this set of players aren't good enough and they have been "found out" in some way in the last fortnight. Surely what has happened over eight months and forty two matches is a more accurate barometer of a team's ability than three matches played in a week?
As I mentioned earlier, I don't have any answers as to what has gone wrong, but I would say that the two most likely answers are;-
1. Individually and collectively, there has been a drastic case of bottle trouble and players feeling sorry for themselves. Various members of the side spent forty two matches telling us how good they are and how we were going for automatic promotion and not just a top six place. Indeed, it appears that some of them thought we were home and dry after the Burnley match and therefore had nothing to answer a Preston side, whose whole season depended on that ninety minutes, with. Since then, this set of players that I for one had so much faith in have shown that, perhaps, they are a bunch of imposters.
When the prize is so big, I don't want to see wingers in my side sulking by the corner flag after losing out in a one on one with an opponent as we concede a goal, I don't want to see strikers whose sole ambition when getting the ball is to win a free kick or penalty as they fall to the ground for the umpteenth time and I don't want our central defenders "rag dolled" about by such an imposing figure as Jon Stead (the word "imposing" was used sarcastically there by the way!). That is what I saw on Saturday and it would appear that those unfortunate enough to have seen us at Preston and Charlton have seen more of the same - some of our play on Saturday was pathetic and if it is all really down to bottle trouble, then important players within our team are, indeed, imposters.
2. Maybe it's a sign that I am getting old and cynical, but when I see a previously successful team implode like City have, the word "money" comes into my head. This matter was touched upon by someone on Sunday and I am surprised it did not attract more attention - is it really so far fetched to think that after the Burnley match some players started to ask about an additional bonus for getting automatic promotion and that they have, effectively, "downed tools" since being told to forget it? It wouldn't need the whole team to react like that for things to go as badly as they have done - if, say, five or six of the side were not pulling their weight, then, particularly in such a tight league, results would inevitably suffer.
It's only the fact that our loss of form has been so spectacular that makes me wonder about the second of the alternatives I mention as I am at a loss to explain it otherwise if the side haven't suffered a collective loss of bottle, but, whatever has happened, a humilating failure to make the Play Offs on Sunday could have profound effects on the club.
I have mentioned before that this season represents our best chance of going up since 1970/71 and it's worth remembering what happened in the years that followed then - the club went into a sharp decline and it is only since the turn of the century really that it has started to recover from what happened back then.
People talk about the sale of Toshack, but, even without that, a good side was broken up (largely because the players were getting old together) and falling gates meant that they were never adequately replaced.
Ross McCormack spoke a few weeks back about this side being broken up if we do not go up and, although our players will be probably be regarded as damaged goods if we don't make the Play Offs, I still think that there will be plenty of clubs around who will be only too willing to take our best players off us given the opportunity.
Back in 1971 there was a group of us who used to have our own team that played games at any time except for Saturday afternoons because they were for going down the City - within a year only two of us were still going to games as the decline set in.
After largely missing out on two generations of potential support because of a chain of events which started when we sold John Toshack in November 1970, I find it so heartening to see so many young faces at home games now, because it means that, for the first time in nearly forty years, it is a bit "cool" to be a City fan. However, if the current pathetic form continues into our next match, that situation will change in no time at all and to be a Cardiff City fan will mean that there will be an open opportunity there for the plastics who support clubs hundreds of miles away to ridicule you - how many of our new found young supporters will be willing to stand by their team in those circumstances?
Keith Morgan talked yesterday of people at Ninian Park who love the club and I would finish by asking any one who is in a position of power at Cardiff City who genuinely loves the club and does does not see it just as a meal ticket to do all that they can in the next few days to try and sort things out down there. If the current malaise lasts until Sunday then, new stadium or not, the implications for the club could be massive. Nobody accused the 71 side of being bottlers but the local public soon fell out of love with them - if the current team were to fail to finish in the top six after getting into the position they did, then there will be plenty who will, justifiably in my view, see them as bottlers or, perhaps even worse, disinterested and it is the club, not the players, who will suffer in the long run.