OPINION: Mansfield Town's words are meaningless without results

Obviously whilst all COULD happen, it’s highly unlikely the will . . . unless of course I did something about it myself.

“Mansfield Town will be League Two Champions 2017/18” has also been written by a number of people, but like my hopes – just because it’s written on a bit of paper, doesn’t mean it will happen without desire, application, commitment – and simply hard graft.

The Stags are capable of achieving the predictions set out and everyone who has backed that prediction can rationally argue a case for why - Steve Evans has multiple promotions, as do 95 per cent of the players he’s signed and has within his squad.

But they’re just words – they mean nothing when it comes to crunch time on the pitch.

Within the dressing room, the players need to stop thinking about the fact they’ve been there and done it at previous clubs, they need to stop looking at their team mates and thinking “he’s played in the championship so…” and stop making silly little playground errors thinking “it’ll be alright – we’re the champions on paper.”

When we’ve shown glimpses of what we can do on the pitch, I won’t deny my eyes have widened thinking of what could be if it were consistent – but there’s the problem, a flash of light doesn’t completely make the darkness go away, we have to maintain that flair, energy, hunger and desire from the first whistle to the very last.

I’m yet to walk away from a game thinking that I agree with the champions tag we’ve been given, instead I’m starting to walk into games fearing what’ll happen if we get hit long over the top or take a lead and then fail to hold it as teams throw players up front.

A combination of the two have made us drop at least seven points now, after five league games that is frightening for so called champions.

We’ve some tasty fixtures in September and have just five games to get to the marker where Steve Evans wanted the club to be at the end of the season – thus far we’ve looked insecure and indecisive at the back, shore that up and that will ignite the paper and burn those words into ashes, floating through reality.

The journey as ever will have main twists and turns, if we can get the basics right – those glimpse of magic will grow stronger and the light will stay, rewarding us with that champions tag we crave so much.

As for me? Well I’ll guess I’ll wait for those numbers to come up, an approach to be made, and most of all, that phone to ring.