IN THE crazy world of modern football, where players and managers can go from heroes one day to incompetent buffoons the next, the phrase ‘managing expectations’ has become as much a part of the footballing lexicon as the ‘stonewall’ penalty and ‘110% effort’.

At this stage of the season in particular managers are likely to trot out this phrase when fans, having seen their side scramble a win and two jammy draws in their first three games, immediately start dreaming of titles and promotions or the odd knock-out trophy and declaring that anything less would represent such a massive under-achievement as to require the ritual disembowelling of the entire coaching staff.

Generally speaking, football fans aren’t interested in having their expectations managed; ‘consolidation’ and ‘mid-table safety’ are not phrases to set the blood racing, even when one half of your team shoots like Sol Campbell and the other tackles like Naomi Campbell.

They may, however, be more amenable depending on the stock held by those who are doing the managing. Thus when Kenny Dalglish declares that his team will just try their best and tot up the points at the end of the season, these are treated as words of wisdom and judgement, while similar utterances from Roy Hodgson this time last year about needing time to build in more difficult circumstances were met with the kind of derision that greets every Joey Barton philosophical Tweet.

So acknowledging that no-one from within the club is going to start hyping us up on promises of a trophy-laden spring, what are we to make of a start to the season which has seen us gather a rare win at Arsenal, and play some of the best football seen at Anfield for a long time on Saturday?

There was a barely believable statistic being promulgated by the BBC at the weekend that this was our best start to a Premier League season for 17 years, which I found hard to understand since we gathered seven points out of nine as recently as the start of the 2008-09 season, and on several other occasions before that.

But regardless of the foundation of this particular statistic, there’s no doubt that spirits were very high indeed as we skipped away from Anfield, excited by the quality of passing on display and the improvement being shown by those who have arrived over the summer.

Such is the capricious nature of football however that, no sooner had we revelled in the praise flowing from the pages of the Sunday newspapers, we were confronted by two scarcely credible results later that day that gave a clear picture of the challenge ahead.

It was hard to escape the sensation of wind being taken out of sails.

The rational conclusion to draw now would be to accept that the two Manchester clubs are just too powerful for us at present, and that Chelsea will probably have enough experience in the bank to last the pace.

In which case the six-point lead we have established already over Arsenal and Spurs could well prove decisive when the last Champions League place is being decided.

Expectation may be manageable but hope, as they say, springs eternal.