Back on October 30, when Bournemouth extended their unbeaten start to the Championship season to a 15th game with a 2-0 win at Reading, they stood a whopping 19 points ahead of Nottingham Forest.
While the Cherries had enjoyed their best start to a campaign in 60 years, Forest lost six of their first seven - their worst start since 1913 - and had already axed manager Chris Hughton and replaced him with Steve Cooper. By October, they'd only just got going.
The prospect of the two clubs being engaged in a dogfight for the division's second automatic promotion place seemed pretty remote.