For me it’s actually a little more about concentration and bravery. Cedric played well yesterday, but was absolutely shocking for their third goal. Just like Newcastle’s firstgoal, he seemed to disappear into the ground without really trying to put the player off. Players can try as hard as they like, but they need to get the concentration right at the The critical times. Defensively we seem to lose concentration
What about the two challenges that he didn’t pull out of and was lucky not to get booked, leaving an Arsenal player on the floor in agony on each occasion?
Is also like to add that we showed a lot of spirit yesterday but we lost, because we weren’t good enough/smart enough/concentrated enough (delete as appropriate). That was not a good Arsenal side. We still look far to easy to score against. I think we played to how the opposition were, if I’m being really honest with myself. I’d want Hughes working on our game management in certain situations and if he spent all week working in defending as a team, I’d be happy. We showed that we can create, but we also showed that we still can’t defend.
I watched the game last night on MOD for the first time since about the middle of the season. That set up actually suited Saints.......Although they took a bit of time to settle down in the first half. However for the way Saints played an inform side they deserve a lot of Kudos. There was a lot more purpose in midfield and for once their head didn't drop when Arsenal got their lucky equaliser. Long played his heart out........and it was a timely substitution. For the third goal yes it was a bit of a disaster.....McCarthy shouldn't have been beaten at his near post, although possibly a bit harsh but even he thinks he should have got it.Two things went wrong with that cross Mac came out and should have gone through his own players to punch that ball clear he hesitated in no mans land. Also the defenders didn't read the cross right. Trouble is it is easy to see with hindsight and make judgements after the event. Sparky is beginning to get them to play which is all we wanted to see. Any under-pressure team that watched that game yesterday imo will not fancy having to play Saints. It's a pity that last effort from long was ruled offside, which of course was correct. It was a grand move. While I agree Stevens had to be sent off I was annoyed the Referee did nothing about Wiltshires shirt pull after all he did rip the lads shirt should have been a minimum of a yellow. Wenger stated he thought his player's sending off was a bit harsh...........am I wrong didn't he do much the same as Stevens?? Also for some who know the rules better than I, am I wrong in thinking you are not allowed to try and prevent a quick free kick? Aren't you supposed to retreat as soon as the whistles gone? Mind you it was a bit of a melee but he was daft to try and prevent it after all that had happened. Just showed how much Saints had rattled them. We may have lost but at least we gave it a bloody good go!!
Missed the game through work yesterday. From what l have read we improved alot from previous weeks but still manged to concede 3 goals to what is not a strong Arsenal team and managed to make Welbeck look good in the process. So although l take heart from the improved performance and hope that we take that intensity into our remaining fixtures, we clearly have issues at the back. Until we stop leaking goals it is difficult to see how we are to get out of this mess. I see alot of vitriol towards Stephens on here and relief by some he is out for 3 weeks. With Maya coming back from injury; we need all our CB's available. Although l would prefer Maya on the pitch l am not so sure l rate Wes any better than Stephens.
Congratulations. Now you might like to consider the cycles of every generational history ever, and also whether labelling a whole generation with the same moniker is sensible. But you probably won’t.
State of this It is OK to call out a player who is not playing well. it doesn't mean he is the scapegoat.
If you mean that nasty little challenge against their young player early in the game, yes I saw that and wasn't overly impressed in his attempt to hurt the kid but didn't detract from his unfortunate 50/50 pull out when if he had gone in hard he could have had a goal scoring opportunity I am not someone who looks for a scapegoat but Saints Fans do enjoy picking on someone and have noticed on here and especially on a number of Facebook Forums that Stephens has been the main target for abuse and blame for everything that has gone wrong
Exactly what it says. Just because people are saying Forster/Redmond/Stephens/Tadic/Pellegrino have been crap doesn't mean they are the scapegoat and getting all the blame, they have all been crap at various points. It is not looking for someone to blame, it is a Saints football forum where we discuss the team, if people have been **** it will be mentioned.
I thought Wes was utterly inpet yesterday. Unable to deal with simple crosses and to hold a solid line. Maya i thought was brilliant, corralling the defence and being the leader on the pitch we needed. I'd be more inclined to sack off Wes and play same formation with Bednarek/Bertie and McQueen
I've given up, though not sure was that bothered to be honest about any Facebook contriubution to our team's performance. From what I have read on there many, not most perhaps, have a real problem with themsleves, i.e. need to get out more and try holding a conversation with people that consists of more than two sentences as a start. They would not in a million years say those things to the person directly.
The second Arsenal goal was down to Maya turning his back on Welbeck’s shot and leaving his leg in the way, from which the shot deflected out of McCarthy’s reach. We have to face the fact that none of our CB’s are top class. Each is OK if paired with someone like Virgil, but since his departure we haven’t had a secure partnership there.
Not sure what Stephens has to do with our discussion on Tadic... All I was trying to point out is that on one challenge Tadic looked like he pulled out but on a couple of others he clearly didn’t... so for you to focus on the one he pulled out on is a little unfair in my opinion DL. Ps. In hindsight that young player he did that nasty little challenge on was pretty damn quiet yesterday. Nice one Dusan. We’ve been lacking a bit of fight haven’t we???
I think SF4L was saying that it is ok to point out if someone has been crap, but most of us know that Saints fans have a tendency to decide someone is crap and then hammer their every move, guilty or not guilty. I think he’s right.
... partly and partly down to Jack’s poor positioning and being two yards off Welbeck, allowing him to cut in. It was a typical goal against us, with more than one person culpable. We simply aren’t solid defensively.
Yeah Bilic made the point at half time (maybe fulltime) in his analysis for Sky. Said that it wasn't individual mistakes that were costing us goals, but multiple mistakes all over the park which is far worse. He also said after the West Ham/Chelsea game that you felt that Chelsea would have to do something special to score against West Ham (which was a bit ironic considering the goal of the season contender Azpi scored against them) where as we just look vulnerable all the time. Kind of goes along with what I was saying that even though we dominated large spells of the game yesterday as soon as we got a goal Arsenal just went up the other end and scored pretty quickly. We can't defend and we aren't good at converting domination into goals which obviously isn't a good combo.
I get his point but I also think you can go too far the other way, overlooking just how poor someone has been. Genuine question here, how many more points do you think we would have if Forster had been replaced by McCarthy after the first 10 games? Our fans are dicks and went too far with the ironic cheering and stuff when he did something right, but he wasn't a scapegoat as he genuinely did cost us points and on forums such as these people had every right to question him.
You just said our fans went too far. Therefore he did become a scapegoat. I think he did. I also think he did become a poorer keeper, but as I have already stated, no problem with pointing out when a player is poor, but Saints fans often go too far. I said yesterday that Foster probably wouldn’t have got down to a couple of those low shots that McCarthy saved. He may have got to the first goal though because he has such a big frame. Fans get fixated and then only see the bad.
