I hope you're right about Wilcox, but this time last year we were all singing the praises of Ankersen as though he was some incredible football guru. I do like the fact that he's an ex-professional. Think that should instill some common sense to some of the decisions being made (hopefully). But it seems to me Wilcox's main asset will be his 'name' in the youth football scene. If he can replicate what he's managed at the Man City academy down here, then happy days. But regarding senior football, he is relatively unproven as a DoF (right?).
Watching the goal again I have come to the conclusion. Why the F didn't Benarek block it, or kick it away. How was Bazuni meant to expect Benarek to totally F it up therefore not reacting to the shot. 100% Benareks screw up
Don’t you know!? It’s been ingrained into Saints fans to blame the keeper and has been ever since Niemi.
He rooted himself to the spot. As soon as the guy received the ball he should have been closing him down.
I think it’s 70/30 down to Bednarek. He should have closed the shot down instead of standing there like a moron. But also, a good keeper would have positioned themselves better and stopped it IMO. I think both of them are utter toilet and nowhere near good enough for PL. Baz may improve with time, but hes quite simply relegating us.
Beddie ****ed up, but it isn't 100% on him, because Firpo shouldn't have been able to get the ball in that position in the first place. AMN and Diallo, both Championship standard players, with piss-poor attempts to tackle or block.
Again, it's not on him. If the defence could defend, and the strikers could score, you wouldn't even notice him.
Back in the day, Fraser was a top keeper behind a mean defence. Not long after he was the worst keeper in the PL, behind a very porous defence. Keepers have a hard enough job guessing what the opposition forwards are going to do, without guessing what their own defenders might throw at them. Keepers are an easy target for poor defending by the whole team.
I mean it’s a team sport, so obviously it’s not ever down to one player. But I do think he’s noticeably poor. Even if we had our poch/Koeman era team in front of him, I think he would be costing us a lot of points. It’s not his fault, but he is a huge, huge, glaring problem for us. Statistically the worst keeper in Europe. Never makes a save. But as you said, he’s one of many glaring problems. So I just feel sorry for him.
Maybe. But how many games have we had where we’ve said “our keeper kept us in the game then”. I can’t remember but I think I’ve said that 2-3 times this season. It’s always hard to know how good a keeper is when the defence is ****, but he doesn’t save any of those shots which a keeper has no right to save. Forster, McCarthy, Kelv, Boruc, they often pulled something out of the bag that gave us 1 or 3 points. Add to that the fact that he lets in some shots he should be saving. I think there’s a good keeper in there but all the evidence suggests he’s not a good keeper for us atm. He has the lowest shots per goal ratio in the PL.
This is fairly damning on that front from The Athletic - and we know someone who loves data, don't we?! An xG per shot of 0.09 is the lowest in the division, and highlights how tough the Saints are finding it to work the ball into good areas. While he has bailed them out on more than one occasion this season, James Ward-Prowse won’t bang in the free kicks from 25 yards every game. please log in to view this image The positive news for Southampton is that their defensive numbers have improved as the season has progressed, but their attack has flatlined — rarely deviating from an xG of one per game. please log in to view this image Doomed is a strong word, but Southampton could do with more results like Saturday’s victory at Stamford Bridge. They have some very tricky fixtures to negotiate in the coming weeks, and the hope will be that they don’t become cut adrift before it’s too late.
He's good at coming out for crosses (Fraser's weakness), decent with his feet and distribution (McCarthy's weakness). I do agree with you and Os that he is a weakness. But then I always felt that McCarthy was good enough, which everyone else seemed to disagree with. So I clearly just don't know my goalkeepers haha. Or I just have a lot of sympathy for anyone playing behind our defence.
Interesting: Our attacking xG has dropped off a cliff since Ralph left. So in short, NJ tried to focus on defending but in the process has nullified us as any form of attacking threat. And now we can’t defend or attack.
You can blame the defence all you like, but one mistake is all it takes, if the rest of the team aren't scoring goals at the other end.
Tend to agree with this, the fact that we barely had a shot against Leeds means that there would’ve been dozens of mistakes throughout the game that led to us being so **** at attacking.
Doesn’t that particular xG stat focus more on poor finishing than chance creation I.e it means we are scoring 1/11 shots taken.
Also, Bednarek moves forward (yes I know so radical) & even if gets past him it’s a little easier for Baz to save. Baz certainly didn’t cover himself in any glory but Bednarek ****ed up as did the other two morons sheparding
No one covered themselves with glory for the goal. Two players closed Somerville down, yet still gave him a gap to get the ball through to Harrison. Walcott should be asked why he wandered over to the touch line to watch this, instead of going with Firpo. Diallo escapes blame, IMO, because he had to go towards Harrison when the ball was passed to him and was unfortunate that Harrison shifted the ball quickly and skilfully to an unmarked Firpo. Bednarek should have done better as should Bazunu, given that the shot was soft. I still put the bulk of the blame on Walcott, because he actively took himself out of the game with his dreadful decision to go out wide, leaving Firpo unmarked.
I had no high hopes for this game....other than wishing for a stroke of luck. You can pull yourself out of trouble if you are scoring goals , but we aren’t. Relying on the opposition missing and sneaking the odd goal yourself is a recipe for disaster.
I agree entirely with this. If a keeper makes a few saves and catches a few crosses (his job) in a match but lets in a shot which he should reasonably save, he is held up for ridicule and castigation, and is blamed for losing a match. A striker who misses every single chance in a game, is attributed no blame, or nowhere near as much as the poor keeper. A midfielder or centre back who consistently misplaces passes and thereby gives the ball away in potentially dangerous areas is attributed nowhere near as much blame as the poor keeper. This is unfair in the extreme.
