I've taken myself off the forum to reflect since we lost yesterday and tbh I'm glad I did... So much pure emotion and a touch of reality needed here I think. I think more than anything the players will hopefully be shocked% angry by the result, they'll feel huge embarrassment alot more than us fans will feel. As a team, we were second best and lazy and probably only a couple of players who had a okay game. So much laziness in tracking back and hardly any intensity or desire to win it back. Alot has been spoken about the defense and Holgate ( who I feel some empathy for ) whether you agree or not is fine. But for me, Midfield was a **** show, Allowing Sunderland to dictate the game and hardly put a tackle in to stop balls coming in all game set the tone I think. We were never coming back from that early 2-0, Sunderland soaked it up and hit us on the counter, they wanted it more. Let's regroup, Get it sorted and I have plenty of faith we will do just that. Up the Saints.
Can't argue with that - but in this circumstance, I would say we have played two reasonable teams and conceded 9 goals and won neither game. Our coach has admitted he picked a player who had one week with the team because he thought he could handle the atmosphere better than players who were in form and we have a break now with not enough players to work with - so nothing will change between now and then - my confidence has taken a huge battering, much like Southampton FC. He also said incidentally it might be a hang-over from last season, so that doesn't bode well either.
How the heck can any team be lazy and lack intensity when they haven't lost a game this season? You can play poorly or be unlucky and lose 1-0 or 2-0 but being lazy, hardly put a tackle in and have no desire means there is a tremendously serious problem at Southampton FC. They're professional footballers the minimum is to put a shift in. Terrible Ted Lindsay said I may have looked like I had my skates on the wrong feet some nights but every fan that paid to sit in the seats could be assured I tried my hardest every game. Appears our players already can't say that.
We’ll yes, that’s the point I believe that Russ is a competent football manager and has more knowledge than most of us what to do to improve things New manager, new squad, new tactics It was never going to be a walk in the park Give it time COYS
It is probably an arrogance thing if there is any truth in it. Just turn up and think we’ll beat the opposition because we have better players. Only people who will really know if that is the case are the players themselves, but hopefully that was a reality check that they won’t just be able to coast through games and win
This is the same Leicester who lost 1-0 to Hull at home yesterday? The Leicester who have won four games this season, all by one goal? They're the ones who are going to beat us 9-0? Vin
I have no problem with a plan A manager. The tinkering over the last few years didn’t get us anywhere. As others said, aim for a decent spine, with Charles and most likely Taylor and Stewart in time. With regards to working through the issues, Russ said he has around 6 players due to international duty, unless I heard that wrong! Frustrating. Really want it to work with this team and Martin.
Niall Quinn was our manager at the start of that season, we won it on the last day of the season, Birmingham ****ed up their final game
Yeah we're a mess this last year or so. Ralph Hassenhuttl sacked Oct 2022 Nathan Jones sacked Feb 2023 Ruben Selles 'mutually decided' to piss off at the end of last season And now Russell Martin. Ralph had a very distinctive gegenpress type of philiosophy, Jones was a long ball merchant, Selles was a poor imitation of Ralph, and now Martin wants to switch to a possession-based game. Each manager was/is insistent on their brand of football, and so it must just have been a bloody nightmare as player learning all their bollocks. I long for a manager to come to the club, look at the squad, and then just play to its strengths. Because we had decent players last season, and we have an elite squad right now for the Championship. Obviously early days for Martin, and generally our fan base likes the cut of his jib. But there have been enough warnings from fans of other clubs that he's not all that.
Remember our first season in League one? Norwich were smashed at home on the first day of the season 7-1 by Colchester, but went on to win the league by some distance Just goes to show. Coincidentally, Martin played for Norwich that season.
We have gone down the director of football route, whichever coach that comes in has to fit the mould. Long gone are the days of Dr Death (David Moyes) who claimed we were in a relegation battle after 2 Premier league games, he turned out to be correct, helped somewhat by him buying past it over the hill players from Everton to help their pension funds!
Looking at how Mowbray got Sunderland to perform did make me start to think that maybe we should have gone stronger for him when we were linked. But Martin has been very positive so far so he deserves more time
