It's about time Loading got the Saints v Birmingham match thread up, so that we can discuss things that probably won't happen, as well as dissecting things that happened before.
Oh yeah I hear ya for sure. I said before the season that I didn't expect to see the best of us for months into season and think we'll still improve going forward. I just don't see us improving anywhere near enough and still see us lacking consistency due to our defence. I don't see this side going on a run of 17 wins in 23 or whatever it was Reading did that year. I think realistically to have a genuine shot at autos we'd need to either double our goals scored or half our conceded number and I don't see either happening.
Why not? That's exactly what Swansea did under Martin at the back end of last season. if you're going yo judge the defence on what Martin did at previous clubs then you can't ignore the run they went on.
Swansea's run wasn't at all that epic though. Just 5 wins, and that was preceded by an equal number of losses.
Ummm cos doing it for 9 games isn't the same as doing it for over 20?! We could quite conceivably go on a run of 7 wins and 2 draws at some point and still get no where near autos. In fact Ipswich have had a better run than that and yet people are still mostly thinking they'll fall away. Poor comparison mate. That was also when they had nothing to play for iirc which I'm always skeptical of.
I can't see it either. And unfortunately it seems that there's only realistically one auto up for grabs, and the longer Ipswich's run goes on, the harder it will be to make up the gap. That's fine. Playoffs this season would be great, and if we are improving still by the end of the season, then we will be a match for anyone if we get through to the final. Failure to make playoffs then I think we need to look at other manager options.
Agreed. All we need is for a few more of their narrow wins to start becoming draws, and the gap will steadily close. 33 games to go; it's an absolute marathon.
Saturday 28th October 2023 Southampton v Birmingham City (12:30) Referee: DAVID WEBB Assistants: Daniel Leach and Mark Russell Fourth Official : Alan Young
Bit ****ing weird you’ve done that. But if you look further back I thought it was a bad decision to appoint a manager with such a below average record, and it wasn’t a gamble a club of our stature should be making at the current time. This post was after a couple of games where we looked good. And now over a larger sample size I can see my initial concerns were absolutely spot on. If you want to go back and dig through old posts I’m pretty sure you will find that I have been more correct than most of the deluded optimists in here
Last season we looked like a team that tried not to lose, this season we look like a team trying to win. Love the fact that we are getting last minute goals. Might be building a bit of togetherness and fighting spirit. I’ll take some of that.
Last season we had the worst defensive record in the league. This season we also have the worst defensive record.. in a worse league
I've always thought that the play-offs were the more realistic target given that the club has had so many changes since last season throughout from the top to the coaching and playing staff. I expected a few bumps in the road initially that would probably cost us automatic promotion but we are now 5 games unbeaten and confidence and momentum should hopefully build. The performances haven't been dominant but I believe the players are still adapting to the style and I think that we will get better but it's far too early to pull the plug on it yet and we can't keep going back to square one, we have to try and build an identity that everyone understands instead of the chaos of last season.
I understand why RM rested Charly and Stuart but he absolutely must ensure that one of them fills the third spot in the midfield, simply because they are the only midfielders we have who will turn with the ball and run it at the opposition. I don’t see why he couldn’t start with one of them and switch at HT if fatigue was an issue. When you put 3 work horses in the middle, like last night, it showed that they were always looking to lay the ball off, sideways or backwards, as befits their skill set, which in turn slows us down and makes us more predictable to defend against. I’m not writing off an automatic promotion but we really need to start turning the opening goal into a 2 or 3 goal lead, to kill off games, to help make it achievable.
I was really disappointed with Charles last night, but Charly was really poor when he came on too. I think we are a midfielder light, to be honest.
This is the New Saints, well, a work in progress, a rough diamond needing further polishing that specialises in last gasp thrills. the final mix, the directors cut is under way.
