Thick and fast, everyone. Thick and fast. The footballing equivalent of Linford Christie. We're off again, and we're at home for what feels like another pointless game right now, and one against an in-form Coventry City. Seeing as the football is a bit painful at the moment, and we're not really terribly good, I think we would all benefit from looking at history as we enter this game. And in particular the history of our manager, which may give us some pointers as to why we're in the situation we are. Russell Martin, as many of you know, is the younger brother of French tactician, Remy Martin, best known for the advent of 'Champagne Football'. When growing up as young boys in the small Scottish village of Brighton, Remy and Russell used to pit themselves against one another tactically over the Subbuteo table. Remy, of course, provided Keegan-esque spills and thrills, and would more often than not come out on top against his brother, who was obsessed by short and intricate passing amongst his back four and goalkeeper. In fact, young Russell hated the idea of goalkeepers, and far preferred playing his final player as a defender. This was due to the fact that the Subbuteo figure in Russell's goalmouth was a very worn bit of plastic, and the hands and arms had sadly fallen off. So saving goals became secondary in Russell's mind to kicking the ball about. Russell's best friend at school was a Spanish boy called Joseph, and Russell found himself much influenced by his ideas of tiki-taka, and tried to implement those into his games with Remy. Sadly though, Joseph's Subbuteo set was a far newer and more expensive collection, with no broken players, and he cunningly used a horse from his farmyard set as a striker. They became so close that Russell had a nickname amongst the others in the class, "Pap" Guardiola. They even called his Saints team, Manchester ****ty. As they grew, and the House Martins flew their nest, Russell was drawn to the Beautiful South where he set up home, and brought his footballing philosophy to bear at St Mary's Stadium, whilst also setting up a wildly successful business, Jack's Footwear, specialising in gold-plated shoehorns. Onto the game, and frankly, who really cares. We'll probably draw or lose. We might even win. But realistically everyone knows it's now a trudge toward the inevitable playoffs. Momentum might be an idea though. Personally I'd introduce some chaos through the middle, put Adarma to the right and Che back up top. It's the bane of our season, that the only player that can realistically play the 9 position isn't terribly good, though he does have lovely thighs. Prediction - Saints 1-1 Coventry. Stephens plays. Rasmus creates a chocolate Ankersen so he can lick himself.
Coventry will want it more, we will play like it’s a pre season game. 1-0 to Coventry with a late goal
Tuesday, 9th April 2024 Sky Bet Championship Southampton v Coventry City (19:45) Referee:- JAMES LININGTON Assistants:- Hristo Karaivanov and Graham Kane Fourth Official :- Charles Breakspear
Is Linford bringing his lunchbox? Stormy weather forecast for Tuesday easing later with sunshine in the evening. Perfect conditions for an outbreak of scintillating footy from the Saints. Is Russell related to John Martyn who made the Album Bless the Weather in 1971?
If Coventry can beat We never give up Leeds 2-1, then I expect 0-3 against We can’t be arsed Saints. Possession stats will be 75% to 25%. 70% of our stats will be in our own half. Baz will end the season as the Saints player with most passes to his name. Just glad I won’t be there, or at any of the play off matches. Yes I am a miserable old git.
I'm looking forward to seeing O'Hare live. I don't put him in the category of very top Championship players, who will likely be playing in the PL next season regardless of what happens with their current club. But he might just be good enough to fall into the next category down. And that is probably where we should be looking this summer, to make a signing or two, especially if we don't get promoted (and the fact that O'Hare is out on contract makes him very attractive).
You need to join Miserable Old Gits Anonymous (MOGA, not to be confused with Make America Great Again - MAGA). We meet weekly, mostly on-line, as we all have Tags and Restraining Orders. We take it in turns to shake our (sometimes metaphorical) fists at the universe, railing against the clear injustices that occur for 90 minutes plus added time, that prevent our personal football heroes from expressing themselves with balletic-like grace, and winning matches. If all else fails, we'll blame some perceived villain or other, who can't hit a barn door/can't tackle/can't pass to our own team/can't keep a clean sheet/can't pick eleven players, plus substitutes. Once all that is out of our collective systems, we'll look forwards to another game, that is bound to be the one when we finally get our act together. Still, it stops us from roaming the streets, terrorising the locals. Oh, and we'll win 3-0.
8-2 Saints. Just as it was a little later in April in 1984. Wallace (Edozie) and Moran (Che) hat trick and Armstrongs with the others.
TBH I won't be going to anymore midweek games as it seems a waste of time now. Less effort to watch on TV.
Yes he was pope Adrian IV 1154 to his death in 1159. Divine intervention? Don't know about that, God helps those who help themselves, god help those who get caught especially when in possession playing out of defence.
Sounds a bit like my WF group. Twenty old blokes who meet for an hours whinge, while running around, complaining that everyone else is running. We all support the worst team in whatever league they play in. Having put the world to rights, we then find out next week that the world has ‘nt listened to us and we have to do it all again. We do all agree that any day you wake up, is a good day. Always look on the bright side of life, where ever that is.
I think I qualified for founder membership for MOGA and also GOBS - Grumpy Old BastardS. I often have to clean the foam flecked spittle from laptop and phone screens and can be found in rooms or the garden wondering what the **** I'm doing there. Mrs Jab is threatening to have a GPS locator fitted and is preparing a label with "If found please return to" information.
At least the label says return to. Imagine if it said don’t bring back, cause we’ve had enough of the MOG.
If we play anything like we did against Blackburn we'll get thrashed. Coventry are in form and have everything to play for so will be well up for it, which is essentially the complete opposite of us right now. Not looking forward to this, but I can't make the Watford game so not missing this one too despite my better judgement.
Thankfully, I didn't have to watch the last game I'll be at this one, so I can't dodge this bullet I've seen a few iterations of Saints teams that can either attack or defend, but never both in the same game I think a few tinkerings could improve our chances here, but I'm not expecting miracles Stu's return is good, there's been many a time that we've needed him to effectively and quickly transition from defence into attack I think we're all clear that Che is our only No 9 and AA needs to play from the right, love RM as mush as I do, I still don't know why he can't see this This inverted full back business is all very well when you are truly dominating a game and I like the wild-card nature of an extra midfielder But, we keep suffering from full backs being out of position when something changes Jack's cross to Aribo where he hit the bar demostrates a positive Blackburn's first chance that went over the bar demonstrates one of its negatives, Bedders needed someone in a safer position to pass to, Jack wasn't available The idea is clearly very risky at our level with the standard of players we have If the players were making better decisions then we'd be fine, but if they found that easy then they'd be in the Prem RM needs to hybridise his ideas to make them more achievable for these players Smallbone isn't a sub, subs need to bring energy Too many of our players seem better as subs, I feel for RM having to decide on a starting 11 e.g. Fraser, Brooks, Rothwell, Sulemana, Edozie
