Not really, but depends on how we go in the other cup competitions, it's all relative. 9th-14th wouldn't be disappointing if we make the latter stages of the EL and go quite far in another cup. I've not been expecting much from this season at all to be honest with the change of manager and turnover of players again. I don't think we should be getting too excited just yet, as our previous manager said: "don't party when we win and don't make **** when we lose". I still think our luck with injuries will go a long way to deciding our performance in the league this year.
To be fair i think we have had **** luck so far with our injuries - goes to prove how deep our squad already.
Fair enough, I think Europe will take more of a toll on us as we get towards Christmas imo. Particuarly if we beat Sunderland. I think it was after the Palace game I posted a list of our fixtures and it was ridiculous the amount we play leading up to and in December. I know Claude is doing an excellent job of rotating currently but it only takes a couple of injuries to make that immensely more difficult. Edit: I'm gonna look for that Palace thread now as I'm interested
We have and we haven't. We were unlucky with Pied yes. But otherwise we've had short term injuries in the same positions which is unlucky, but it's also a position we have a lot of depth in. I'd rather have those injuries than a long term one to a key player or 2 such as Virgil/Romeu/Austin.
Away we have played champions Leicester, west ham, arsenal, man u and man city. To be where we are now, and doing ok in europa and FL trophy is amazing. The saints are marching in. #proudasever
Another very good away performance. Loved the way we allowed their CBs, early on, to pass to each other, then close down the forward passes to their midfielders, forcing them to pass back then go long, conceding possession. Hated Martina's lack of positional awareness, leading to the equaliser. With the ball on our left and our CBs pulled across, leaving acres of space on our right side, he should have been tucked in, behind/beside Jose, not 5 yards the wrong side of Sane. It was a great cross field pass, but had Cuco been in the right position, he could have cut the pass out, and prevented the goal scoring opportunity. Boufal looks a very promising acquisition, and players may have to raise their awareness as to where he will play the ball. Towards the end, he played some kind of reverse pass, with the inside of his right heel, which, had Redmond been on the same wavelength, would have got Redmond round the back of the City defence. I am struggling to understand why Clasie was yellow carded. Football is still supposed to be a contact sport, and it is inevitable that there will be accidental, coming togethers. He clearly won the tackle, and yes his foot then made contact with the City player's foot, but it was unavoidable, IMO, and shouldn't have even been a free kick. These days a lot of very good tackles, end up being penalised for accidental contact by the trailing leg, etc, or upper body contact, which in days gone by would have been seen for what they are. Unavoidable contact caused by two players going in different directions, accidentally coming together- play on.
Of course they could... I'm not being negative, I'm just trying to urge caution. After the first few games loads of people thought we were **** and would be in the bottom 6/7 maybe in a relegation fight. Now a couple of months later we're the dogs bollocks and one of the best teams in the league? There never seems to be any inbetween and it's frustrating. I happen to believe when fully fit and firing then we are in the top 8 teams in the league, but with all the other games we have this year our priorities may lie elsewhere and we may pick up more injuries than squads with no Europe and who exit the cups early. I'm only making the point about injuries as we don't score many goals which is fine as our defence is fantastic and doing the business at the moment. But if we were to pick up a long term injury to Romeu (best example for me) then we could start to leak goals and then if we're not scoring then we're not going to pick up many points in that run. I think it's way overboard to EXPECT top 8. People always say that teams like United etc. don't have a divine right to be in the top 4. Well we don't have a divine right to be top 8 (or half, even). If we lose to Sunderland, go out of EL group stages and in the 3rd round of FA Cup, then yes I would expect us to be in the top 10. I happen to think we'll go quite far in the cups though.
In an article someone posted earlier, it was said that he encourages players to take risks. Puel was apparently quite vociferous because he felt the team were playing too safely against Watford....he likes every player who gets the ball to be given several options by his team mates and to not take the safe option every time.
Yeah I think that is about right. We are 8th now and things are looking good, but there are only 3 points down to 15th. 10th would be totally fair, a serious Europe challenge is far less likely.
Where have I stated that I EXPECT Saints to finish in the top 8?. It is merely my opinion that we are good enough to finish there based on what I have witnessed so far. I won't be ripping up my season ticket if we don't look like finishing there...
Yes In MY opinion we are, but I won't be disappointed if we finish anywhere in midtable....there is a difference.
For anyone interested, our fixtures leading up to busy xmas period: 26/10 - Sunderland (H) Sun 30/10 - Chelsea (H) Thurs 3/11- Inter (H) Sun 6/11 - Hull (A) international break (?) Sat 19/11 Liverpool (H) Thurs 24/11 - Sparta (A) Sun 27/11 - Everton (H) league cup if we beat Sunderland Sat 3/12 - Palace (A) Thurs 8/12 - Be'er Sheva (H) Sun 11/12 - Boro (H) Wed 14/12 - Stoke (A) Sun 18/12 - Bournemouth (A)
