Despite the amazing job ralph has done with this team. I still think we are one loss away from being right in the mire.have to beat cardiff. Also , what the **** has redmond been eating.looks such a good player now
As it stands it is probably 1 from 6 competing for the last relegation place and Brighton with no wins in the last 5 must be looking over their shoulders right now. We have to keep this run going and I have faith in Ralph's game management (look how we came out and dominated at the start of the second half) but the old negativity and panic still exists in the players when coming into the final stages of a match defending with a desperate oppo throwing the kitchen sink at us.
Yep.i notice that still even now,we take the lead and then sit abit too deep. Its almost like the player are expecting the oppo to score
The problems i see over the last 2 games are that our bad sides are still there - predictable attacking play against sides that don't come at us and retreating into our shell when we score first. Both serious flaws for a long time now. Hopefully Ralph can work some of his magic on this before the end of the season just as he has done on an individual level. As a man to with the squadman coach he has done an outstanding job Defensively we are far more solid but upfront we don't seem to have much impetus at the moment. Now with Ings out we lack the players to really get at the opposition which will make scoring against Cardiff a real challenge. Obafemi, Sims, Gallagher chance to step up?
It was disappointing the way we conceded, however we are conceding less and we are scoring more and picked up 15 points from 9 games, few teams have better form in the last five matches so I think we have to go into the Cardiff game with some confidence.
We have been lambasting Stephens for his handball, however he was under more pressure and it was far less reckless than Steve Cook's and Cyrus Christies' handballs!
I think that Tom might've threw his toys out of the pram a bit but most of us saw the incident for what it was, a piece of bad luck after probably being unfairly challenged by Peter Crouch.
Haven’t seen the highlights but yet again one of our CB’s make a costly error. I don’t like us with 3 at the back atm. Neither fullbacks are pushing on and pinning their fullbacks. We allowed palace to come on to us a bit. Also I noticed vestegaard was dragged out wide marking the winger and target came inside. Surely the fullback marks the winger and the CB picks up players in the box. It’s as though we didn’t know when to mark zonally and when to man mark. Ings injury is worrying, only long and Austin to cover him.
100% not a penalty. Had the ball hit his hand from the cross, fair enough but it didn’t. It rebounded from Crouch’s head about 2 inches away with Stephens facing the other way. How can he possibly have got his hand out of the way? It’s no argument to say his arm shouldn’t have been there in the first place because he can’t possibly have known what was going to happen next. The first Burnley appeal though was definitely a penalty.
As another matchday comes to an end, if you are like me you have mixed emotions after Saturday's result. As a comparison to matchday 25 last year we had a point less last year and we were in the bottom 3 We had no momentum and we had Pellegrino in charge and the bottom 2 were breathing down our necks. We survived. This time around, we are on a decent run, players have stepped up and we have a manager who knows what he is doing. It ain't going to be easy but roll on matchday 26 and let's see if we can't convert some of these draws into wins. Up the ****ing saints
If it was so common that defenders cannot control their arms in close quarters in the box there would be a handball just about every game. Defenders would have their hands up every aerial challenge and the ball will hit a hand at some point. At some point, I suppose defenders would just start starfish leaping at opponents. After all, they can always claim they cannot know for sure before the ball is kicked that it will hit their hand. But theyare certainly increasing the odds it will and gaining a big advantage. I'm a big hand to ball guy myself so strictly enforcing that rule I would say there is no penalty because at no point did Stephens ever intentionally play the ball or try to gain an advantage by placing his hands in a given space. At the same time, I'd also feel like Stephens got a little lucky and got away with one. Because he definitely made himself taller by having his hands up, even if that was not his intent. And he messed up a big hill scoring opportunity. Instead he got unlucky. I do not blame Stephens, but I also do not blame the official. It's basically an unlucky deflection to me. It just hit his hand for an unfortunate pen, instead if bouncing off a legal body part and into the goal. Six inches difference, and nothing happens. Unlucky, yes. But we gave them too many chances so eventually something was going to happen.
I didn't have a problem with us going defensive so much. I had a problem with us being bad at it. We actually passed the ball in the back a bit which is better than our usual "hoof it right to their defensive mid so he can eam it right back dien our throats" strategy. But we had nothing on the counter to keep them somewhat honest. And Long unfortunately did a rather **** job of holding up the ball today. There was one point where someone cleared the ball right to their fullback, but Long being Long never gave up, pressured him and managed to get a head on the ball when they tried to play it back in. Then with the ball fortuitously at his feet he flailed out and gave it right back to them, and they had it right back in the mixer on the second attempt and costing them like, 2 seconds max. It was the Shane Longiest play I've ever seen.
S.A. Can I ask you to withdraw that remark? I have a 6' 9" Saints supporting grandson who regrets being as tall as he is and imo does not deserve to be regarded as a freak.
As others have already said we dropped too deep as the game progressed. A big part of the problem imo is our lack of players up front who can hold onto the ball for long enough to let the defence and midfield push up. Redders can, and so can Ings to some degree, which is why we need one or both on the pitch for the full 90 minutes. A striker with this ability must be a priority in the summer.
