I remember Ralph saying that he wanted his teams to be horrible to play against...that is exactly how I felt Spurs players were feeling at around the hour mark...they were hassled and harried every time they got the ball! Such a remarkable difference to just 6 weeks ago! Well done Ralph and the team!!!
On way back. Cracking team performance, good to see us hold onto a slim lead against top opposition. Big difference; atmosphere at st Mary’s was rocking.
I think they generally are Laces, now he has stopped dicking around and full credit to him for doing so. people do have a right to point out and moan as they see fit, and it was pretty justified as at the time we were utterly hopeless. but as you and I just said, full credit to Ralph and the players for turning this around. I cant wait to go on Saturday to see Che get his first 2 goals for us...
So it looks like Stephens with a few solid performances is heading towards claiming a place on the prestigious list of 'Players that large (or incredibly disproportionately loud) sections of our fanbase declared as an abject failure who actually turned out to be somewhere between passable to very good'. And being called an abject failure would probably be one of the nicer things said about him, both online and in the stadium. How many players have been written off and abused by the crowd now? Now this is the kind of time we'll be seeing a lot of people saying things varying from 'Well Stephens was actually okay today, still not convinced' to 'Well I have to hold my hands up and admit I was wrong on Stephens, he's been great recently'. This is all well and good, and at least those people are willing to be somewhat moved from their entrenched positions. But you know what would be better? Learning from it. Seeing players like Redmond and Stephens have bad spells as young players only to turn it around should start to stop these people from turning on future players so quickly in future. Will it? Probably not, hopefully it will in some cases. It's probably just as likely that an equal or greater number will almost claim credit, that those players needed to be jeered and abused at the stadium and slated online, and that it 'forged them in fire' or 'gave them some backbone'. But all the same I will use this as a time to make a plea. Support the players, especially young ones. And if you can't manage enthusiasm, just try at least to not abuse them or heckle them.
So checking the league form tables, in the last 8 games, we are second only to Liverpool, having gained the same number of points as Leicester but having conceded 4 fewer goals.. Erm yes that's what I said, on current form we have the 3rd best defence in the league!!! https://www.transfermarkt.com/premier-league/formtabelle/wettbewerb/GB1?saison_id=2019&min=14&max=21
As the great philosopher, Nigel Adkins once said, hard work will beat talent if talent doesn’t work hard How true
From what I have read, Wesley is also having a cracking season on loan.. Sometimes it takes a while to click and with pressure removed.
He has played very well recently but I'm still not convinced that he has it in him to be a consistent PL player, well done to the lad though as he seems to really have worked hard to turn it around and I hope it continues. You've made that age old mistake of correlating people criticising players on a forum with people not supporting them in the ground which is nonsense. It's a football forum, for opinions, about football. I'm going to keeping on posting mine if that's alright with you.
Fantastic result, didn’t get anywhere near my usual levels of anxiety, even with 5 mins injury time! Onwards and upwards!!
Wasn't targeting you specifically Libby, nor trying to silence you. However if you want to suggest that Stephens, amongst others, has only taken criticism on a forum and not in the ground, I really struggle to see how you could come to that belief. The contempt shown to him has been abundantly apparent. I am not correlating from the stick online, I am talking about empirical evidence.
Really impressive win. We looked so organised and yet better team ... fuxking hate the spuds so even better to beat them today Jack Stephens MOTM. Superb display.
Didn't see that coming....not because we aren't capable of winning a game like that, but illogically* because I felt we'd earned enough points recently and fate would decide to bring us down to earth. *Based on being a Saints fan for some time. Loving it
