How the heck are we missing such simple goals. Two at least were tap ins for goodness sake. The midfield are crap I’m afraid.they just do not have the foggiest how to play. WP was totally useless mostly backward or sideways passes. I so disappointed with this result. All the goals came from down our left side.
Defending teams need to actually be worried that if they attacked too much they could be punished. This is where Broja was good. He ended up being hit and miss but defences were still scared of him. They aren’t going to be of Walcott and Elyounoussi I’d quibble with the bit about players being ready. Lavia, Bazunu and Livramento started instantly. ABK after a couple of games. Salisu took a while but was very good as soon as the trigger was pulled (and then tailed off) AMN took too long to throw in really. That was bizarre. And then we sit on the attacking players too long - Edozie and Broja being examples. So it’s a mixed bag there
The likes of Rice and Guimares come to St. Mary’s and show up JWP with a neat little one-two to create space and a 20 yard placed shot into the corner. Make it look so easy. Prowsie doesn’t look like scoring again this season.
Fwiw I think the club could do everyone a favour and come to a mutual agreement with Ralph, pay him off and let him go with some dignity. The highs have been brilliant and the lows dreadful . Perhaps the board needs to draw the famous blue line and start again.
In all comps since his first Southampton goal in March, Romain Perraud is the clubs 2nd highest scorer with 3 goals
After today's performance I am convinced we will get relegated. In so many ways, I can understand why some supporters are still sticking with Ralph. The football we played was often good and we kept creating chances. If we were higher up the league, some people would have walked out of the ground saying it was an off day. Newcastle had four chanceson target and scored from all of them. However, i think that this perception comes with a massive caveat. This performance was so typical of what we have seen from Ralph for ther whole of 2022. There are moments where we play good football yet, by the same token, we never look like we will score. For me, I feel we only did half the job of sorting the club out in the summer. The point about Mara is a good one as you wonder just how bad he must be in training for Adams, Armstrong ,Aribo and now Walcott to be chosen to play up front. Adams and Armstrong are not good enough for this league. I believe that Ralph will be shown the door after Liverpool. He should have been binned in the summer. There is no sign of improvement on our results and given the money spent in rebuilding the side, we have looked too far ahead to the future as opposed to addressing an issue which was urgent as soon as Danny Ings went out of the door. There will be a massive inquisition in May when we go down and you can see a lot of heads rolling within Sports Republic having got the whole summer re-build so horribly wrong. The problem with the defence looks like being solved (unitl today!) whilst the midfield and forward line look ineffectual when it comes to scoring goals. Senior player like Stuart Armstrong and JWP are no showing up. Got to say that I love Ralph as a bloke yet it was abundant before the summer that he had no future with us. I do not see us escaping relegation so the next manager to be appointed with probably need promotion experience. .
With a fit squad and a nice-looking run of fixtures after the World Cup, plus new manager bounce, I can honestly see us winning 3 or 4 games in Dec/Jan and pulling away from the scrappers. If we sign a decent striker in Jan then comfortable mid-table finish.
Yeah, up until they scored their second (out of nowhere) I thought we were comfortably the better side. But Ely and Che continued to have their miss-of-the-season competition, and Newcastle made us pay. We largely disappeared once it went 2-0. Absolutely no idea what Theo was doing in the starting XI. Give Edozie a chance. Or give Mara a chance. Look at the two kids who are flying at Leeds, having been given a chance by Marsch. I have no idea if they're good enough, but I do know that Theo isn't. Our finishing is a complete joke. Some people were rating our transfer as 8 or 9 out of 10, and dismissing the lack of a goalscorer as essentially being nothing more than not having a cherry to put on top of an excellently iced cake. Whereas in reality the transfer window was a failure. Sticking the ball in the net is the most important thing on the pitch, and we could barely be any worse at it.
Just back and read over this thread/argument. Not much to add. Never been Ralph out, but I know now is the time for a new challenge for both us and him. Thanks Ralph for being passionate, trying and caring. Good luck in the future.
Just got back, I think 4-1 flattered them but we weren’t great. The first half was competitive, we were unlucky to be 1 down. Second half they just carved through us. Perraud did well, Lavia was ok. Liked the look of Edozie when he came on. Aribo was ok. The rest were average to poor. Elyonoussi was ok in the first half. Our lack of goals is not just a striker thing, when we get to the edge of the box we run out of ideas. Nobody moving around making gaps and calling out for it. Especially in the second half, we would be in possession going forward and only Aribo and Lavia looked like they wanted involvement.
