I have written a special song with a tractor theme (the combine harvester song) and with a welcome to our new Danish signing. Saints got a brand new Gronbaek harvester and Juric's got the keys. Come on now let's get together as we climb up the league. We just got the 6 points and you might have 10 more. But saints got a brand new Gronbaek harvester and Juric's got the keys. Oooargh are you ready? The February come back starts here.
Saturday 1st February 2025. Portman Road, Ipswich 15:00 KO Ipswich V Southampton Referee: Michael Oliver. (As if things couldn't get worse!) Assistants: Stuart Burt, James Mainwaring. Fourth official: James Linington. VAR: Jarred Gillett. Assistant VAR: Adam Nunn.
They were pretty poor at St.Marys but still managed to steal a draw. I think they've overall improved since then though. It's not a '6 pointer' because we are so hopelessly adrift, but it's still a massive game. It's a must win for Ipswich if they want to stay up, and there's a reasonable chance they'd move out of the relegation zone if they do win. Our need to win is purely because we are running out of games to get 12 points and this is in theory one of our easiest remaining games to do so. We also don't really want the crowd to start turning on Juric because there is no point in firing him this season, but if we keep losing every week they will turn sooner or later, despite the hopeless situation.
Thought they outplayed us first half tbh. One thing for sure I'm not sure I can handle a late goal for them for the 3rd game in a row. Confident we might get something from this. Agree on your point re Juric and for me this is the first game we can properly judge him on imo.
At least, with this being a 3pm kick off, I shouldn’t Miss too much of the Ireland v England rugby game, which has a 4.45pm ko. Hopefully Sulemana will be back for this, just so we can see if he can maintain his new found confidence and willingness to run at defenders.
This may be an unpopular opinion, but if he can control himself from doing something moronic, and if we continue with 3 CBs, I'd still rather Stephens be the third CB than Bree. That said, I would prefer Wood over both of them but Juric clearly doesn't agree.
Actually buzzing for this. Feels like the first winnable away game for quite some time. Also going to be the first game this season where I can sing "you're going down with Southampton"
One tactic I have noticed, of late, is Bree or THB breaking forward into midfield, with Big Les or Aribo dropping into the back line to fill the gap left. Maybe it’s just me, but I don’t see the reason for the switch because both Les and Joe have more ability to move forward with the ball than either of the defenders, who then just swap back again.
Looks to me like he's asking Bree to do a similar job the CB's did when Wilder was at Sheffield United first time round.
