A part of me believes that the players may have been up late with new years celebrations. The performance was unbelievably bad, it was like their heads were not in the game.
Arsenal were toothless against a bottom 3 team. We can not win every game, that's right. The problem is - we could play untill tomorrow and never make a shot on target let alone score. Utterly toothless. And persisting moments of our casual defending are just scary.
As a Saints fan, and also biased, I think we are pleased with a point but on the day edged it and maybe should have had three. Even with the disallowed goal and we could have had a softish penalty in the first half when Yoshida was kicked rather than the ball. Sadly we don't kill teams off and as District Line said we often have a lot of possession. I think Arsenal were quite one dimensional and Southampton defended well and prevented the Gunners from playing through the middle; you didn't really work our keeper and although your keeper didn't do too much either, he was certainly busier. It was a big contrast from the game at yours where we defended to high and got hit on the counter far too often.
That's a pretty fair analysis of the game. I just feel that game lacked any real quality from both sides and most of it was really scrappy. You looked busier in attack but at no point was our defence under some serious periods of pressure. We were just plain **** in attack, though.
You look at players like Walcott and you feel that the service to the front man was non-existent except for the one decent ball Oxlade-Chamberlain put in in the first half but even once Giroud came on there was little supply. I thought your midfield let you down and ours harried you. Gervinho did run at Cork, who is a midfielder who rarely plays right back but you would have thought they would have got at him more. I think we defended well and although Arsenal were below par, part of that was our doing. You are right it was not a great technical match but quite exciting; I think we play good enough football to stay up but unfortunately we don't keep enough leads. Good luck for the rest of the season.
We lacked energy today. The midfield didn't chase the ball enough or protect our defense. The forward line didn't move enough. So I have to ask, where was Rosicky? We needed his energy today. Sagna was diabolical, but after his recent poor performances, a shocker like this was just a matter of time. Cazorla has been poor for three games now since Reading. Podolski started well but became anonymous yet again. The only players who did well were Vermaelen, Szczesny and Wilshere. Walcott played badly but it was his free kick that gave us the goal. Gent, you have 1700 posts on this forum. Has every one being about how **** you think Walcott is? Seriously wtf... after reading through all the posts in this match thread, all i could say was "Oh not again!" and "Give it a bloody rest".
I sit in the stand directly behind the goal which we (Saints) were attacking, and I called the Ramirez foul immediately. So I have no complaints at all that the goal was ruled out. Compared to some of the rubbish referee's we've had down here this season, I thought Probert actually had an alright game.
This has been a regular fixture this season. It often seems like the players are either uninspired, inhibited or lacking in creativity generally.
Southampton's disallowed goal wasn't a foul for me. Too little contact to give a genuinely unfair advantage. It was however offside, not by Gaston Ramirez, but the other Saints player was and he was interfering with play by obstructing Szczesny's view and movement. So it was right to disallow the goal, but for the wrong reason.
Walcott or any other striker can not score if he does not recieve the ball. Your wide men were pushed back and made a non threat by a 17 year old and a centre back playing out of position and is the quickest of guys. Love to watch Arsenal play but how can a team one week play so well and win 7-3 and the following week not muster a shot at goal. To quote our leader- Hard work beats talent, if talent does not work hard
Hear me out with this, it's a quite franky ridiculous idea, but I think it might have worked: With Theo struggling to make an impact up front because of the Saints playing a deep-line, why not go all crazy, and switch Pod & Theo? Putting a bigger, stronger player in the CF position to link play and allowing Theo to utilise his pace & crossing ability from the wing? Means no need to bring a sub on, but changes the dynamic of the team. Was there any evidence of this at any point?
where was Rosicky?????...we needed his energy ....God help us ....if you think that man is gonna ...make us a better team your as blind and misguided as Wenger
Rosicky has not been involved in any of our last four games despite being on the bench. If he is not going to use why does he keep wasting a place on bench by picking Rosicky in the first place?
