Three points given away without a doubt, complacency? most probably. Snodgrass always has a stormer against us, can you have bogey players?. I'll settle for a solid mid-table and a shot at one of the cups this season, the top five or six are at a different level.
To put it into quite scary terms , we've only scored 3 more goals than Sunderland who gave 5 points from 11 games! Worrying !
No question; Tadic didn't have a great game, and Davis and Clasie are a poor pairing, as neither are exactly eager to drive us forward. An all-action CM with a willingness to get into the box wouldn't go amiss...and neither perhaps would a bit of a clearout at the end of the year.
I think that we could have accommodated both Tadic and Boufal today at the expense of either Davis or Clasie. Hull were barely getting out of their half in the first 45 and the extra creativity might've resulted in the crucial second goal for us.
I agree, I don't see why it's either-or with Boufal and Tadic. Redmond, Boufal and Tadic all behind Austin (rotating between the 3 who's on wing and no.10 etc) could work, I'm not sure we've seen that yet? Boufal is being nursed back anyway, this could be Puel's plan eventually we will see.
We also had one cleared off the line and hit the bar. Snodgrass buried his chance, and Austin should have done better with his. That's the way it goes sometimes.
Which Austin chance? The one that drew the diving save? I was actually kind of impressed by that. I felt like the ball was played to him a little too hard and a little behind him and he did the right thing by just trying to place/poke it into a corner. He couldn't get enough on it and so it was saved. But I was thinking how nice it was that Austin is a finisher and knew what to do, as opposed to trying to crush it and whiffing, or trying to take another touch to dig it out from under his feet and then not ever getting the shot off.
Yeah, let's replace half our squad who finished 6th in the league with a manager whose still learning about his squad and the league. We don't need a clearout, we need a few tweaks.
It's a reasonable statement. You could argue cases for Davis, Rodriguez, Clasie, Martina and Cedric to be sold.
You could also argue cases for them not to be. I think it's still too early in the season to judge player futures, but I agree some of these have had poor starts to the season. RB is certainly an area I'd be looking to upgrade, if Cedric doesn't start performing this year.
The only one of those that I would be vaguely happy to lose is Clasie. Even that is a bit dubious in my opinion though. Martina has been brilliant in covering for Cedric. Cedric will be back and isn't bad at all. The main problem with Cuco is that he has played too many games. Davis isn't the Davis of last year, but he still gives 100% in every game. Jay needs a break, he is showing glimpses of what he is good at, but it may take time. I'm not ready to writ him off yet. Just my views....
Just got back from Hull and the result was no surprise. After the penalty we just seemed content to pass the ball around or create fancy patterns. The pace got slower and slower. Hull lost two players but still looked comfortable. Eventually they realised that Saints would never score, so they just upped the pace and took the two chances they had. Suddenly we woke up but it was too late. Not being able to turn possession into goals continues to be a problem. We stumble on.
Not sure where you got half the squad from. We are missing something in CM, despite having a sizable CM contingent. It's something that not only will likely require one or more additions, but corresponding subtractions. Same applies to our strikers.
Haven't read any of the above, because it probably matches the frustration I am feeling. This kind of result is what happens when you play with the intensity of a training session. When Snodgrass came on, I told my son he could be a handful and had a great left foot. My son understands what I meant, now. I also told my son, shortly into the second half, that the game had the feel of a 1-1 draw, with their equaliser resulting from our sloppiness. The marking for their first was dreadful. Despite all the above, I never envisaged losing. Was it Adkins who said something like "never get too high, and never get too low"? After the euphoria of beating Inter, this is now the lowest feeling since the home defeat by Liverpool, in last season's EFL Cup. Hopefully, for once, this international break will come at a good time for us.
Why do players need to be sold? To punish them for not achieving our expectations? As usual, some people need to take a deep breath and offer opinions on squad sales once they've got over the undoubted disappointment of losing to Hull. Players can only be sold when better replacements are available and that would be a constant. Clasie is currently one of our squad players and won't get a game once Claude thinks he has someone better. Yes, I agree we might need a better RB unless one of the current one's improves their all-round game, but we'd still need a 2nd & 3rd option and how would we get players better than we have to sit on our bench? As you say, JRod needs time, Davis works his socks off and we miss him when he's not there. You need hod carriers to allow the bricklayers to do their job. Wouldn't everything seem different if we could convert one of our many shots on target and stop opposition from scoring every bloody shot they have on target? We just need goals to convert our decent performances into wins.
I agree that Davis gives 100% every game. But I personally feel we've reached a level where that is no longer sufficient (in fact, I think we've been there for at least a year).If he played for a City or an Arsenal, people up and down the country would ridicule him like they have Allen, Barry, Milner and co in recent years (and actually, you could argue that all of them are better than Davis!). Now of course I'm not saying that we're Man City, but to take the next step, we need to looking up at those sides rather than down at the likes of WBA and Palace. Davis would do a great job for those sides, but I think we're better than that; I think we have outgrown him. Until we add goals and assists to our CM, there's a ceiling which we are never going to overcome in my view.
A quick summary of today's game. MELTDOWN We haven't had one since half time against Inter. Firstly I applaud all those who travelled to support the saints today. Long journey and disappointing. Secondly, let's stop all this talk of calling Hull a pub team or expecting that we just need to turn up to win. This is a tough league and we should show some respect. Sometimes teams have an off day and the luck just doesn't go with you. It's not just a saints thing, I'm sure man city expected to beat boro yesterday and Utd beat Burnley last week. A big result for hull, a poor one for saints. Let's turn it around for the next one.
