Whats constructive either about whitewashing a perfectly decent manager from memory? I believe we would have played a lot better today under Adkins. Simple as that.
When we beat Man City everyone was on a high and suddenly it was sort of presumed that Adkins could not have accomplished the same. But we don't know that. Similarly now we have many fans assuming we would have won this under Adkins. It's just the nature of being a fan that we sometimes let ourselves get too high or too low based on one result, so that doesn't bother me. I do get annoyed by people playing games. When Adkins was sacked there were people who thought that just too shabby a way to treat someone. Therefore (so they said), they could no longer support Saints in good conscience. That was a stance I respected, though ultimately I decide I would personally see how things played out. But now these same people are complaining about results after MP has only had a few games in charge. They are not showing much loyalty or support and frankly not even much logic. In short they are acting exactly like the plastic "big club" fans they purported to hate. If you don't like how Cortese runs things, then don't support the club as a matter of principle and stop following the team and pretending like wins or losses would make a difference. Don't keep hanging around the messageboard looking for very petty grievance to complain about. All you end up doing is proving to everyone that your principled stance is not so principled after all, and so you just look silly and a bit of a douche.
Speculating how we would have played today had Adkins been in charge is completely illogical and pointless in my opinion. For me, it's just a way for the anti-Pochettino brigade to some how try and justify their stance. Only a month before he was sacked, we put in arguably our worst home performance of the season when we lost 1-0 to Sunderland. Considering we'd beaten QPR, Newcastle and Reading over the previous five weeks or so, I don't think any of us really saw that coming. But it did. To me, today's performance (and result) was very similar to that Sunderland game. Likewise to the Wigan defeat. Comfortable in possession, but ultimately very slow and flat and very rarely testing the opposition keeper. Lots of side or back passes, rather than forward passes. And of course defensive lapses. That applies equally to all three matches. The moment QPR went 2-1 up, I said 'game-over' because I had gained no confidence in our performance up to that point that we were capable of equalising - and that is exactly the same in the second half's vs Wigan and Sunderland, when we were 1-0 down in each. Just never, ever looked like scoring. And as I say, those previous two games were under Adkins.
But I believe we would have lost against Man City under Adkins. Simple as that. Not. It is impossible to tell how Saints would have played today under Adkins so there is no point speculating about it.
People are reacting to a poor result and guessing we would have done better under Adkins. This is a massive volte face based on one game...perhaps they are right and, ignoring our recent good performances, we are about to lose every one of our remaining games and drop out of the league, but, more likely, we are not. We've been lucky that results went our way today, let's hope Villa lose as well. In that case, we remain 3 points (+ good GD) above the drop and have a lot of games to get the points we need. I think the points total for safety will be low this year and 3-4 wins may be all we need...let's get them sooner rather than later though...don't want to get to heart attack time.
I think we'll get our 3 - 4 wins, but not sooner rather than later. I'll go on record now and say that this will be a last day of the season jobbie. Sorry! (Thankfully, Stoke should have nothing to play for).
I hope we keep ticking it over, even with draws, so that we don't have to win too much at the end. Only 3-4 wins is great from 10games, but not so funny when you get to 5 games.
As your next appointment, you should try a proper manager rather than goalkeeping physio's and non English speaking ladies football team managers. HTH
This article is testament to the quality material that's submitted on LoftForWords every week! I don't imagine many rival sites would run articles as honest and complimentary with regards to opposition teams/managers. You're welcome
