How does us conceding a goal from a mistake reflect on our style of play? Now that is just a ridiculous statement, in what manor was that a cup final? It was a home game we needed to win, we are a high pressing side against any team not just you lot. I think a little bit more respect needed to be shown in this post.
No ones being disrespectful, we were rubbish yesterday and didn't deserve anything, what I was surprised about was your tactics. Very one dimensional just spent most of the time lumping it up to the front and hoping for flick ons. I won't go so far to call Southampton a Hoofball team but I would suggest more variety is needed to survive.
Well I suppose that's why it's a game of views, yes we occasionally went long (as did you to michu). But I think we out passed you constantly. The possession was 60/40 towards us as well.
I think you guys sound a bit bitter and disrespectful if anything, you dont seriously beleive you out passed us constantly do you? sure you had spells of good play, but after we scored i thought you got a bit lucky really as your team started flapping a bit. I thought Southampton were poor and i thought Swansea were poor, you have spent £30m quid yet i dont see where that money has improved you, you were playing against our reserve defence and keeper but didnt really trouble us as much as i thought you would. I see it as a point gained for Swansea non the less, 2 crap teams yesterday and BOTH need to improve to maintain prem status, it was like a cup final for you yesterday, on your message boards your fans were talking about how 3pts was a must and it was essential to win at all costs, i see that has now changed when you only gained 1pt . I wish you guys well, you have had a difficult start to prem life, i hope you can stay up but at the same time i kind of want you to stay where you are, only because it gives us a greater chance of staying up. best of luck
Both teams targeted this as a game they wanted a win from but both deserved a point each for various reasons sloppy passing, poor defensive slip ups and lack of urgency/killer instinct due to tiredness maybe but thats not a luxury we can afford at this level . Roll on Jan so ML can bolster our defence from his foreing contacts.
A point gained on our actual performance because I thought we were way below par, which Saints' display had something to do with. Two points lost on our expectations after the previous three games. I am concerned about our performance with good cause. We weren't taken by surprise because ML had been saying for two weeks how important this game was and how Saints would battle. Despite this, after a tidy start, we allowed them to take control and it was backs to the wall stuff at times. We didn't come close to imposing our game on them and I put this down to an alarming lack of authority in midfield. We usually lost out to 50/50 tussles for the ball and didn't look to have the appetite there to compete and win it back. We have to realise that other teams are not going to sit back and let us play - particularly those teams in our own mini league.
I noticed a few times Ash williams screaming at his mid field because they were a few yards off their runners, it was concerning as Britton,ki and JDG were all responsible for this. I can take the midfield having an off day but as Ivor rightly says, this was a game we knew we had to compete in strongly! ML press conference in the Chelsea game ,he was asked how important points were against the blues, his answer was simple and truthful, " of course i want to win, but if i had to take 3pts against Chelsea or 3pts against Southampton,then i would take 3pts against southampton every time" ML knows full well the significance of taking points off your relegation rivals, and i have maintained we are relegation candidates from the start of the season. Talk of europe and mid table is premature especially with injury crisis that is getting worse by the game. Performing against the big boys is easy,just ask southampton ,who had spirited games against the top teams as well, the bread and butter is against your rivals and yet again we fall short. There were 2/3 results that were bonus games for us last year Man city home,WBA away and Fulham away , all those teams will not make the same mistake twice, thats 9pts we gained that was in fact the difference between us staying up and being on the edge of relelgation, its such a fine line and we didnt have any injury problems like we have this season. Im concerned about the defence as all regular posters know. Laudrup cant do much about it right now but i do think the inability to move on players in the summer meant he had little option to move in the transfer market defensively, this is totally understandable as the club cant have too many pro footballers getting paid and not playing games. People talk about monk having a great game, he did well but his faults remain. If they had been awarded the penalty for that stupid tackle on the edge of the area people would be taking a different view of the player today, he was very lucky to get away with that. When you have to perform on your limit every game just to have parity mistakes are always going to happen, we saw the same with the southampton defender, its been their main problem this season and its also been our main problem since we missed Taylor,chico(various reasons)bartley and vorm . We are limping to the transfer window but i get the feeling we will struggle to move on the likes of tate,monk and gower. this may make it more difficult ot bring in other players as we know the club operate a strict financial structure. The more i think about it the more im thankful for the point !
Norway, I have said before that Ki, as great as he's playing for us, lacks that ability to get his foot in and frequently loses the man who runs off and past him eg. Tevez' goal against us. Leon is less guilty of that but doesn't always track his man. JdG, though, is non existent in terms of ball winning. They all forage, intercept and pick up scraps from loose passes etc but we do not have a midfield dog that steams into tackles and wins us the ball in the tackle on a consistent basis. This means that usually we have to wait for the opposition play to break down for one reason or another, as opposed to robbing them in the tackle and countering quickly. For me, Kemy is the closest we've got to that but I'm not necessarily saying he's the answer. Could be worth a run of games, though, to get proper match fitness. It also helps that he is a very good passer of the ball when he's won it.
Ive put alot of Ki 's earlier positioning down to finding his feet in the team and getting use to our movement and comunication, his 4yrds off tevez was indeed poor, but tevez is world class at finding space anyway. There is definatly less working off the ball under Laudrups leadership and we have maybe missed a genuine ball winner for quite a while, the problem we have is that to sign a ball winner who can actually play as well will cost alot of money, hopefully Laudrup knows of one, trying to think back to his playing days and if there was one in the teams he played in or if he had one while managing in Spain,not sure if it forms part of his plans or not. JDG was dissapointing for me, went missing for long periods, it was mentioned somewhere else that maybe he is one of these players that enjoys the limelight and puts it in at the big games but goes into automatic mode in the run of the mill matches, its a thought but im thinking tiredness was more of a factor for the midfield boys yesterday perhaps. I expect a few changes for the Newcastle game,maybe Kemy will come in and add a bit more steel, its going to be mighty tough away at newcastle thats for sure
My Saints friend, I have not forgotten you boys giving it big against us on the old BBC 606, you had some right idiots berating us, having said that, no post on here has been disrespectful of you boys game, and matter of fact I stated on this thread earlier, that you pressed us high up field, and closed Michu down, so think you need to be less touchy, ok your propping the table up, but no need to be so sensitive, you played well in my view!.....................
definitely 1 point gained on that performance....a deserved point never the less, our keeper is showing his worth and was MOM and monk and dyer the old southampton players were top of the rest of the players worth a mention....not one of our best games but i will take a point after that....
We aren't propping the table up, that honour now goes to QPR. I was very happy with how we played yesterday against a very average Swansea team. You didn't create any chances until we gifted you the goal. We had many chances which on another day and with a ref who understands what a fowl is the result would have been 3-1. The way we play is mostly on the floor, we change the tactic if we play a team that struggle in the air which you obviously do. Congrats on your snatch and grab!!
Hell these Saints boys are touchy! Ok your not propping the table up then.................... Penalty!!! Are you referring to our Garry Monks marvellous tackle on the edge of the box?............... Snatch & Grab = Tough!.................
I said before the match that the saints will only get anything if we were not at our best and thats how it turned out. If we were on song then we would have beaten the saints with ease. they were on top form but we still came away with a point and im happy about that...Saints have a couple of good players one being lambert but i dont think he alone will save them from the drop this season....even at their best they are still not good enough at home and are worse away from home so i cant see where they will get 40+ points from.....We should nick lambert off them when they go down ....im sure he would jump at the chance of joining his mate ash in the premiership.....
I don't expect any changes actually, bar Chico Flores back in for Monk if he's fit. Laudrup clearly has his first choice team identified and doesn't seem inclined to chop and change much. Any 2 from Dyer, Routledge & Hernandez seems to be his only decision. If you remove our 3 games against the top 4 teams then we have W3 D3 and L2 and if we can keep up that level of progress against opponents in our 'mini-league' then we should be able to keep our position in mid-table. The positions from 5-10 are currently quite interesting. We have West Brom, West Ham & Fulham who many would say are over-achieving while Arsenal, Tottenham, Newcastle & Liverpool(?) are lower than you would expect. Given time, those positions may start to be reversed but I still think a mid-table position of 9th - 12th is not beyond us by next May.
dyer, Routledge and Hernandez will be rotated by the look of it and chico will replace monk who fair play to him put in a good display against the saints....he is a better organizer than ash anyway and ash plays better when he dont have the responsibility of captain.....monk was directing his players well and is a worthy stand by when we don't have anyone else....
