It is always difficult when the good times inevitably come to an end, it is how they deal with it and approach the future, that is more important right now, RonKo needs support from all directions, from the Club to serve his requirements for replacements, from the Players to make up for the setbacks and most of all the fans to keep the faith and back every move.
I hope not, but judging by some of the Neggies that are posting, they think we can't keep it up, as I say with the right kind of support there is no reason why we can't get over a couple of poor results and come storming back, particularly if those missing elements can get fit and fighting once more, it is no surprise that we have faltered, with injuries and very little good luck it was bound to happen.
Exactly, swings and roundabouts. They dominated the first half at the Liberty, should've been ahead, and then Bony was sent off. We then scored a really good goal from a midfielder in the 80th minute, and won 1-0. Today, it was almost identical, except we lost our man right at the end. A win each is probably about fair.
To look on the bright side, things could have been a hell of a lot worse when we lost Yoshida, Mane, Toby, Morgan and Victor at about the same time. We got a few points during that period. We got Mane and Maya back and the others will start to return soon as well.
We really need need somebody from midfield who has a good shot on him. I like JWP as his set piece delivery is good, but is he ever going to score?
I didn't see any of the game live but the MOTD highlights appeared to show us dominating in terms of possession, chances created, shots on target etc., but obviously we lost to Swansea's only shot on target. Is that a fair assessment? Anyway, FWIW I thought Bertrand had to go, and although Ron says they'll appeal I hope they don't. Good to see Keown agreeing that we missed a chance today, and that we simply ran out of steam with our midfield problems.
Yes, his finishing, like Davis', is tentative and this is something we miss: a player who can arrive in the box and score. Ward-Prowse makes great runs but unfortunately does not look like scoring. Today we were unlucky but we lacked a cutting edge. We put in crosses but other than Pelle we have no box player or arial threat, therefore we also do not make the most of corners. I would be interested to know our corner conversion rate. Our centre backs don't score anymore, not sure why. Both of Shelvey's goal threats came from him getting too much space in the pocket in front of our defence after Reed went off and therefore we had no holding midfielder. This is partly why we looked vulnerable against Palace: their attackers could run at our defence when no Schneiderlin or Wanyama is present. Disappointing, a draw would have been fair, but we move on to some more upcoming winnable games.
Think the CBs need to take responsibility today too for backing off. Also, Shelvey hit the post when Reed was still on the pitch.
Positive points: Elia is a skillful player and works hard. Mane came back and looks lively. Reed is really promising and was central to our dominance 1st half. Davis is a class player. Target can deputise.
I wonder if our play is a bit tired at the moment. It's like we've done this for 10000 minutes. Try this, try that. loft a ball up to Pelle. Really, without criticising because how could I after the season so far, I'd like to see us try Tadic, Mane and Elia up front, give Pelle a rest. He must be knackered and jaded right now, anyone would be. Chance to use him as an impact sub. And FFS James Ward Prowse, would you just get it in the net. : )
My 2 sons said to me after 35 mins that this was going to be easy like that Fulham game.. I just had a feeling we werent going to score if we played all day. Line drawn lets thrash QPR that will cheer us all up!
Would he have been selected for the game if he was still a Saint? Might have made the difference. Yippee, he's gone but I can still find ways to write about him. Every time we lose, I can just say, "We wouldn't have lost that if Jack was playing". Lets see, I reckon I can get 2 years worth out of that one. Actually, quite a lot of our football was superb today. Tadic, in the first half, was excellent and he and Clyne together were unstoppable. It is a pity that Clyne has no left foot though because he can only cross the ball when getting outside and round the defender and that gets a bit predictable after a while. Unlike some of you, I thought Pelle was great today, until he got into the box when he just appears lumbering, but outside the box he won everything. The only disappointment really was JWP. He is very enthusiastic but doesn't appear to achieve a great deal. His dead ball stuff looks good but what's the point if we aren't able to get anywhere near the crosses. At the end of the day, its hugely disappointing but these sort of games are quite common. There's no point in having all the possession if you don't create any chances. RK was getting frustrated himself at some of our 'possession passing'. In the end, he wanted to win the game which is why he brought on Mane. He's done this before and it never works. It just ends up with a line of defenders and a line of forwards all getting in each others' way. To be fair though, it nearly worked this time as Mane looked sharp. Obviously it left space at the back from which they scored but it was a gamble.
Give JWP time. He's only 20 and I think he'll get better in front of goal as his confidence increases.
It lacked quality. JWP missed a sitter at the beginning. There was lots of other chances in first half we didn't take. Our corners were mostly terrible. Tadic on the right is pointless because he has to cut in on his left foot every time. Forster nearly gifted them a goal. Can't blame Koeman's sub because they looked like scoring every time they broke anyway. Elia looked like our player most likely to make something happen.
