He does have quite a wide mouth. I’ll say that much for him. He could take 3 or 4 dicks in that mouth, which I admit is a turn-on.
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You are right about the loss of VV and Austin and the fact that things could be a lot worse. My only concern is that they could be a lot worse next season.
For me the biggest issue of concern is that there is no clear identity to this team. No longer are we a high tempo pressing team that seeks to win the ball back in the attacking third and create clear cut chances from hasseling defenders in to making mistakes. I had thought that this was the ‘Southampton Way’? We are slow, pedestrian, withdrawn and unimaginative. As far as I am concerned, regardless of injuries this HAS to be down to the manager’s footballing philosophy. He has farted about with a diamond, then 4-3-3 before eventually finding his way back to 4-2-3-1. Worringly I read an article that suggested that this was at the players request!!! If that is true then how much respect do you honestly think these players have for the manager?
That said, sure he is playing 4-2-3-1 but that is just a formation, not a game plan or tactics. I dont think 4-2-3-1 is HIS formation or that he knows what the fuck to do with it. Clearly the diamond is his formation of choice otherwise he surely wouldnt have persevered with it for as long as he did during the early part of the season.
If memory serves me, at the time he was defending the use of the diamond and explained that it is important for the players to learn another system in order to adopt it at certain times. Now… correct me if I am wrong here please… have we at any point in the 30 odd games since that, reverted to a diamond with 2 up top for tactical reasons? Chasing a game that we are losing late on does not count. Even still, I genuinely cannot recall an instance. So if that is the case, clearly that is bollox and it was the case that he wanted to play that way because it was HIS way. He perhaps realised that it didnt work for us and with the players we had but I am not convinced that it is particularly suitable to the Premier League. Even more so now that Chelsea, Tottenham and more will follow, have adopted a back 3. There is not the right balance in midfield and we would get overun with not enough cover for the back four.
@lifeintheslowlane is bang on about the lack of through balls. Fucking terrible. I don’t recall a single one against Hull (my last live game). Obviously we didnt against Liverpool either.
Somebody mentioned Eric Black above and I agree he comes across as very uninspiring. I think it is clear that he got the job because he could speak fluent French and Claude can only mumble nonsense about things being interesting possibilities in English. Nothing more and nothing less. Purely his ability to communicate with a manager who was not proficient in the native tongue. We might as well have hired a hot female translator for Claude. Maybe then the players might try and show off and inadvertantly play better, if only by accident.
We sold players who were scoring 15 goals a season and replaced one of them with Nathan Redmond who was NEVER going to provide regular goals. I know he is young but his career stats show this and his lack of end product has been evident for a long time. He always looked like a bit if an Aaron Lennon to me in that respect, but less direct. If he ever gets to that level of consistency then guess what, he will be sold too. Mane’s first instinct was to run beyond at and beyond people. Redmond doesnt. He checks back square far too often which means the game is slowed down, we allow opposition to get back goalside and our attacks build further from the opposition goal.
Some of you will argue, and rightly so, that Boufal was Mane’s replacement - not Redmond. Fair enough, I think you’re probably right. However, his injury hit start to the season and lack of game time in general has rendered him largely out of the equation. We knew he was crocked when we bought him though so I don’t think we can rue our bad luck in that instance.
It just does not feel right at the moment and I am not sure what benefit a transfer window and a pre season will have.
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Saints are really boring now, aren’t they? I’ve kind of lost interest.
Good job the cricket season has started. That’s a much better sport.
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Answered ur own question there I Reckon!
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Yeah, nothing makes you appreciate how, even the most boring, slow football is interesting. Than sitting for days to watch a man rub a cricket ball on his knob, only for it to rain and everyone to agree to just call it a draw. A few months of that and we will all be begging for Poooel to come back and see if we can grind out another 0-0 at Anfield.
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I had an idea the other day to make Cricket more interesting! How about right, when ur batting the rest of ur team is not sit in stands smoking pipe or whatever, they’re mixed in with the other teams fielders.
What happens, right, is when you hit the ball, you try and hit it to one of ur own players in the field. If he gets it, you can keep scoring runs until the other team have caught ur player, duffed him up, and got the ball back.
What do you think Bout That?
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Either that or bigger goals.
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I’d watch that shit.
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We certainly played a lot better last night, which doesn’t really say a lot, if our finishing had been better in the first half then I think we may have taken all the points.
As it was Arsenal ground us down with their defensive performance and then got us on the counter when we were looking tired. A supoerb goal from Snachez and then Yosh caught out for the second.
I am dispirited but not down hearted.
I feel for the people travelling oop north this weekend though.
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The lack of an attacking midfielder who can slip a well-weighted through-ball through to a striker has been a problem for a while. Trouble is, recognising this fact rather puts the blame on Steven Davis which many are extremely reluctant to do.
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Tadic should be able to do that. He’s got that in his fkn locker I reckon, lazy cunt.
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He should, and he has done in the past. For some reason he seems to have stopped, just as we have a shit-hot striker who’s always looking to make runs onto a neat through ball. Gabbiadini wasn’t far off getting properly on the end of a pretty speculative, though overhit, pass in the first half last night. That ball came from Redmond though, not Tadic.
Personally, I’d like to see us start the last three games with Boufal in the central position in place of Tadic. I think he’d offer more. The way Tadic is playing right now he could scarcely offer less.
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I don’t think it helps that Davis is playing as one of the two holding players. Under previous (more successful regimes) he was played in a more advanced role. Almost as a number 10. The one currently occupied by the immovable, unsubable Tadic. Davis used to knit shit together quite nicely with short sharp passes in the final third but in his deeper role he just plays square. He hasn’t really got the threaded through ball in his locker like Steven Gerrard used to for Torres. Gabbiadini’s movement is decent but he needs the ball played to him a hell of a lot earlier. That is why I say push the boat out for Gylfi Sigurddsson. (Will never happen though. Especially as Swansea look like beating the drop now).
Personally I would rather see Clasie or PEH played alongside Romeu for a run of games. At least that is their natural position and Clasie can pass forwards. Under Claude’s regime that would mean dropping Davis which I don’t think will happen in the absence of VVD as captain.
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I could live without Davis tbh. I reckon we could persuade Villa to give us £15m for him. I’ll make a couple of calls.
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Send Mick along to have a word with Tony when you have 5 minutes away from your fryer!!
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Funny thing is, the best passer of an incisive through ball by far is Clasie and he hasn’t even made the bench lately or started since he scored … seems strange to me, unless he’s injured
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He is never talked about as being missing through injury so I don’t think it is that. Either Claude doesn’t rate him or Clasie has banged his wife. I refuse to listen to any other possibilities on the subject.
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it is strange JC and PH arnt getting games. I thought we would be training them on. Something is rotton in Belguim or Netherlands or even Denmark
I’ve obviously spent far to long on the election thread. I read that as Jeremy Corbyn and Philip Hammond.
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You’ve got me there NYS … not sure what this means