NPC Match 18 - Bristol City 2 Southampton 0

Bristol City fans celebrate on their bus home.

Today we have a trip to Ashton Gate to play Bristol City who after a nightmare start to the season, are languishing in the bottom 3.  Their notable players are David James at 56 who is still a decent keeper and Nicky Maynard who we were linked with by the gutter rags in the summer.  Bristol City are however, on the upside of ‘new manager bounce’ (in direct contract to The Skates) at the moment having picked up 3 wins since Derek McInnes replaced Keith Millen. 

Talking of the Skates (which I haven’t done for a while) and we have the news of another dodgy owner (Antonov) arrested for alleged financial irregularities.  He joins a long line of illustrious names like (deep breath)... Dodgy Manager arrested and charged for alleged tax evasion (Redknapp), Dodgy Chairman arrested and charged with the same (Mandaric), Dodgy CEO arrested and apparently done a deal (Storrie), Dodgy manager in a Brothel (Grant), Dodgy Non-Existent Owner who was invented to buy time and pass the Fit and Proper Persons Test (Al Mirage), Dodgy Gun Running Criminal owner with Assets Frozen by the Courts (Gaydemak Snr), Dodgy Gun Runners Son Fake Chairman and Car Park Owner who wasn’t owning it as a front for his Dad cos that would be against the rules (Gaydemak Jnr), Dodgy Loan Shark Ground Owner (Chanrai), Dodgy Potless Owner and Ice Cream Salesman and not a Doctor really (Al Fahim), Dodgy Administrator with a strange approach to financial ethics (Andronikou), Dodgy Convicted Fraudster running the club for a bit (Azougy), Dodgy nonsensical appointment of the FA’s head of integrity as CEO (Lampitt) and I’m sure I’ve missed some.  So the new owner is at least a bit dodgy as well - Who’d have thought it?  They did get a 9 point penalty that made absolutely no difference though and a transfer embargo that made no difference either....  and of course, they still have to pay a whopping 20% of their debts over a 5 year period, starting whenever they feel like it - so fair’s fair.  One of the downsides of Colonel Gaddaffi’s family being killed / arrested is that they can’t be linked to being prospective new Pompey owners any more. 

Since the Brighton game there hasn’t been any actual news coming out of SFC, just bullsht in the papers. There was some interesting fall-out with Brighton being charged with failing to control their players in the aftermath of the dodgy penalty decision.  Interestingly it’s for the 2^nd one rather than the first so I’m guessing that this is about Ashley Barnes barging the referee, which he should have got sent off for.  Also, one of their players, Marcos Painter, he of the rugby tackle / assault on Sir Rickie which went unpunished was bleating that the ref swore at him.  Put your dummy back in you embarrassing Muppet.

Our Nigel names the same team as the Brighton match with Deano keeping Morgan out of the midfield and Barney keeping his place on the bench.

Both teams start in fairly positive fashion and David James gets come predictably stick from the Saints end.  Sir Rickie is getting dogs abuse from the Wurzels who aren’t too fond of his Bristol Rovers background.  There’s a big blow on 7 minutes as Chappers goes down with no one near him and it immediately looks bad.  It’s obvious that he can’t carry on straight away and so Schneiderlin comes onto replace him, going to the right wing.  To me, this is a bit of a negative substitution with de Ridder being on the bench but I can see why he’s done it.

Morgan adds a touch of quality though and Lallana played a nice 1-2 with the Frenchman before firing in a decent shot which James tipped round the post.  It was a decent save and hopefully that former Skate Bastard wasn’t going to have as good a game as he had against us last time.

City are feeding their right winger, Albert Adomah at every opportunity and it’s easy to see why as he flies past Danny Fox and looks like he’s going to be a right handful.  Hopefully he’s one of these quick wingers who can run and that’s it, has no end product.  It’s fairly even for the first 25 minutes but City and Adomah fired a warning with a quick break, ending with an ambitious effort which flew just wide with Superkelv scrambling.

A growing sense of uncertainty is in the air which is not alleviated when a bread and butter cross comes in from the left and Luckykelv makes a complete bollocks of it and juggles it round the post for a corner.  It’s all Bristol City now and the Wurzels are coming across loud and clear.  They think they’re going to score soon and so do I – can we get to half time though?

We have a rare foray into the danger zone which ends with Lallana’s goal bound shot hitting the Gulyman, who‘s playing like he had a few pints at lunchtime.  Normal service is resumed as Pearson fastens onto a Kilkenny pass and it through on the keeper but Superkelv forces him wide and he thankfully runs out of angle and squares it across to no one.  I am unavoidably reminded on the Cardiff away game (the last one we lost) when it seemed like there was only one team on the pitch and we hadn’t turned up.  Mercifully, half time was just around the corner so Nigel had a chance to hopefully sort it out.

Half time came and went and unless the team talk consisted of “let Adomah have the ball and let him run at us and shoot”, then I’m guessing that we messed up as it takes all of 2 minutes for City to take the lead.  Adomah runs and shots and Superkelv parries it.  We half clear it before once again, Adomah runs at Fox, cuts inside onto his left foot and hits a bit of a scuffer which flicks off of Foxy (I think) and flat-foots Superkelv who ends up on his knees as the ball rolls past him and into the net.  It’s a scruffy, horrible, crappy goal but you can’t say they don’t deserve it.

Seemingly stung into action, Saints win a free kick when Lallana is carted over in none too subtle fashion by Pearson and Fox’s free kick presents Fonte with a free header at the back stick which he 50p heads wide of the other post.   Fonte, empowered by his driving run forwards against Brighton which won that stonewall penalty, attacked the box before feeding Deano whose cross went back to Jose to tee up the Gulyman, who from 6 yards out, controlled it for the Bristol defender to clear.  In a game of few opportunities for us, this was definitely one of them.  Time for a substitution, Gulyman off, Steve de Ridder on.

Adomah is still causing us problems and his cross from the right is met on the volley by the left winger steaming in but Superkelv gets down well to block at his near post, prompting Merringtitus to spout his usual gem about what we don’t want to do, which according to Dave, is let in another goal.  No shit.

We’re faring a bit better in attack as Foxy takes time out from being skinned by Adomah to feed a ball into de Ridder who jinks himself past a defender before lashing it into orbit.  Barnard comes on for Deano for the last 10 but all we can manage for now is de Ridder going to ground in none-too-convincing fashion and for the second week running, we get a booking for diving.

With 5 to go, Saints push forward more in hope than expectation and lose the ball, giving Adomah yet another opportunity to run with it through the middle this time.  As he overruns the ball, Jos slides in and hoofs him up in the air but not before he’s poked it through to Maynard who takes it on and shoots and then watches as it hits Fonte, deflects onto the ground and loops up, sailing over Superkelv who can only watch.  2-0, another deflection but you can’t say it’s not deserved.

Merringtitus predictably gives it the “I told you we didn’t want to do that” but to be fair to him, he sounds gutted.  Usually he can find a positive, even in a poor performance but he’s struggling today, suggesting there really is nothing to see here.

Nigel was quite philosophical and honest afterwards, explaining that there was a lack of goal threat, no shots on target and he never felt like we were going to score.  The question on his mind was whether we were bad or they were good.  Bit of both I expect Nigel.  For me, more damaging than the defeat itself will be the injury to Chappers who has in my opinion been player of the season so far.  He provides and urgency and snap in our midfield which sounded alarmingly lacking when he went off, suggesting that a long term absence would be keenly felt.  He didn’t sound too downbeat on his Twitter feed in the evening so hopefully it won’t be too long before he’s back.  Everyone needs some Bald Psycho in the team.  We lost today to two deflections so you could argue that on another day, we’d have got a 0-0.  Let’s not get all Brighton about it and moan though – Bristol City deserved to win.

So, it was a bad day at the office, made worse by the fact that West Ham and Cardiff won.  Fans of those clubs in particular will be waiting and expecting us to have a wobble now and fall into the pack and we have to ensure we don’t do that, starting with the visit of Hull City on Tuesday night.  I think I’m correct in saying we haven’t lost two in a row under Nigel Adkins and I don’t see that coming now.  I see us bouncing back as we invariably do and putting consecutive win number 21 on the board.

Keep the Faith etc