Wednesday, March 25, 2015

Premier League Match 30 - Southampton 2 Burnley 0

 
Alderweireld Leads an Old Bloke onto the Pitch
 
There is a mood of positivity all around as we play Burnley at home.  The point at Chelsea and the return of all our injured players (bar the perma-injured J-Rod) has left us all very expectant of a win today. 

No one seems to be factoring in that Burnley have already beaten us once this season and that they beat Manchester City last time out.  However, they’re in the bottom three for a reason and it’s our job today to keep them there.  They are playing with spirit though and there’s much to admire.  Sean Dyche appears to be an excellent young manager with a bright future and I hope they stay up though as there are many more deserving candidates for the drop, Sunderland, QPR and Tottenham.

One of them, namely Sunderland, sacked Gus Poyet last week after another abysmal defeat when they yet again, completely gave up and lost 4-0 at home to a Villa side who hadn’t scored away from home since 1987.  They say Gus had lost the dressing room – well it appears he also locked it as they only had 10 players for five minutes at the start of the second half as permanently whinging tosser Seb Larsson was absent.  As far as I know, that’s not been explained.  I feel sorry for Gus, said no one, ever.  Tosser.

The Saints week has seen Eljero Elia declared fit for action this weekend and reports of a positive reaction from Graziano Pellè to being dropped last weekend.  It’s been a week for international call ups and all the usual suspects got all the usual call ups.  Fraser and Clyney are with the England squad but Ryan Bertrand is not.  Roy Hodgson values continuity you see – it doesn’t matter that his best left back option was not in the last squad.  Instead he uses the out-of-form and non-defending left back Leighton Baines, the out-of-form and out-of-fitness and barely playing Luke Shaw and the out-of-the-Arsenal-team, non-attacking Keiron Gibbs.  Harry Kane got in though which is a good thing and it also sounded the death knell of Rickie Lambert’s England career, a highly predictable by product of his ill-advised dream move to Anfield.  Such a shame.  Well played Brendon.

Other than that we’ve had contract renewals for Ryan Seager and Dominic Gape and the usual speculation of players signing for Arsenal and Spurs and United.  Morgan and Sadio Mané to Arsenal, Morgan, Toby and J-Rod to Spurs, Clyney to Man United…. Yawn!  The only new one is Sadio being linked which is basically because he played well last week and Theo Walcott is yet to sign a new contract at Arsenal.  That’s how it works folks!

There is a strange yellow object in the sky as we take our seats in time to hear the team news.  Usually I look on my phone before nearing the ground but I forgot today and head reached the communication dead zone that it SMS before I had chance.  Ronald appears to have had a meltdown and picked too many attackers with Graziano recalled and Shane Long retained…. And Dusan Tadic and Sadio Mané.  It’s looking like a very attacking 4-4-2 formation with Morgan and Steve Davis in the centre of midfield which is Vic-less.  The man mountain has racked up 9 victims this season and one more will see him banned for two matches and with the yellow card amnesty coming up, I guess Ronald wants to ease him though to that.  Burnley are unsurprisingly unchanged from their win against City and it’s like a who’s who of Saints connections with Ings and Vokes on the pitch and Jutkiewicz on the bench.  Other players include Ashley Barnes who always seems a bit of a cock and celebrated big time at Turf Moor when his shot which was destined for Fraser’s midriff, deflected and went in.  They also have George Boyd who looks like a rat and dives around like a twat all the time.  He did however score a great goal last weekend.

Saints start well at a high tempo and are zipping the ball about with Morgan at the fore but haven’t created anything meaningful when Fraser makes a routine clearance and collapses.  There’s been a minor collision with Vokes but there’s nothing in that really.  You can tell that he’s done himself though and that it’s serious and that’ll be it for the afternoon and probably the season.  With the medical team on the pitch, it takes about a minute before someone is making the signal to get the sub on and five minutes later he leaves the field on a stretcher.  Bollocks.  It’s time for Superkelv and here he comes to a hero’s welcome.  This is good – everyone loves Superkelv as a bloke but he’s always given me the shits as a keeper and my mind goes back to when King Artur broke his wrist last season and we had a combination of Superkelv and Gazzaniga in goal for 10 or so games.  It was similar to holding a grenade with the pin out and wondering when it was going to go off.

The stoppage has knocked us back a bit and following a scrappy passage of play we get it back together with Morgan sending Bertrand away down the left and he played a perfectly weighted ball into Graziano who took it on the run and instead of hitting it like Pellè 2014 would have done, he tried to jink inside a defender and the chance was gone.  Burnley have found a way to get at us as well and it’s by long crosses and piling in.  With no Big Vic there’s only Morgan trying to pick up the knockdowns.   Boyd swept a long ball out to Barnes on the left, his cross was knocked down by Ings to Vokes who creamed it and Superkelv managed to block it even though he appeared to be diving the wrong way.  Good save that man and just what he needed.

The corner is cleared to Boyd on the left hand side of the box and he takes a tumble and José Fonte launches himself at him.  Put it this way, I’ve seen them given but Boyd’s reputation for hitting the deck has probably gone against him here. José has to stay on his feet more.  He’s done this a few times now, just trashing through everything and getting the tiniest bit of the ball before he trashes the player.  Sterling against Liverpool at SMS springs to mind.

Saints are looking dangerous when they attack though and Morgan tries a sidefooter from the edge of the box which is on target but deflected out for a corner following good work from Clyney, Mané and Pellè.  A few minutes later we’re ahead as Tadic gets a yard on Trippier (who was having a bit of a mare against Bertrand) and crosses.  Sadio’s header wasn’t going anywhere but dropped to Clyne who lashed it across the goal and via a deflection and an airshot from Pellè 2015, arrived with Shane Long at the back post who sidefooted it over the keeper and into the roof of the net.  Get in.

It should be 2-0 from our next attack as the ball breaks to Pellè 2015 and he manages to smack the bar with it from 5 yards.  So it should be 2-0 but 30 seconds later it’s nearly 1-1 as another deep Burnley cross is knocked back down by Arfield and smacked by Ings, only for Superkelv to take off and claw it away.  This is a quality save and gets the whole ground up an applauding.  Great stuff.

We have one further chance before half time as Tadic gets away from Trippier again and delivers a cross to the near post which Davis meets with a flick header and Heaton does well to back-pedal and shovel it onto the bar and over.  It’s half time and things are going to plan though we do need to tighten up in midfield.
 
The clouds all turn dark and move across the sun and the rain starts to fall.  There is a rumble of thunder and a deep sense of foreboding fills the air.... Big Vic is coming on.  Oh yes, Big Vic is coming on.  He’s replaced Tadic and lines up next to Morgan in the centre of midfield.  We look more solid even before the game has kicked off again.

We’re on the attack almost instantly with Bertrand getting down the left and chipping the ball into Steve Davis who lashes a shot into the side netting.  Davis is having a decent game today having been a bit off recently and is the kind of player that makes the whole team tick when he’s on his game.  The part of Graziano’s game which is still functioning is his hold up play and he expertly brings down an Alderweireld pass on his chest and lays it back to Shane Long who hits one first time from 30 yards which flies just wide.  Heaton in goal was more than a bit worried about that one.

It’s Bertrand again though who sets up the second goal.  His throw to Mané is returned to him, onto Steve Davis who waits for Bertrand to make a run before lifting the ball over Trippier who is still chasing shadows trying to look like a footballer.  Bertrand volleys it across with pace and Shackell feels he has to get something on it but that something is his knee and it bullets past the keeper.  Top finish.  Actually, it’s utter gash.  That’s why you’re going down, as the song goes.

What we need now is a goal from Pellè 2015 and he has another go when we play a short corner and Davis chips one up for Graziano to get his head on but there’s not enough power to test Heaton.  The rest of the game peters out.  Burnley throw on Jutkiewicz for Ings and the new man is lively but no threat and he manages on shot which flies miles over the bar.  They win a free kick when Toby stands his ground under a header and Jutkiewicz runs into him, collapses and gets the decision.  Burnley sub Wallace lines it up like he knows what he’s doing and then shats it wide in Championship fashion. It’s easy as you like and the fans sing ‘Happy Birthday’ to Ronald Koeman again.

Final whistle, 2-0, happy days.  Ultimately the second half was easy once Big Vic came on and we had the right blend of attacking and defensive players on the pitch.  Another problem in the first was that Mané, who has been our best player recently, was too deep and too far from the area of the pitch where he makes a difference.  Once we went 2-0 up we handled the game really well and Superkelv didn’t have a save to make in the second half as Burnley managed a couple of long rangers into row Z and that was it.  The first half was a different story though and the veteran did his job with aplomb.  It’s one thing everyone saying that he hasn’t played for the first team for a year – he’s barely played at all as I don’t ever recall him playing for the Under 21’s (as a ‘double age’ player).  Question for you all – who is the oldest player to ever play for Saints Under-21’s? Answer (99% sure anyway) at the bottom...

I have a feeling that it’s the form of Shane Long that made Ronald pick an over attacking formation.  He probably wanted to recall Pellè but didn’t think Long deserved to be left out, which he didn’t.  Big Vic managed to get through 45 minutes without launching anyone and getting a yellow card so no harm done and all is well.  Long was decent again but Graziano is still misfiring somewhat.  Hitting the bar from 5 yards was pretty horrible and though he produced a lot of good hold up play, the lack of confidence was shown with the non-shooting effort in the first half which will give our idiot fringe ‘supporters’ something to kick him over.  After the game he got called up to the Italian squad and the Facebook item that broke the news was bombarded by idiots questioning it and him.  I lose faith in the mentality of some Saints fans when I see things like that.

Talking of losing faith, Fatty Shaw has dropped out of the England squad due to being thick and fat and Hodgson has called up Danny Rose.  Danny Fucking Rose.  Another fullback who can’t defend whilst Ryan Bertrand just rolls on being part of the best defence in the league.  I have decided that Hodgson must think he’s French.  Personally, I’ve spent my life with people thinking I’m French as I have a French surname.  It sounds like I’m joking about Hodgson thinking he’s French but I honestly would not be surprised.  I can find no other logical reason.

Out of the teams at the top end of the league, everybody won this weekend except for Liverpool who lost at home to Man United.  They really had a shocker and ended the game with Lallana being injured, Sturridge being injured (well, there is an England game to pull out of), Gerrard with a 3 game ban and Skrtel about to get the same on video evidence after his stamp on de Gea was missed by the referee.  Be smug about that little lot then Rodgers, you tosser.

As mentioned before – it’s time to focus on Roy Hodgson’s inadequacies for a week or so and hope that Graziano plays and scores for Italy and that no one comes back injured.  There are bound to be more stories of Saints players leaving but the next thing to focus on is our next league game which is away to Everton which will be a sterner test of Superkelv than Burnley provided today.  Let’s do this.

Radhi Jaidi (35)

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