First the good news - another player has joined. Dean Hammond was signed today from Colchester and once again, a need is being addressed as he's a central midfielder. The bad news is that he could not be in the side tonight against Swindon who started the season with a 5-0 defeat and a 0-0 draw. So, they hadn't scored so far. I'm sure that every fan of every team feels that their side is the one which all opposition teams or players break their bad streak against... well I promise you, no one does it quite like Southampton.
Alan Pardew tinkered with the side with Lloyd James reverting to right back to replace Murty who had a pie strain. Shockingly, Ollie Lancashire has been picked instead of Chris Perry, which in my book is a major black mark against the manager because, as I've mentioned before, he is useless, the proverbial chocolate teapot. Jacob Mellis came into the midfield alongside the holy trinity of Schneiderlin, Wotton and Lallana who all have major defects in their game that stops them from being decent midfielders. Todays name out of the hat to partner Lambo was Matt Paterson, the quickest but least experienced of the options available.
Again I'm in the Dublin B&B but I have found text commentary from the BBC website which is not great but better than nothing. The best thing about this is that it auto refreshes, meaning you avoid the condition known as 'F5 thumb'. John Paul McGovern shots wide for Swindon, says the BBC. Corner to Swindon, says the BBC. Headed goal by Sean Morrison, says the BBC. Swindon 1 Southampton 0. Remember what I said about Swindon not scoring... well it took them a whole eight minutes.
Another 5 minutes of auto refreshing and it's all Swindon so I turn my attention to the Celtic v Arsenal match on the TV. Celtic are like the Saints in that they haven't got a clue of how to be effective. I'm not sure Arsenal have a goalkeeper playing as I haven't seen him yet. Text alert, half time, 1-0 down.
At half time I get a Skype message from Pompey Dave reminding me that we are still on -9. I call him to pass on my best for Portsmouth's relegation struggle and he takes great delight in reading out the BBC text comentary on the game and generally taking the piss. 'Lloyd James? Is he one of yours, big black bloke with a name like that ? etc etc'. Not good, I'm still on the call midway through the 2nd half and we've still not even got close to scoring. It's reads like it's really really poor again and 1-0 is flattering us.
The minutes tick by and he belief that you have that you will score a goal is conspicuous by its absence. Booking for Paul Wotton for unsportsmanlike behaviour, says the BBC. I bet I know what happened there. I bet a Swindon player passed the ball, got substituted, went to the dressing room, had a bath, got dried, put his suit on and came back out to sit on the bench... and then got hit by a Wotton special.
More bookings and more nothing and beep beep, text alert, another defeat. So now, even if we didn't have the 10 point deduction, we'd still be in the relegation zone. My optimism for the season has not evaporated as yet but if Huddersfield was a reality check then this was a slap in the face. Huddersfield will be near the top this year whereas Swindon will be bottom 6 and it sounds like we hardly had a shot. Not good.
Brentford at home on Saturday and my guess is that new boy Hammond will come in for Wotton in midfield and hopefully Murty will be back. I'd like to see Saganowski up front with Lambert but if our midfield is shocking again then it wouldn't matter if we had Lionel Messi and Christiano Ronaldo up there.... and guess what, I can't bloody go... as I have to go to a farm with 20 5 year olds. Happy birthday my son.
PS - There will be no league table published on this site until we have more than zero points. We're last by miles and that's all you need to know.
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