League 1 Match 8 - Sheffield Wednesday 0 Southampton 1

Finally

Never had a weekends football started so badly and unexpectedly. I had spent a night on the beer on Friday night in Brighton, where I now work. So – a few beers down – I got on the train at 10 o’clock-ish to head back to Hedge End. I read a discarded newspaper and saw that our friends The Cheating Skate Bastards were playing at home. Checked my phone and saw they’d won 6-1 with 4 of the goals being scored by two players they were paying 20k a week each to, just weeks after ripping off all the people they owed money to. A word floated into my mind and it rhymes with Bankers. Then it hit me... oh fuck, this train goes to Fratton where I have to change. Fast forward an hour and it’s all morons going ‘Der Der Der Der David Nugent’. Luckily, it was 11.30 by this time so most of them had gone home as the tag on their ankle will only allow them out til 10pm. Not a good start.

Saturday saw a clash of the two teams who were favourites for automatic promotion at the start of the season, namely Sheffield Wednesday and the mighty SFC. They’d started the season well but were coming into this game on the back of 3 straight defeats. We of course had started the season averagely and then gone 23 games without a goal. Something was going to give today.

Despite the positive impact made by Lee Holmes last week, Nigel Adkins decided that his body couldn’t stand up to the rigours of two games in three years and so Holmes found himself on the bench again, alongside the half fit Adam Lallana and a fit-again Aaron Martin. The one change in the starting line up saw Radhi Jaidi back in the side in place of Jose Fonte who had what was mysteriously described as a minor knock, very very minor and he’ll be back for midweek. The players had had a full week with Adkins and his methods so maybe we’d see an improvement today – we certainly needed to.

Saints were the first team to show and immediately, Alex Chamberlain fired in an effort which Weaver turned away. I remember Weaver being touted as the next big thing in goalkeeping about 10 years ago when he was at Man City. Then they got promoted and he was under a bit of pressure and was suddenly found to be Robert Green. Hammond had decided to have a large game in midfield, smashing into tackles and basically providing the grunt but he also put Barnard clean through, only for him to be denied by the keeper – you know, the one I just said was a bit shite. Puncheon beat the keeper but unfortunately, not Darren Purse on the line and so we’d had three decent opportunities in the first seven minutes

Anyone remember Darren Potter? I do – he was one of the loan players we filled out squad with when we got relegated from the Premier League. If memory serves, he was a Scouser who naturally, played for Ireland. He should have been good but he wasn’t. Anyway, he was playing for Wednesday today and curled a free-kick wide, obviously put off by my shouting ‘fuck off’ at the radio as he ran up to take it.

Sir Rickie is of course, not scoring as many this season as last but he is at last, strting to show signs of life. Within two minutes he’s fired across a ball which Barnard was inches away from turning in and then set up Chamberlain to fire over. Soon after, we have a spot of bother when Jaidi takes time out from being a man mountain in defence and attempts an overhead clearance which is only going to end one way – on his arse, needing Superkelv to make a fine fingertip save to bail him out.

Saints no nonsense approach was winding up the home fans and also the referee as Hammond smashed into a tackle, won the ball and got booked, soon followed by Schneiderlin. I’ve not totted them up but I’m guessing the pair must be pretty close to 5 bookings now and any suspension together could mean the debut of the Wotton-Pulis ‘Dream Team’ central midfield pairing. With that horrifying no doubt in mind, Chamberlain swung over a good cross onto the head of Sir Rickie and Weaver pulls off another fine reaction save. Why are we finding this with keepers at the moment. League 1 Team of the Week – In goal – whatever fucker is playing against Southampton.

Despite the decent play and the barrage of shots and headers, we had managed to arrive at half time at 0-0 with the usual frustration – no goals. Now standing at 495 minutes.

For the second game in a row, a substitution made by the opposition resulted in us facing up to one of our inept right backs from last year as Jon ‘Two Holes in his Ass’ Otsemobor came on to no doubt demonstrate pace and nothing else

And then it happened. 61 minutes and Wednesday were pissing about with it, trying to ping it about but without the ability. An interception by Schneiderlin high up the pitch and he strode forward before splitting what remained of the defence with a through ball to Barnard who took it on and dinked it over the onrushing Weaver. Fuck me – we’ve scored…. and Morgan managed an assist. 511 minutes and finally a goal.

Wednesday look deflated and the crowd are giving them dogs abuse which as we know from our own experiences, doesn’t help very much. Saints are well in control now and on 72, Lallana comes on in place of goalscorer Lee Barnard who is struggling with a hernia injury and the novelty of having ‘goalscorer’ as a prefix to his name. Saints are creating openings and Lallana goes close a couple of times including a sitter of a header from about 8 yards which he puts wide. As we fail to get a 2nd, you just know that Wednesday will come back and they surely do as Harding manages to keep a goalbound header out on the line by using some part of his ribcage. The shot from the rebound is uncomfortably dealt with by Superkelv who foregoes using his hands and saves it with his face.

Ryan Dickson is on for Chamberlain with just under 10 to go and Saints are looking quite comfortable until that most evil of times – the time that the 4th official indicated how long there is left. When you are winning then 1 or 2 is greeted with a cheer, 3 is greeted with a bit of a moan and ‘4’ gets a ‘faaaark off, where did you get that from you barrrrrstaard’. 5,6,7 or 8 means you’re at Old Trafford and Taggart is pointing at his watch. We get a 4 – which seems like 4 hours when you are winning away from home and listening on the radio.

Predictably it’s all Wednesday and we waste time by bringing on Lee Holmes for a minute to bring him up to 90 minutes completed in three years. For the remaining time it’s all about Superkelv who is there again to repel the two decent efforts they manage and in another similarity to last week – when the 2nd save is made, the final whistle blows and we’ve won, thank Christ. Superkelv disappears under a pile of team mates and it shows how much it means to the boys to get a win. Nice for Kelvin too as we lost 5-0 here last time and he had a complete shocker. Another clean sheet and the confidence from this win should be massive going forwards.

Nigel sounded chuffed to bits afterwards and gave a very impressive interview, pointing out the need for fitness to play the way he wants to play and the fact that the most senior player in the team, Radhi Jaidi had been putting in extra work to get fitter. To me, that’s brilliant as it shows that a 35 year old with 100 international caps, in the last year of his contract is prepared to put the hard yards in for this manager.

In order to prove we are back on track, we now have to go on a bit of a run starting with Yeovil away on Tuesday night. We won in the 94th minute there last year and they were not happy so I expect a tough game but one that we really should win quite comfortably if we’re serious about getting out of this league this year. Following that we have Bournemouth who we know we can beat as we’ve already done so this year, regardless of how high they are in the league at the moment. So this weekend has told me that the season starts now and that you should never go to Fratton.