Premier League Match 8 - West Ham 4 Southampton 1

Nicola... I have a cunning plan

A return from international break sees us face a trip to the Boleyn Ground to play West Ham who are flying way having hoofed their way to 3 wins already which even allowing for a favourable fixture list, is a brilliant start for a newly promoted club.  I’ve always liked the Boleyn so for this and many other reasons, I hope they get knocked back regarding the Olympic Stadium and continue to play here next season.  I can’t quite get my head round a stadium that showed all that was good about British sport in 2012, showing Fat Sam’s charges hoofing the ball into the Statford Stratosphere and waiting for it to come down, watched by The Dildo boys as they count their pile of money from not having to build a new ground.

I’m quite confident about this game as we did well against them last year and I don’t see a real reason why we can’t do well this year.  I predict a 2-1 win with goals by Sir Rickie and Mayuka.  This prediction was lodged in my head until about 10 minutes before the kick off when I saw that neither were playing.  Oh for fuck’s sake, he’s done it again.  For the second time in a week (England in Poland being the other) I’ve seen the starting line up and known that we were going to be shite.  Artur Boruc was making his debut and Gazza wasn’t even on the bench so I guess he’s injured.  Danny Fox wasn’t in the 18 so Maya was at left back and Big Jos partnered Jose in the middle.  Hang on, why are we playing a centre back out of position at left back?  Where’s Luke Shaw or even Ryan Dickson?  The midfield three were Morgan, Steve Davis and Lallana and up front providing our goal threat were three players who have not scored this season, Punch, J-Rod and Guly.  I only boiled over when I heard that Sir Rickie was on the bench and not injured.  I fucking give up.  West Ham have a few new players from last year, the most obvious being Andy Carroll up front who could have been built in a lab to fit into Fat Sam’s style of play.  In midfield they have Diame who they signed from Wigan who is another monster of player fitting into the ‘brick shithouse’ category.

The first half can be summed up quite quickly in that it was very flat and dull.  If anything, Saints were the better side with a snap shot from J-Rod going just wide.  Artur Boruc remained relatively untroubled in goal and for us, it’s nice to go 45 minutes without letting in a goal.  West Ham were predictably hoooooofing it up to Carroll but aren’t getting players around him so even if he won it, we were picking up the loose ball with Lallana, Steven Davis and Morgan all showing up well in midfield.  West Ham were booed off and happy days, so far.

Our story really begins at the start of the second half when having shackled the focal point of all of West Ham’s attacking in the first half, it must be assumed that the hooooof up to Carroll would have to be dealt with again but from the first one of the second half it’s a free kick to West Ham as Big Jos and the Big Jessie bang heads.  The decision could easily have been given either way really but it goes to West Ham.  Noble floats it into the box in a kind of bread-and-butter dead straight lob into the box kind of way and it’s missed by Fonte and Hooiveld, it bounces about 6 yards out and Boruc is distracted by Collins run and allows it to just bounce past him and straight into the net.  As goals go, it’s an absolutely shit one..

We kick off and within a minute, Guly has given Yoshida a hospital pass which he’s lost in the tackle to send Benayoun away down the right wing all on his own.  His hard and low cross shot is parried by Boruc, past Fonte who seems to give up on it and wave it past, totally unaware that Nolan is behind him, two yards out with an open goal thus completing the 2 goals in 2 minutes trick which we have managed in every away game so far.  I shout swearwords very loudly which is ok as I’m walking my dog round a cemetery with Dave Merrington in my ear and the only others within earshot have been dead for 96 years.  Still, we still have the Cunning Plan up our sleeves of Sir Rickie on the bench to bring on to win the game for us after we’ve kept it tight.  Oh.

Having torn my headphones out of my ears in a fit of temper when the second goal went in, I’m fully reconnected in time to hear J-Rod wriggle past Collins and feed Lallana who turned and smashed it past Jaaskeleinen from the edge of the box.  Game back on again and Nigel wastes no time in removing J-Rod and Punch and bringing on Sir Rickie and Mayuka.  Two minutes later and we’ve got a head of steam up and Collins needlessly trips Lallana on the edge of the box to give us a free kick.  Sir Rickie chips in, Jaaskeleinen stands feet planted.... and the ball just floats narrowly over the bar.  Still, we’re now playing better and the big man is on the pitch, what can possibly go wrong?

Andy Carroll has had his fitness issues for a couple of seasons and he’s clearly getting tired now as rather than compete for anything, he collapses in a heap any time anyone comes near him which is embarrassing for a 6 foot 4 inch centre forward.  Get up you wanker.  From one such clash he falls down like he’s been hit by a bus rather than brushed by a Big Dutchman and the ref buys it and gives West Ham another free kick from the sort of 45 yard range where Mark Noble was deadly from a bit earlier.  In it comes and it’s half cleared and is travelling away from the goal when Jose appears to grab a handful of Carroll’s hair and throw him on the ground.  I know he’s a wanker who falls over a lot but this is one of the most stupid challenges I’ve ever seen in my life – penalty.  I’ve seen it reported that the penalty was for handball but even if it was, hair-pull wrestling throws don’t go down too well with referees or hopefully, managers who hand out fines for stupidity.  Up steps Noble for the second goal that we’ve made him work really hard for, bang, Boruc the wrong way, 3-1 and any chance of a comeback completely gone. 

You think that it can’t get any worse but with us in away games it certainly can and as the game ticks down, Maiga, the big powerful sub gets the ball on the right and none of Yoshida, Fonte and Hooiveld cover themselves in glory as he’s allowed to cut in and curl a left footed strike in off the far post.  Brilliant goal but what a load of crap from us.

And so the game ended and we got twatted.  Harsh scoreline or not, we went to West Ham, only defended for 45 minutes and didn’t create more than three chances all game.  The bottom line is that we didn’t defend well enough and we didn’t attack well enough, therefore, we were pretty shit and deserved to get nothing from a game we should have been getting something out of.

The cunning plan to leave Sir Rickie out and bring him on to win the game is quite clearly so lacking in cunning that even the great Baldrick himself wouldn’t have been stupid enough to consider it.  That means that it’s pretty bloody stupid.  We have one player who has in any way proven that he can be a regular scorer in the Premier League and we leave him on the bench.  In my book, that is stupid.  As I’ve said before, we are less of side with Sir Rickie not in the team and have been for 3 years and guess what, this will continue to be the case until he leaves or retires.  It seems to me like Nigel is over thinking things when football is a simple game.  You’re more likely to score if your main goal threat is on the pitch – simples (fucking Meerkats).  Also, in our 8 games so far, we threw leads against Man United and Fulham after Sir Rickie got taken off – we could do with those 5 points now.  I guess J-Rod was preferred because he’s quicker which in Nigel’s mind at some point, obviously outweighed the fact that he’s not as good a player.  He might be one day but he isn’t at this moment in time.  I could understand the similar selection made at Man City because Man City are the Champions and we were going to be chasing around all game trying to get the ball back.  West Ham are not Man City and leaving Sir Rickie out suggests that we were scared of them somehow which is ridiculous.  I’m sure Nigel knows though that if you make very strange selections like this one, lose the game and you’re going to get slaughtered and deservedly so.  Of course though, it wasn’t the forwards that cost us the game though we created nothing of note up front.  Punch had a decent first half but did his usual 2^nd half fade before being subbed and Guly did nothing of note at all.  J-Rod meanwhile looked ok in general but does he ever look like scoring?

I don’t like Fat Sam and I never will – don’t like what he stands for and the way his teams play football and the stuff he comes out with in defence of things he holds dear but I can guarantee you one thing, he won’t give a flying fuck what anyone thinks if he keeps West Ham up this season - which he will.  He knows it is ALL about points on the board and anything else is secondary.  It’s also interesting to compare the shopping in the summer, bearing in mind that we were better than them last year.  Both sides needed some strength in midfield - they got Diame and we brought in Davis who is a tidy ball playing midfielder.  They needed a winger and got Jarvis, we needed the same and got Ramirez who plays in the centre.  Both sides needed a centre back - they got Collins who has a lot of Premiership experience and we got Yoshida who has no experience at playing in England... and we play him at left back, where he’s shitt.

You hear some people saying that playing good football is the most important thing but let me tell you, as a supporter of a team that plays some good football but is currently getting dicked in every away game that it really isn’t.  Fat Sam wants to get points as does Nigel but Nigel thinks the way to get points is to play like we do in the formation that we play.  Away from home that is simply not the case.  We got completely thumped 4-1 by West Ham who in the context of the Premier League, are not very good. Fair play to them for their excellent start to the season but watch them fall down the league in November and December as their fixtures get difficult.

And what is ‘good football’ anyway?  I hear that Southampton are a good footballing side but where in the good football manual does it mention about defending like clowns and conceding 3 goals per game.  The term ‘good football’ sure encompasses the ugly stuff you do without the ball, not just poncing about playing 20 passes and after all that, the opposition have 11 men in front of you – Propaganda football as Gordon Strachan used to call it.  We allegedly want to play like Barcelona who pass pass pass but guess what, they defend properly when they don’t have the ball with a proper holding midfielder and defenders who concentrate, as if they didn’t, they’d get humped every week as well.  Nigel has to adopt a more pragmatic approach, get some midfielders in the side who can put a tackle in and some defenders who are capable to concentrating for 95 minutes.  Conceding two goals straight after half time is simply scandalous having defended comfortably for 45 minutes – there is no excuse, you have to tackle everything and head everything against West Ham so what do we do… all leave it to eachother.  It’s odd that I had a pop at Roy Hodgson for his rigid approach with England but that is what is needed for us in away games, two banks of four, hard to break down, bark, bollock and bite which admittedly is hard to do with no midfielders who can tackle.

We cannot sign any new players until January and we have very few options when it comes to defenders and defensive midfielders to come into the team so all we have which may improve things is the set up of the team.  That’s down to Nigel and his coaching staff.  If we carry on conceding three goals a game until January, we’ll already be down. 

Nigel sounded gutted afterwards in the post match interview which ended with him being asked if he thought we should have gone with 2 up front at the end.  He’s responded that we play 4-3-3 and then the interview ended so you didn’t really get the context of how he meant that last answer.  On first viewing, I took it to mean that he was saying that “we play three up front” but then, I’m not a conspiracy theorist.  Others, who I assume are out there looking for little green men on a visit from Mars, took it to mean that “we play 4-3-3 because I’m told by Cortese that we have to and I can’t change it and I have to pick J-Rod because we paid a lot of money for him and I have to do what The Don says because he’s in charge and he’ll probably shoot me”.  However, explaining the Sir Rickie omission away with “we have a squad of players to use” is not an explanation that is going to wash with anyone.

Still. Next week we have a nice easy one at home to Spurs.  They’ll score three so tune in to see if we can score four.

England - Bloody Hell.

We'll be there, We'll be Crap

In the build up to the Poland v England game, after the postponement for the roof not being closed and the start of the actual game, I took to Twitter in frustration and tweeted the following

“Forget Roofgate.  The real scandal is this starting line-up”

“No pace, no width, no skill”

As far as I could tell before the game started, the midfield would like up as follows;  on the right, James Milner, offering nothing going forward, giving the ball away repeatedly which allows him to show his best trait – running around after people who can actually play football.  In the centre, Michael Carrick who though he’s been picked to keep the ball, will continually give it away as it’s not like playing for Man United when you’ve always got time as you spend 90% of the game on the front foot.  Also in the centre will be Steven Gerrard who will try and dictate the game but will be let down by the failings of those around him who are not in his level which means he will start trying to play Hollywood 60 yard passes as there will be no one else willing to do anything positive.  On the left, Tom Cleverley who will not be on the left as he’ll be loafing about in the middle, passing sideways for the sake of it and having no influence whatsoever aside from making the team unbalanced and not helping out the left back at all.  Roy Hodgson is a nice guy but I’m sorry, he’s an idiot if he thinks that a line-up like this was going to be anything other than woeful.

International football is of course, all about 2 year cycles as that’s when the tournaments are.  England must be the only country in the world who go to a tournament and do very averagely (like we did in Euro 2012) and then come back, look forward to the next tournament and think “I know just what we need to freshen things up and get us ready for 2 years time.... it’s a midfielder who is 32 who has never been a regular under a succession of England managers and refused to be a standby player in the last tournament”.  Step forward Michael Carrick.  It’s not Carrick’s fault he’s been chosen of course, it’s down to Hodgson.  Hodgson has picked a player who is totally one paced and has a track record of playing poorly when he’s put under pressure.  Consequently, Carrick has never been good enough to play international football and guess what, at 32, he’s never going to be.  He’s had his chance and is a proven failure.  Time to move on.

Stan Collymore was on Twitter last week talking about our attacking midfield players, the exciting game-changing type of player who causes problems for defenders by running at them and makes them make decisions.  We have a few of them in Theo Walcott, Alex Chamberlain, Aaron Lennon, Adam Johnson and further down the list (for now) we have Adam Lallana and Raheem Sterling.  We have lots of these players who could make the national team exciting and you never know, maybe make it entertaining and successful.  However, if we have a game against anyone who is better than San Marino and Roy Hodgson has a choice to make as to who plays on the right wing.... guess who he’s going to pick?  I’ll give you a clue, it won’t be any of the players on the list I’ve just written, it’ll be James Bloody Milner.   That’s right, James Bloody Milner is going to get the nod, every single time.  Why? Because Roy is negative and sets out to not lose before he sets out to win.  You cannot be positively trying to win a game if you pick Milner.  The argument against Walcott for example is that he gives the ball away too much which he does because he tries to make things happen and will maybe take on one man too many and lose it which is of course a crime, compared to Milner who will just give the ball back to the opposition when trying to execute a 10 yard pass.  Of course though, Milner is a better defender which is exactly what you need if you’re dour and negative and never want England to achieve anything.  Again though, it’s not Milner’s fault he gets picked, which brings us onto Tom Cleverley.

When it came down to the Poland game, Roy Hodgson had to choose a player to play on the left, having decided that Carrick and Gerrard were his central midfielders.  He had the choice of Alex Chamberlain, Adam Johnson qwho are naturals or he also could have picked Leighton Baines or even Jonjo Shelvey who are left footed and could easily play there.  Roy went with Cleverley which is just plain daft a he’s never played there in his life so what the bloody hell makes him the best player to play there for England.   It’s not a negative move particularly, as Cleverley is not a particularly negative player but I feel with this one that he’s been picked out as the new Messiah (or the new Fabregas by Roy Hodgson) and so he has to play somewhere.   Roy has backed himself into a corner here by praising him to the skies but I’m sorry Roy, he really isn’t that good – he’s average at best.  I saw him play for Man United at St.Mary’s and he got totally eclipsed by Adam Lallana and James Ward-Prowse (both English) and Saints were winning 2-1 when the turning point came and Sir Alex took him off.  They won 3-2 with a young sub called Paul Scholes totally changing the game.  That’s just one game I grant you but performances in 5-0 wins against pub sides from Moldova and San Marino really don’t count for much.  I can see us turning round one day and Cleverley has 40 caps like Stewart “no goals, no assists” Downing and then people start questioning how when he doesn’t actually do anything much – again, it’s not his fault he gets picked and he tries really hard but is completely out of his depth.  If he played for a mid table side he wouldn’t be anywhere near the England set up and this is another issue.  When it comes to England selection, it’s better to be an average player at a top club than the star player at an average club.  And, now the biggest talking point... Wayne Rooney.

Rooney is our best player as we are repeatedly told by Roy Hodgson.  This is almost as big a load of rubbish as saying that Tom Cleverley is the new Cesc Fabregas.  If I was manager of a team and a particular player had not played well for it in 8 or so years, I wouldn’t pick him and I definitely wouldn’t stand up say that he’s my best player which basically says “he will play whenever he’s available and is undroppable”.  The most interesting England match of recent times was the 3-2 win over Sweden in the Euro’s when out best player was suspended and Carroll and Welbeck were up front.  They both scored and England won and as an attacking side, were decent.  The next game was against Ukraine and Rooney came back in, Carroll was dropped for no other reason but to accommodate Rooney and England and particularly Rooney, were terrible, even though we fluked a 1-0 win with Rooney scoring from 4 inches after the keeper had a mare.  Then of course, the game that mattered against Italy and a clearly unfit Rooney was knackered after half an hour and should have come off but he was left to wheeze around for another 90 minutes, to the detriment of the rest of the team.  Hodgson then denied there was an issue with his fitness when the whole world could see that there was. 

Fast forward a bit and he got made captain for the game against the pub team of the San Marino Arms, scored a couple of goals and suddenly he’s saying he’s a reformed character and wants to be full time captain etc.  He shouldn’t even be in the team if it was picked on form and as we are only 6 months on from when he pointlessly kicked a Macedonian up the arse and got sent off, I think it’s a bit early to say he’s reformed.  Also, I’ve just had to explain to my 8 year old son what racism is all about courtesy of him asking “What did John Terry do?”.  As I was trying to explain it and fielding questions like “what did he say?”, I was thinking “Thanks John you great role model”.  The prospect of Rooney and his prostitute bothering and red mist which really wasn’t that long ago, is not something I want to have to entertain explaining to my kids if he’s England captain.   Anyhow, back to the football and his 2 goals against the pub team put him in the top 5 English international goalscorers of all time list.  Let’s scratch the surface a bit.

31 international goals and for the sake of analysis, I’ve grouped the countries he’s scored against into one of 4 groups.  Group 1 is your traditional football powers who have a chance of winning tournaments (where England aspire to be), Group 2 is your countries who are dangerous on their day (England’s level), Group 3 is the average sides who occasionally qualify for tournaments but aren’t much good and Group 4 is the pub teams who are basically League 2 standard and should have to pre-qualify for qualifying groups.

Rooney v Group 1 – 2 goals in friendlies v Argentina (2005) and Holland (2006)

Rooney v Group 2 – 5 goals v Croatia (4) and Russia (1)

Rooney v Group 3 – 11 goals v Macedonia, Denmark(2), Switzerland (2), Slovakia(2), Bulgaria(2), Ukraine, Poland

Rooney v Group 4 – 13 goals v San Marino(2), Andorra(2), Belarus(2), Kazakhstan(3), Iceland(2), Liecetenstein and Estonia.

So, he hardly ever scores against decent sides and he hasn’t done it in a tournament when the pressure is on, since 2004.  Somehow, this makes him undroppable.  Though I’ve used stats here to illustrate a point, they of course can be used to illustrate just about any point you like.  Trust me though that he’s played against Italy, Portugal and other countries who you’d put in Group 1 and done nothing.  If we’re going to play 2 up front for England then Carroll and Defoe would be a better partnership than Rooney and anyone else.  Pick the best team, even if it means leaving out who you think is your best player.  It also might give him the jolt he clearly needs to get him back to his best as he’s a million miles from that now.  He’s so mollycoddled it’s untrue – we change winning sides to accommodate him, we pick him for tournament squads when he’s suspended and countless England managers pin their colours to his mast and he never does a thing to justify the faith put in him.  The answer might be to stop putting faith in him for a bit and make him work at impressing people again.  We’ll qualify for the World Cup if Rooney plays or if he doesn’t.  Lets try the latter option for a bit and see if there’s a long term benefit.  He can be a good player but right now, for England he just isn’t.

With Roy Hodgson, we are following the same road as always – qualify because the opposition are poor and fail in the tournament because we are poor when the opposition are a bit better.  I was slightly encouraged by Euro 2012 as my blogs illustrated but It’s been a really really disappointing start to the qualifying group for Rio 2014 in terms of progress in our way of playing and it needs to improve or else you begin to wonder what the point is.  In my opinion, if performances don’t improve and the negative thinking is not abandoned, Roy Hodgson needs to go.  I know a point in Poland is not the worst result ever but we aren’t improving and this has to change.   Can we ever trust the FA to get something right though?  To be honest,  I wouldn’t trust the FA to sit the right way round on a toilet so I don’t expect them to get this right either.  We’ll limp on, we’ll qualify and then we’ll be crap and come home.

Premier League Match 7 - Southampton 2 Fulham 2

New Statue for Fulham

In a week when Jimmy Savile has been exposed as something a bit nastier than a Gold Pair of running shorts, it’s ironic that we have Fulham as our visitors to St.Mary’s.  Fulham’s Craven Cottage Ground, of course contains a statue of Michael Jackson (who never played for Fulham to my knowledge).  This statue is the worst statue at any football ground anywhere in the world and has been since the Original Ted Bates/Jimmy Krankie statue got taken down.  However, a trip to see the Jacko statue is for another day.

Today there are the three generations attending the game with my Dad and my 8 year old son making the trip.  Dad’s not feeling well and can’t face the usual walk over the Itchen Bridge and so comes up with the idea of driving over and parking near the stadium as it’s Sunday and the meters will all be free.  Great idea.. however... we’re late, horribly, due to a combination of a stupid kick off time and a late running Eastleigh and District Mini Soccer fixture and so, no spaces forcing me drop the elder and younger off at the ground and then to actually pay for parking which I never do, on principle.  Never had this problem in League 1 did we?

To the team news and a Saturday night Twitter rumour proved to be true as Gaston Ramirez was injured, as was Nathaniel Clyne meaning recalls for Jason Puncheon and Danny Fox.  On the positive side of injury news, Morgan Schneiderlin is back to take the place of James Ward-Prowse.  Fulham have Berbatov missing which has to be good news and have Chris Baird in midfield who was our Player of the Year in 2006/07 when we lost in the Championship Playoffs which we reached despite Whiskey George being the manager.  Our referee today is Mark Clattenburg who I’ve always thought was awful.

To cut a long story short, as the game kicked off I was outside the ground waiting to meet someone with a spare ticket (or rather a credit card style entry device card thingy).  We were impatiently waiting outside different burger outlets and following a couple of ‘where the fuck are you?’ phone calls, we got into our seats as we won a corner.  Adam swung it over and Jose Fonte got to it on the near post and flicked a header (with a large hint of shoulder), back over everyone and dropping in the far corner of the net.  Great start, come on!!!

From the first Fulham attack down our right, the Eastern European with the unpronounceable name went past Frazer who seemed to pull out of the tackle before collapsing in a heap.  It looked a worrying one and sure enough, off he went on a stretcher with Big Jos coming on and MayaYoshida being forced to play at right back.

Saints are moving the ball through midfield well with Baird and Sidwell struggling to cope with the movement of Davis, Lallana and Punch in particular.  Sidwell is a horrible player – a younger Ginger version of anti-footballer Michael Brown who just runs around kicking people with no discernable footballing ability at all.  He goes in studs up on J-Rod and it’s a yellow card all day long but not in the eyes of Twattenburg who waves play on.  I know you should always play to the whistle and all that but it’s so obvious a foul that every Saints player has stopped as Fulham come away with the ball.

All the football is coming from the boys in red and Fulham are torn apart again like one of Michael Jackson’s (alleged) victims.  It’s a superb move with Lallana feeding J-Rod on the left who got his head up and played a superb ball into the onrushing Sir Rickie who tried to be too clever and sidefooted wide instead of leathering the shite out of it.

Fulham can’t handle us at all from set pieces as the next Lallana delivery misses all the big guys and hits Punch on the shin at the back post and hits a combination of post and a defender before bouncing away to safety.  It seems for a second that we’ve made it 2-0 from another corner as Foxy swings one over from the other side and Punch slams it into the net as Schwarzer lays on the ground.  Twattenburg gives a free kick to the goalkeeper which looked incredibly generous and just plain wrong on first viewing but when you see the replay, you realise it’s actually a correct decision as Punch has flicked out a leg and brought him down though it has to be asked whether it’s enough to bring down a 6 foot 4 goalkeeper.  Twattenburg is nothing if not inconsistent though and he produces a yellow card for Big Jos as a ball is flicked onto his hand from point blank range.  So... that’s a booking whereas a studs up tackle which leaves a player needing treatment is not.

In our last chance to make to 2-0 before half time, Lallana feeds Punch who plays Sir Rickie in on the left but his near post left footed blast hits Schwarzer and rebounds out.  Fulham eventually clear the danger in classic style as Davis breathes on Damien Duff, causing him to dive on the floor to win a free kick to save him the bother of clearing the ball.  Twattenburg unsurprisingly falls for it.

It’s half time and 1-0 and you can’t help but feel that it should have been about 4-0 and game over. Fulham were, quite frankly, shite and had offered nothing at all going forward.  They wouldn’t be as bad in the 2^nd half and we could really have done with Ramirez today who would have I’m sure, turned the possession into a couple more goals.

The second half starts and it’s noticeable that Maya has defended ok from right back but he really doesn’t want to get involved in the attacking side of things. Steven Davis and Morgan, superb in the first half appear to have taken a step back towards our own goal and Lallana and Punch seem to be trying too hard to make things happen and keep losing the ball.  Regardless of playing worse, we still create chances and Morgan’s cross was met by Sir Rickie who tried this time to break the net but instead, volleyed over the bar at 200mph and killed someone in the Chapel Stand.

Fulham are getting closer to our goal without really threatening but this all changes as Lallana pressurises Duff on the wing and Duff’s legs give way again and he falls on the ground.  Not even Superman with his X-Ray vision could see a fucking foul there but Twattenberg does.  The free kick is swung over and there’s a horrible moment when it looks like Sidwell is actually going to score but it kind of bounces off him and hits the post before bouncing out.  5 seconds of carnage and Keystone Cops style defending follow and the ball hits Yoshida on the hand and we are at last grateful to Twatts foer not giving it.  It’s all Fulham now and we’re getting deeper and deeper as Rodallega gets his head to a cross from the Fulham right and Gazza does brilliantly to claw it out. 

Nigel can see it going wrong and probably thinks that Maya is struggling at right back.  He had a decent first half but seems to be struggling now and so Punch is replaced with Bald Psycho which should make us a bit more solid on our right, the downside is that Chappers won’t offer as much going forward.  Jol replaces Sidwell with a footballer in Kieran Richardson and I notice that we are making our 3^rd and final sub with Mayuka coming on for J-Rod to add some pace up front... oh no it’s not... Sir Rickie is off to be replaced by the Homesick Drink Driving Man.  The last time we took Sir Rickie off in a home game, we were 2-1 up and duly lost.  It’s looking like Groundhog day once more as Riise has an age to fire in a shot from the left which is going wide and Gazza is letting it go until Big Jos steams in and with clinical finishing, slams it into the top corner of the net.  Fuck it!!!... great finish though!  At this point, I got told off by an 8 year old for swearing.

Fulham are in the ascendancy now and look like the only team who are going to win it.  Sir Rickie’s withdrawal has left J-Rod running around up front but he’s not getting hold of ball from the stream of hoofed passes heading his way.  Greek international Karagounis is on and his first contribution is to have a dive, lie on the ground holding his head, stop the game and get treated and then spring back to his feet afterwards. Wanker.  Hangeland then booms the ball forward behind Fox to Reither whose cross along the ground it met by Kieran Richardson whose shot is covered by Gazza but it flicks off of Big Jos who really should know better by now and ends up going the other way to make it 2-1 with a minute of normal time to go prompting a mass exodus of our fair weather 8000 who are only here for the good stuff.

It’s brilliant when the people who storm out early miss the good stuff.  Firstly, Twattenburg does us a favour by not pulling up Maya for a ropey tackle on Richardson who then seems to lose his rag as a result and take out Morgan.  Foxy swings in the free kick and the Portuguese Man of War get sup and flicks another header past Schwarzer and into the net.  Off comes the shirt, out comes Twattenberg’s cards and notebook again and the celebrating Fulham fans have suddenly gone quiet.  I’d keep quiet all the time if I had a statue of Michael Jackson at my own ground.  We have a bit of a go in the injury time that remains with Guly to the fore and win a couple more corners but we can’t force Schwarzer into serious action again and so from a game we should have won and could easily have lost – we get a draw which has taken us out of the relegation zone.  Hurrah for small mercies.

In Nigel’s post match interview he sounded somewhat deflated, mainly at our second half performance which he quite rightly said wasn’t good enough.  It seemed to me though that Fulham upped a gear and we instantly went on the retreat with the midfield dropping deeper and deeper.  It’s strange that we’re an attacking side and it’s only when we try and tighten things up that things go wrong.  We took off Puncheon for the more defensively minded Chaplow and this meant Riise could go forward more and he set up a goal.  We look Sir Rickie off against Man United when were were 2-1 and immediately let in 2 goals which is what also happened today.  I accept that he was knackered and not being very effective in the ‘10’ position so why not take J-Rod off and put Sir Rickie up in his normal position.  We’re not as good as a team when he’s not on the pitch which has been the case since September 2009 when he arrived.   There were some positives today with Fonte being decent in his primary role as a defender and a mention too for Danny Fox who did well today, helped by being up against a left footed right winger who always wanted to cut back in to where Foxy naturally seems to position himself.

Martin Jol’s interview was interesting because the second half of it needed subtitles.  He was understandable at first when moaning about Twattenburg regardingYoshida’s tackle in the build up to the 2^nd goal but then went into the deepest voice ever with a Dutch accent.  During the unintelligible bit he was obviously talking about the goal we had disallowed and Duff’s diving about and Sidwell’s tackling or maybe he was divulging details of the proposed Jimmy Savile and Gary Glitter statues to go with the one they already have.  Back to Twattenburg though, he was absolutely dreadful today and in the main, we got the worst of it.

Now, I don’t like Mark Lawrenson and I struggle with him being called a ‘Football Expert’ because he quite obviously, is a plonker.  However, he did point out on Match of the Day that our defensive problems are down to concentration and not down to defensive set-up or anything like that.  He’s right in the main – today, Jos had a shocker for the first goal and no one tracked Richardson for the second.  Nigel also seemed to be pissed off with the standard ‘we need to learn’, changing to ‘we need to learn quicker’.  I wonder if we still draw a blue line under it or have we resorted to teacup throwing yet?

Next up is another international break which we will hopefully use to get Nathaniel Clyne and The Great Gaston fit again and Spurs with hopefully use it to get injuries to Bale, Lennon, Defoe, Dembele, Dempsey, Walker, Vertonghen and anyone else they have who is decent as we’ve got them next at SMS.  Hmmmm.. lets see it as the game that could kick start our season! Perhaps.

Premier League Match 6 - Everton 3 Southampton 1

Above: A midfielder who could tackle

If there was one fixture in the Premier League that I wrote off as being a definite 100% rock solid defeat – it was Everton away.  As a travelling away fan I only ever went there once and we got a goal through Egil Ostenstad – the trouble was that we were already 4-0 down (if I remember correctly) when the big Norwegian did the business and we eventually lost 7-1.  After the monumental trouncing, there followed a nightmare coach journey home which took about a week. We won there once that I can remember, a 2-0 win when Kevin Davies got the ball on the half way line, dribbled past everyone and scored.  The man of the match that day was Carlton Palmer (yes, THE Carlton Palmer) and you’ll see why I’m mentioning him later on.

The build up for the game has been about Nigel Adkins and Sir Rickie going back to Merseyside and also it’s brought up that Adam Lallana was a boyhood Everton fan.  This year, Everton have started the season really well as opposed to their usual start of ‘quite shit’.  I have an Everton supporting friend who usually is looking for three teams worse than them at the end of September in order for them to stay up but this year he’s pondering them reaching the Champions League. 

Saints, despite the win last week, are in the business of looking for three teams worse than us and Nigel has decided (or been forced to) change things about to try and get something from this game.   Morgan Schneiderlin is out with injury and with natural replacement Jack Cork being injured again, instead of bringing in Bald Psycho or someone else who can put a foot in, he has brought in Jay Rodriguez, meaning that defensive solidity is really not on the menu as we’ve replaced our defensive midfielder with a striker.  We appear to have the back 4 that finished the game against Villa, a midfield diamond which includes the attack minded Steven Davis as the holding player, the non-defensive JWP and Adam right and left with The Great Gaston at the point.  I have decided that with no players who can defend in the midfield that we are going to get mullered and have accepted our fate.  Gazza retins his place with No.1 in waiting Artur Boruc, still no considered fit enough.

We start the game well and push Everton back and they look nervous and are unable to get the ball off us.  So far so good and with 5 gone we get a corner which Adam Lallana swings in from the left, Howard and an Everton defender go to the ball and both miss it, allowing Ramirez to head into an empty net from about 4 yards.  ‘Shitfuckbollockswanker’ says Tourette Tim.  ‘Jesus Christ’ says I, we’re 1-0 up.

David Moyes has gone purple on the sidelines, no doubt imploring his charges to rip our fucking heads off but it’s still us producing the chances as Frazer bombs one forward, Heitinga misses it and J-Rod does him for pace and is through on the right.  He cuts in, the ball drops nicely and he shanks it across the goal and off for a goal kick.  Ooh, big moment.

Everton, possibly in response to the rage coming from their dugout, start to pass the ball on the deck and immediately we start to creak and it doesn’t take long for them to get back in it as Mirallis bursts down the right, past Clyne and fires in a cross which is behind Jelavic but it hits someone and drops very kindly into the path of Osman who can’t miss from 5 yards and he doesn’t, though he may have had a slight heart-in-mouth moment as he scooped his shot into the top corner.

Five minutes pass of almost exclusive Everton possession while we run about not getting tackles in.  As predictably as you like, Everton score again as Fellaini and Mirallis combine in midfield to send Jelavic away in the inside left channel.  As he bears down on goal, Gazza looks too far over at the near post and so it proves as the Croatian rolls a nice finish across him and into the far corner, showing J-Rod how it should be done.

We’re now not keeping the ball, nor winning it back and the Everton players are queuing up to shoot.  Jelavic gets in a decent header which Gazza does superbly to claw out but we only clear the ball out as far as Coleman on the right who goes past Lallana as if he isn’t there or as if he’s a fully paid up member of the Everton fan club and crosses for Jelavic to thump in a header at the back stick which Gazza couldn’t keep out despite a decent effort.  I have gone all Tourettes with a ‘forfuckssake’, giving it far too much volume for my kids not to hear it.  Half time can’t come soon enough but we have a go at equalling our Arsenal effort as Sir Rickie allows Fellaini to get his wig on a corner and hit the bar.  Half time, fire up the bus, we may as well go home.

The second half was a bit of a chore to watch (thanks to dodgy internet streams) as we were never, I repeat never, going to get back into it.  Everton played at half pace but still had decent chances with the Be-wigged one firing a long distance effort just wide and Gazza producing a decent save to keep out a Mirallis effort.  There were just 20 minutes to go when we woke up again as Gaston fired in a long range effort which Howard held.   He must have beeen Tourette Tim again a minute or so later as a superb ball from Sir Rickie picked out Gaston who dinked it over Howard who turned, said something like ‘shitfuckgowideyoufuckerbastard’, which is duly did, by inches.

Mayuka comes on for J-Rod and a mascot comes on for Nathaniel Clyne.  Actually it’s Ben Reeves so he can go to left back and end up trying to mark two players every time Everton attack down that side.  We have one more decent chance before the end of the game as Steven Davis hoists in a cross and Sir Rickie outjumps the defender and thumps a decent header towards goal which Howard keeps out easily enough.  In the 89^th minute, Nigel sends on Bald Psycho to stiffen up the midfield cos you need that when you’re 3-1 down with a minute to go.  Final whistle but I’d long since stopped caring about his game.

This game was doomed from the start and defeat was inevitable.  I’ll repeat roughly what I said after the Arsenal game and say that in the Premier League, you cannot play the decent sides away from home and hope to out-pass them or have more possession.  We actually did for a bit today but once Everton sorted themselves out (20 minutes), we got shat on from a great height.  I’d be seriously pissed off if I was Bald Psycho as I’d not only be bald but I’ll have seen the manager change the formation for the first time since pre-season started, rather than give me a game.  I’m not saying for a second that Chappers would be the miracle cure but he at least has some appreciation of defending and might actually win the ball or cover the full-back every so often. 

Though not as heavy a defeat, today was much like the Arsenal game in that we were out of it by half time and we also allowed ourselves to let in 3 goals in 10 minutes.  Nigel may well say we played better in the second half and could have got back into it but it doesn’t fucking matter if you’re already out of the game and the opposition are in first gear with their collective foot nowhere near the gas.  If we continue to be this open away from home then we won’t beat any of the lesser lights either and will be left having to win 12 or 13 of our remaining 16 home games.  I notice that we’re not talking so much about ‘The Southampton Way’ any more cos at the moment, ‘The Southampton Way’ involves turning up like some sort of travelling entertainment roadshow, playing 6 attacking players and giving away 3 easy points in an entertaining way. The other side of the argument is of course, would you rather play expansive football and get beat or play like the Fat Sam Total Football Academy and welly everything and get beat?  I guess the silver lining is that our 3 away days have been at Man City, Arsenal and Everton but like I say, if we’d played like this at Norwich, West Ham and Reading, I reckon we’d have zero points as well. 

Next up we have Fulham at SMS and we have a stupid kick off time of 1.30pm on a Sunday meaning that I’m going to have to drive like a twat do get from my son’s football match to home and then back to SMS.  Does anyone at Sky or ESPN or whatever fucking channel it’s on give a shit?  No answer necessary.

Oh yeah, Carlton Palmer… we could have done with him today.  That is all.