Premier League Match 38 - Southampton 1 Stoke 1

Keys offers advice to J-Rod, Lallana and Davis

Sunday and the last match of the season and the Saints are safe.  The boring media figures who kept saying it wasn’t mathematical as we may indeed lose by 13 goals to a Stoke side who have only scored 12 away all season were silenced by Wigan predictably filling the 3^rd relegation place absolutely and definititively, with a 4-1 gubbing at Arsenal.

I’ll save all the season review stuff for another day but it’s nice to get to the final home game with no pressure.  Sure, each place in the league table is worth about £700 grand but that’s for accountants and not for the fans – we don’t really care about anything other than our team staying up.

In other football news we’ve seen the retirement of David Beckham to a predictable media wank-fest and the acknowledgement of the end of a few more of the alleged  Golden Generation with Jamie Carragher, Paul Scholes and Michael Owen all calling it a day.  Owen is of course on the Stoke bench today and Mauricio has threatened to trip him like he didn’t in 2006 in the World Cup.   Elsewhere, Crystal Palace got through to the playoff final against Watford where they will play off for the right to finish 20^th in the Premier League next year.  Palace’s 2-0 win at Brighton was marred or inspired by the discovery of a stray turd on the floor of their changing room at the Amex.  Our mate Gus Poyet went nuts though this might have been because he didn’t think of it.  He’s since been suspended by the club and will be on his way soon.  It appears the culprit was backroom staff and the rumours vary from one turd to ‘fuck off Palace’ being written in smeary shite on the dressing room wall.  Poyet also slammed the Brighton marketing departments’ idea of putting ‘paper noise makers’ on the seats.  I’m with him all the way on that one.  The only question for Gus is “can you keep up?” and I guess that Dagenham and Redbridge could have won the playoffs if they had Wilfried Zaha.

In the past week we’ve had to deal with the media shitstorm regarding the Don’s contract ending.  Then Mauricio came out and said that he’d probably leave if the Don did, then Terry Paine came out in support and then Morgan Schneiderlin did the same.  It all seemed to be part of an orchestrated use of the media to try and apply pressure on the Liebherr estate and it was seen to have worked when on Saturday it was announced that everything was fine on the Good Ship Southampton and full steam ahead and all you salivating hacks and drooling Pompey fans can crawl back under your rock.  Whilst 95% of Saints fans will be pleased with the outcome, a wry smile is in order when you consider what would happen if a SFC employee spilled stuff into the media regarding how the club is run.  Horses head.  Through all this chicanery, we learned out that our owner has a name and it’s Katharina Liebherr who wasn’t quoted but her meeting and agreement with The Don has paved the way for an exciting summer.

So, I’ve had a schoolboy shocker and turned up for a 3 o’clock kick off when in fact it starts at 4.  It was very easy to park and very easy to get a beer in the Chapel Arms before the game and watch Yeovil beat Brentford in the League 1 playoff final. Yes Yeovil are now two divisions above Portsmouth.

Mauricio had hinted at some changes to the team but in the end it was business as usual except in goal where Superkelv came in, in place of the rested King Artur.  Hopefully he won’t have one of his ‘nailed to the goal line’ days against this team which will undoubtedly lump it into the box.  On the bench we have Lloyd Isgrove and Calum Chambers who have replaced Steeeeeve de Ridder and Vegard Forren who obviously need to be rested as well.  Stoke have a few notables with Huth and Shawcross forming an uncompromising central defence as well as being their main source of goals assists (hoooooooof!) and they have Peter the Giraffe up front.  In midfield they have Steven Nzonzi in a mask which he presumably wears to cover up the fact that he’s a thug and a shite footballer who is not as good as he thinks he is.

Away we go and we’re off, attacking at pace and force a throw in the right corner.  Clyne’s throw puts Lallana up against ex-Skate Wilson who gets turned inside out as Adam cuts into the box and shoots, forcing Begovic to tip onto the post and Sir Rickie slams in the rebound…. YEAHHHHH-OHHHH-SHITTTT-OFFSIDE.  Someone at the time said to me that it’s a shame as it would have made it a better game.  I see their point but in fact, all it would have done is made Stoke RFC hoof it further and higher. 

I don’t get why people throw flares onto the pitch.  You’re going to be on TV and you’re going to get banned so well done to the Stoke supporting dickhead who threw a flare which very nearly hit his own goalkeeper.  Enjoy your ban mate.  Equally baffling is Stoke suddenly not clearing their lines and Huth gets caught with the ball and Sir Rickie tries an optimistic effort from miles out which flies over the bar.  One aspect of Stoke RFC play is functioning well though as J-Rod sets off on one of his runs from the half way line and before he can really get going, he’s cynically trashed by Whitehead who is about as close to the ball as I am in my seat in the Kingsland.

One the quarter hour we are popping the ball about and you know when we’re keeping it well because the whiny Chuckle Brother kicks off with ‘too many passes, too many…..’ as we work Clyne into a great crossing position but his cross is just a little high for Sir Rickie who heads over the bar.  We have another chance soon after and it’s following a Stoke corner.  First of all the corner takes ages to take as Nzonzi is being a wanker and shoving Corky and Superkelv about.  After the ref eventually has a word, the corner comes over and is headed clear to ex-Skate Wilson who pisses about with it and gets tackled and we’re away with Steve Davis leading the charge.  He streaks up the pitch with Lallana on his left and Luke Shaw of all people on his right and sadly chooses the wrong option.  Lallana still has the chance to lash it with his left foot but instead tries to slide in Shaw and it’s blocked.

Tony Pulis has had enough of ex-Skate Wilson who has had an absolute mare so far and so he’s substituted and replaced with Wilkinson which gives us another goal threat after his excellent own goal for us up at Stoke.  More good news is that the ref has had enough of Nzonzi who plays the cynical foul card to trash Corky as he was leaving him for dead and get himself booked.

The rest of the first half is pretty uneventful with us passing the ball, winning free kicks and corners and then ruining them all with shite delivery and Stoke cause a few murmurs when Shawcross manages a clean take at the line-out and the rolling maul wins good territory before they win a scrum and set it up for a drop goal attempt from Etherington which clears the bar, earning them bugger all except the half time whistle.

I listened to the announcer reading out the half time scores with a sense of complete boredom.  I don’t really care what anyone else is doing to be frank.  I’ve probably got a slight preference for Arsenal over Spurs for the Champions League spot but I don’t really care.  It’s the first season since the season with the -10 that we’ve gone into the last game with absolutely nothing on it – I like it.

What I don’t like is that within a minute of the restart we’re 1-0 down as Luke slips over the pitch with was watered at half time and Cameron gets down the wing and fires over a cross which Two Metre Peter gets to and expertly guides his header away from Superkelv to make it 1-0.  Bloody hell – for the 3^rd game in a row we’ve been the better side and then gone behind.  As the Stoke RFC fans sang “how shit must you be, we’re winning away”

Stoke RFC have now had their attack for the day and it’s now a question of whether we can score or not.  Our first decent attempt soon comes as Sir Rickie plays a lovely ball inside the full back for Clyne to run onto and his low cross it met by Steven Davis who tries to be too exact and sees his sidefooted effort hit Begovic on the foot and bounce away.  The Foot of Begovic is at work again soon after as another ball fed in by Clyne is cushioned by J-Rod into the path of Sir Rickie whose left footed effort is again kicked clear by the keeper as he dived the other way.  Bastard.

It can’t last for Begovic though and following a Lallana cross and a Davis turn and shot, Begovic parries it out into an area of penalty area that contains Sir Rickie and no one else, bang, 1-1 and not offside this time.  With 25 minutes to go, Punch comes on and he shits where he wants you know.  His first act is to put pressure on Wilkinson who slices his clearance over the head of Begovic but luckily for Stoke RFC, Shawcross is covering behind and calls for a mark before clearing upto the opponents 22.

Stoke RFC bring on a prop forward in Cameron Jerome to replace Matthew Etherington who is far too small and skilful and we respond with JWP replacing Steve Davis who once again, has run about 30 miles non stop.  A significant sub though is that Michael Owen is on to replace Walters.  Are we going to get the inevitable farewell goal?

It’s ourselves who have the first go at winning it as J-Rod picks up a pass from Corky and turns inside a defender but his left foot shot has no conviction and ends up as a backpass to Begovic who just picks it up.  Fucking smash it for Christ’s sake!!!!  The expletives are flowing out of me now as Corky is replaced with a forward.  On the face of it you’d think I’d be happy with trying to force a win but when the forward is the little African Bloke, you know it’s extremely unlikely.

The last few minutes of the season see Punch try a shot from 25 yards with is a daisy cutter but it needed saving.  Stoke RFC actually went forward and a cross from the right was heading for Owen but whereas 10 years ago we’d have been shitting ourselves with him getting the ball in this position, he confirms that his decision to retire was correct by playing an airshot.  There is one last chance and the little African Bloke nearly has me choking on my words as he cuts in off the left wing, inside the full back and then lashed one into the side netting.  Nice try but no cigar. The end and season over.

Overall this wasn’t a great game.  Once again we were the better side and I was going to say the more pleasing on the eye.  Mind you, a big turd on the floor in a Brighton changing room would be more pleasing on the eye than Stoke RFC.  They’re a shit West Ham if that was possible.  We played our football upto the final third and then over-elaborated and lots of times didn’t even get the shot away.  If you’re 18 yards out and there are 6 defenders in front of you, you’re better off just hitting the bloody thing than trying to play a blind little chip round the corner which may or may not pick out one of your own players.  More often that not, the last pass was given an almighty ‘Get to Fuck’ by the Stoke defender and smashed into orbit.  Sometimes, as Richard Keys and Andy Gray would say, “you’ve just got to smash it”.

Like our previous few games, we have little cutting edge.  You wonder who is going to score if Sir Rickie doesn’t with J-Rod having reverted to the form he showed under Nigel Adkins and Adam Lallana showing some lovely skills and twists and turns but not producing very much with it.  In addition, Steve Davis always has the demeanour of a man who is not going to score and then there is our set pieces which are uniformly shite.  Off the top of my head I think I can remember one goal this year from a corner (Jose’s shouldered effort at home to Fulham) back in September.  Punch made a difference to the amount of goal threat when he came on and the little African bloke made a difference in that I was even less expectant of a goal out of him than I was of getting a goal out of Corky.  Oh look, I’ve repeated what I said last week.

During his post match interview, Mauricio was asked if he was going to have a holiday and he predictably replied that he was meeting the Don tomorrow to discuss next season.  I somehow get the impression that we won’t be waiting until the end of September to sign new players for next season and it’ll be worth keeping your eyes on the Saints internet feeds over the coming weeks.

I was pleased that Michael Owen got an ovation from the Saints fans.  As an England fan (which I always will be despite Roy Hodgson’s latest efforts) I’d like to say thanks to Michael Owen for some of my best memories following the football fortunes of my country.  In no particular order there was the hat-trick against the Krauts in the 5-1 away win which was part of another glorious false dawn.  There was the opening goal against Brazil in 2002 before Sven froze on the spot and Ronaldinho lobbed Seaman from 40 yards (old joke) and of course there was the amazing run from the half way line as an 18 year old against Argentina when he put us 1-0 up and we ultimately lost on penalties after Beckham got sent off.  Then of course, there was the blatant dive over some Argentinean defenders leg in 2006 which won us a penalty…

In the end we finished where we started before the game in 14^th position, above Villa, Newcastle, Sunderland and the three slightly more shit teams.  Job done.  Season over.  Bring on the new one.  It’s going to be good.

4 seasons done – thank you for reading – spread the word – Glen x