Clearly a Dive. Never Touched Him
Though I spend a lot of time knocking the media, it has to
be said that a lot of what they’ve written about us in the past few weeks has
been positive. It’s one of the most quoted sayings when referring to the media
in this country that they ‘build you up to knock you down’. Today we’re at home to Manchester City, the
current Premier League Champions and it’s the start of our run of fixtures from
hell. You can feel the pencils being
sharpened and ‘false dawn’ and ‘not that good’ and other phrases being readied.
As I said, a lot has been positive but there was still the
curious case of Paul Mitchell. A head of
recruitment who moved from Saints to Spurs and made headline news. I don’t remember any such movement of
backroom staff making the headlines but its Spurs, a club who have recruited
terribly in the recent past, nicking someone from Saints who have recruited
well. Sorry but who gives a shit and why
is this news? It’s news because Spurs
want it to be news to make it look like they’re doing something. It’s ‘please forget about all the huge
mistakes we’ve made, here’s something for the future’. The bottom line is that Mitchell
was part of a team that are recruited players who fitted the structure and
philosophy at Saints and Spurs have neither a structure nor philosophy and
until they sort that they’ll still get things wrong.
The team news is in and Steven Davis is back to give us a
full strength line-up. The bench looks a
little underdone though with no Corky for some reason and following his 15 minute
masterclass at Villa Park, Mayuka has obviously done enough in training to
warrant a place. When the City names
were read out, I just thought…. Shit that’s a strong side. A few like Clichy, Mangala and Jovetic can be
dodgy on their day but a few more are going to have to have off days and we’re
going to have to be right on it.
Away we go and the immediate signs do not look good as City
look right up for it, closing down quickly when we’ve got the ball and keeping
it when they win it. We’re playing like
the away side to be honest and struggling to get out of our half. Big Vic has been talking about the prospect
of playing against Yaya Toure and is clearly keen to impress and does his best
to keep up with the Ivorian as he rumbles through the midfield only to get
pulled up for a foul that wasn’t and get booked by the ref Mike Jones who
immediately goes down as a twat.
He immediately levels up the card count and it’s an even
more ridiculous decision as José Fonte launches Aguero up in the air. I’m up the other end and it looks like a foul
but he books Aguero for diving which is ridiculous. It was actually in the box as well so it
should have been a penalty. OK, I’m
pleased we got away with one but that’s bollocks refereeing.
The first time that we actually get the ball down and
attack, we get pretty close to scoring.
Morgan brings the ball forward on the left and chips it over the
defence. Graziano is all on his own in the middle but doesn’t seem to realize
he has a chance and Hart parried his scuffed effort out to Davis and then
recovers to superbly save the next shot.
Another rebound and it falls to Tadic but Kompany flies out and blocks
him. The referee decides to save us the
bother of cocking up the corner so he gives a goal kick instead.
Mangala, who is is in a competition with Dejan Lovren for
this seasons “Biggest Bag of Shite Ludicrously Expensive Waste of Money Centre
Back” is booked for the sort of clumsy
challenge you associate with Neal Trotman (remember him!) in League 1, as he
took out Tadic. Needless to say, our
free kick was wank and straight to Hart.
There’s more bizarre refereeing from Mike Jones up next as
Fraser boots it forwards and Pellè comes back from an offside position to
compete for the header. He doesn’t get there and City break away and are on the
edge of our box before he gives offside and hauls them back. Cheers mate, completely incompetent.
City do manage a break without being hauled back by the
referee and we’re lucky that Aguero’s pass sends Jovetic wide on his left
foot. He still manages to smash it
though Fraser but luckily, Alderweireld has seen it coming and got back on the
line and calmly blocks it before hammering it away. Big Vic is everywhere at the moment which is
at least giving us some presence in midfield.
We have nothing up front and what’s noticeable is that we are looking a
lot less calm in our passing in the face of Man City pressing the ball. Anyway, we’ve made it to half time at 0-0.
I found it disappointing that we had the usual half time entertainment
and the players weren’t out practicing set piece delivery. Maybe the kids could show them how to take
corners rather than running round the pitch.
I also realised for the first time that I’d forgotten my glasses and
wondered if the fact that the game was blurred around the edges was making me
enjoy it more or less. Through the
blurred vision I could see a Japanese looking man coming on and sure enough,
Maya Yoshida was on for Morgan Schneiderlin, meaning presumably that our best
defender Alderweireld was moving into midfield.
Toby’s absence meant I was fretting about the stability of
our defence but the man himself was having fun in his new role and tried a 35
yarder as no one closed him down which went fizzing about a foot over the
bar. Dusan Tadic showed intent by
cutting in from the right onto the favourite left peg and skimmed a shot across
Hart and a coupe of feet wide of the far post.
So, a promising start to the second half and then it went wrong.
Alderweireld’s pass out to Clyne was a bit short and Clyne
should have just whacked it but he tried to dink it over a City player and lost
it. A pass infield was intercepted by
Big Vic but he pissed about and lost it and Aguero was allowed to turn by Maya
and tee up Yaya Toure whose low show nicked off of Alderweireld’s boot and gave
Fraser no chance at all. Shit.
Mané has a go at a response but his optimistic effort flies
over the bar and Pellegrini decides it time to reinforce the side as Milner
comes on for Jovetic, meaning Clyney will find it more difficult to get forward
than playing against Nasri. 3rd
Party Frank is on next as Nasri makes way and City should really make it 2-0 as
they show us how to take a corner when the kick is flicked on by Kompany and
Aguero, under pressure from Clyne sticks it over the bar from about 5 yards
out. As City missed that chance it’s
only fair that we give them another go and Big Vic passes straight to Navas who
thankfully skews across the goal and just wide.
Shane Long is on for Mané to try and add some life to our
attacking play and his first contribution is to dispossess Toure and head
towards goal where he is clattered to the ground by Mangala. Even Mike Jones can’t fuck this one up and he
has to go and Navas is off down the tunnel before Mangala and is replaced with
di Michelis. With 15 minutes to go and 1-0 down, it feels like a pivotal
moment. A goal from this free kick on
the edge of the box and we’re level against 10 men. Up steps Tadic and straight into the fucking
wall.
Any thoughts we had of making the 10 men pay are completely
extinguished a few minutes later and again it’s horrific. This time Steve Davis tries to beat Milner up
the wing and gets tackled. For once,
Milner’s telepathic ability to pick out an opposition player is failing and he
picks out 3rd Party Frank on the edge of the box and he does what
he’s done for years – 2-0, game over.
City’s best source of attacks is to wait for us to give them
the ball and we manage this again as a poor Tadic corner puts Big Vic under
pressure and his hasty shot is blocked and cleared and suddenly Aguero is
clear. Fraser, perhaps mindful of the
Villa goal comes out and then retreats and then does brilliantly to dive at
Aguero’s feet and clear it. So, 2-0 down
against the Champions and going nowhere.
It’s pretty depressing and then Mayuka comes on for the clearly
knackered Davis – shall we go home? A
lot of people do but they miss the supersub eclipsing his Villa performance
when he touches the ball.
Our last chance to create some sort of grandstand finish comes
and goes as Bertrand carries it forwards and passes to Long on the left and his
superb cross with the outside of his right foot is just in front of the lunging
Pellè. There’s just time for another
shocker as we win another corner on the left.
Tadic takes it again and it’s crap, straight to 3rd Party
Frank on the edge of the box. To cut a
long story short, City break and pass, pass, pass, Aguero across to Clichy,
goal. Brilliantly worked counter attack and
so now, our corners are so bad they actually provide assists for the
opposition.
Amusingly, Kompany gets injured in the celebration of the
goal and has to go off so we have 7 minutes of playing against 9 men in which
we don’t look like scoring in the slightest.
The ref then got something right and blew the final whistle.
The verdict: Beaten by the considerably better side. I was impressed with City, mainly for the
work they did without the ball in harrying us into mistakes. Once they got the ball they kept it and in
the second half, even with 10 men, they were clinical when they won the ball
and mugged us three times from our own mistakes. For the second and third goal we gave the
ball away and didn’t touch the ball again until we were fishing it out of the
net. The first goal was slightly
different in that we did have a chance to clear that once we had given it away
but we didn’t. As Koeman said afterwards
– make mistakes like this and teams as good as this and you will get punished. It’s interesting also to note that the two
teams that have pressed us high this season, City and Spurs, have made us look
very ordinary.
In order to get anything out of today we needed to be at our
absolute best and City needed to have some serious off days in their
ranks. Neither happened. For Saints , I think that only Big Vic, Toby Alderweireld
and Fraser Forster could say that had above average games. The rest were average or poor. In hindsight I think Koeman got the
substitution wrong at half time. Reed
could have come on with Davis moving back alongside Big Vic. Maybe even Gardos or Maya into a defensive
midfield role. The regular back 4 would
have been more solid than what was out there in the 2nd half. Maya coming on made us look very shaky back
there and it’s odd that he came on ahead of Florin Gardos who has been ahead of
him in the pecking order recently.
The most frustrating thing though was our set piece delivery
which was simply atrocious. Shin high
free kicks and corners that don’t get 5 feet off the ground are unforgivable. Two key moments sum it up... Mangala sent off
and a free kick and a chance for 1-1 and against 10 men and Tadic hits it into
the wall. Then you have the 3rd
goal where Tadic’ diabolical corner straight to a City player on the edge of
the box takes out 8 of our players and give City a 4v3 break. It wasn’t just Tadic as Morgan and Davis put
in shite deliveries as well. There is no
excuse for them being that bad.
So it’s a bit of a reality check for anyone who thought we
were going to simply romp to a Champions League place and we have no time to
feel sorry for ourselves as it’s a trip to the Emirates on Wednesday where
contrary to the usual for an away game, I will be attending. Midfield resources look stretched with only
Big Vic being 100% and Davis just coming back from injury. Corky will hopefully be available and maybe
Harrison Reed will be in line for a full debut.
Arsenal have got injuries as well but as they have limitless funds and
Wenger close to go into the season with only 6 defenders, I refuse to feel
sorry for them. We won there in the
League Cup of course so let’s have another go. Again we’ll need some serious
performances to get anything – play like today and we’re getting nothing.
Bring it on.
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