Premier League Match 6 - Southampton 0 Manchester United 1

Get Off the Pitch You Dickhead

Here comes the first difficult game. Well, they are all difficult but compare to what we had already, this is a whole new level.  Having had a few issues with drawing a load of games that they should of won last year, Manchester United had a rather spectacularly successful transfer window with Nemanja Matic sorting out the defensive midfield area which allows the creative players to go and create. Sure, they lost Zlatan to injury but have replaced him with Romelu Lukaku who so far, is absolutely ripping it up.   Just don’t sing songs about what he’s packing in his shorts though.  He doesn't quite have the presence of Zlatan but he has more pace which makes them an altogether scarier proposition.   Having spent £130 million on those two, they also paid £30 million for a centre back, Lindelof but he has not gotten the team as yet but Phil Jones has been fit so he has not been needed.  In my opinion, Jones has always been a better centre back than Smalling.  Even before you think about wages, these transfer fees show you the completely different level they are operating on compared to us.  

They still have Luke Shaw who appears to still be beating his thick-as-mince head against the wall in thinking that he can carve himself out and Manchester United career.  The manager thinks you’re shite mate – give it up.  Shaw just about beats Calum Chambers and Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain in the ‘Players who left Saints too early’ stakes. He simply wasn't ready either mentally, or as a player.  The manager who Shaw will never impress is of course, Jose Mourinho who apparently has a record of always winning the title in his second season. Well he's certainly made a good start this time around with 4 wins and a draw from 5 games.

I had the bizarre experience of having to write a semi serious piece for a Manchester United website and you can read it here. Unfortunately, The style of the piece meant that I couldn't get into talking about how United are self-entitled wankers and that it's only the travelling away fans who are in any way decent. To be honest, I'd rather beat Liverpool more than United but a win against United is never a bad thing and especially at St Mary's, it doesn't happen that often. In fact, it's only happened once. The Dell days and 3-1 and 6-3 and Matt Le Tissier chipping Schmeichel and Ostenstad’s hat-trick and grey shirts is a long long time ago.

Not so long ago, a week ago in fact, came more proof of the fucking ridiculous politically correct times that we living with the Lukaku song being deemed offensive and this generated a ridiculous amount of inches, that's column inches, as in newspaper column.  The world is gone fucking soft. Away from men's football, the FA have again proved themselves not fit for purpose following the sacking of the England women's manager, Mark Sampson. Having already  investigated and cleared the bloke twice of racism and bullying accusations, rightly or wrongly, they found something that he'd done about five years ago that they were fully aware of and decided to fire him for that.   The FA’s defence was that they were not fully aware of it because no one had read the report which they had, properly until last week.  Pathetic.  Whatever the rights and wrong is of how he's behaved, that is absolute bullshit. It's ironic that the woman who is accused him of racism and bullying is a lawyer. I wonder if she's an employment lawyer.  You really couldn't make it up but the FA clearly do at every turn.

Also, back in media fantasyland, there are still outlets that are trying to push Van Dijk to Liverpool. It's quite staggering really. They are talking about January when he absolutely will not go anywhere and they are also talking about the end of the season when he absolutely will not go to Liverpool. What's changed in the relationship between Saints and Liverpool? The only thing that might change by the end of the season is Jurgen Klopp’s position. We are beginning to get the first people noticing that he hasn't remotely improve the defence in two years in charge. Very amusing and watch this space. In some ways I hope these Liverpool stories keep coming up because Liverpool are playing well but none of the stories would be happening.

Moving onto today and the question is would Mauricio change the team from last week and introduce Virgil or would it be same again. I have a feeling, as I said on the United website link above, that Pellegrino is building us playing three at the back so I would not be at all surprised if Virgil is playing instead of Tadic or Redmond.  As it turns out it’s exactly the same team as we put out against Palace with the only changes coming on the bench.  It’s remarkable that we have a bench with so much ability on it… Virgil, Gabbi, JWP, Hojbjerg, Austin, Pied and McCarthy.  United meanwhile have not picked that horrible little shitbag Herrera and have nstead gone with the pair of elbows with a wig on top that is Fellaini.  A front four of Mkhitaryan, Rashford, Mata and Lukaku is not bad though is it?

Chairman Gao is introduced to the fans before the game –  careful Jinsheng, you’ll get a reputation for only turning up for the big games.  Away we go and it annoys me that we’re not smashing into them at every opportunity.  We seem content to just hold them at arms length and defend in numbers.  Fellaini is even looking like a decent player as they just knock it about.  We have intent when we get the ball though and Tadic finds himself running at the defence and getting towards the penalty area but he’s blocked off robustly and you are never getting that decision against United.

We’re holding our own but not really forcing things and on 20 minutes United take the lead when they build down the left and the totally right footed Young picks up the ball.  He faces up Tadic and it’s as obvious as you like that he’s going to cross it right footed.  Tadic does the same with his left foot from the right side in every game but he doesn’t close down the right footed cross and over it comes, Lukaku shoves Hoedt and meets it, great block by Fraser but it falls to Lukaku to simply knock it in the net.  Fuck.  To be honest, if he’d beaten Stephens like that I’d have been saying that he was bullied and Hoedt really should have been stronger but that really looks like a foul.

We need to recover and with our lack of goal threat, it’s already obvious that if we let in another then we are fucked, so Maya trashing through the back of Mata on the edge of the box is not what anyone wanted.  Up steps Rashford and it whistles about a foot wide of the near post and Fraser wasn’t getting it.

The United fans have spent about 10 minutes droning their version of ‘Feeling Good’ which is tedious in the extreme and then decide to sing about big cocks for a bit.  It suits them better I think.  There’s not a lot going on for the rest of the half aside from Shane Long catching Fellaini late and getting a yellow card.  Valencia is trying his best to get Craig Pawson to send him of but luckily it’s yellow.  Fellaini deserved it anyway.

The second half is a different kettle of fish altogether.  Romeu and Lemina have truly come to the party and we are suddenly dominating the game – higher up the pitch and looking more of a threat.  We win an early corner which Tadic puts over and it drops on the six yard line and it looks like Romeu must score but somehow he hooks it wide, understandable given that about four United players threw themselves at the ball.  Eric Bailly clearly hasn’t played against anyone quite like Shane Long before as he thinks he’d got time to saunter over to a loose ball.  No mate you haven’t.

Having been invisible in the first half, Nathan Redmond has woken up, drilling a hot at the near post which de Gea saves comfortably.  United as an attacking force are really not doing much and for the first time in months, there is actually a bit of excitement and expectation when we go forward.  Redmond again is on the run and swerves past both Matic and Valencia and whips over a first time left footed cross which is just a little bit too high for Long and he heads over.  We of course have a few dodgy moments when United break and Lukaku gets free on the right and drills in a shot which Fraser blocks well.

Lemina is running the show.  If we were winning you would say that he was show boating but there’s a real purpose in what he’d doing.  Winning the ball back and then pulling out all the tricks to make space for himself and set up another attack, making Matic and Fellaini look very average.  Mourinho is worried and on comes that little shit Herrera and Chris Smalling in place of Mata and Mkhitaryan to bolster the United rear guard effort.  Their fans are not singing about big cocks any more and are very quiet.  Daley Blind on for Rashford and a 6-2-1-1 formation.

Another corner, a Romeu header and the elbows with a wig heads it away from in front of the goal.  Mauricio rolls the dice and Steve Davis is off and Gabbiadini comes on.  Striker for midfielder – tick.  We had our first genuine ‘GOAAAAAAfuckittt’ moment for a while as Romeu ran at the Untied defence, playing passes with Gabbiadini and Tadic before screwing his effort across the goal and just in front of Long.

As the clock ticks down, two more subs with Cedric and the knackered Long replaced with Austin and JWP who goes to right back.  Running out of time here and Another Lemina run and we win another corner.  93 minutes are up but we have to delay because Mourinho is being a twat so the ref has to send him to the stand.  That diffuses the head of steam nicely doesn’t it for fucks sake.  United survive the corner despite Fraser being right up there in the mixer and another goalless home defeat is chalked up.

And bollocks. We played well though and have not got what we deserved. The fact that Mourinho was throwing on defenders and defensive midfielders in place and attacking players as the second-half wore on, tells you all you need to know about who was on top and looking the better side. Our fans appreciated it too and even though we scored zero goals at home yet again there is an appreciative ovation for the players at the end of the game. That's really cool actually because it shows that the home fans, or the majority of them anyway know something about football, appreciate the efforts and can see further than the fact that we lost.  As for the fucking 83 minute brigade… The majority of you are a fucking embarrassment.

Another game against United comes and goes where we got less than we deserved. I swear it's fucking psychological. For the first 30-40 minutes we gave them too mush respect and allowed players as limited as Fellaini to dictate the game. When we got into it and realise that they actually aren't that great, we looked decent but by then unfortunately the damage was done with the goal. The cross should never ever have been allowed to come over from Young as he is completely right footed playing on the left and he’s never put over a left footed cross in his left.  He even dummied crossing it with his right foot before he eventually did.  Tadic really should've blocked that but once it came over, that's where luck plays a major part. Lukaku clearly barged Hoedt over but the referee didn't see it and Fraser makes a great save from the initial header but Lukaku suddenly sees the ball presented to him right in front of an empty net.  Lemina and Romeu completely dominated the midfield from that point and all United had in the second half was all the cunty tricks in the book to waste time with Fellani being shown up to be as limited a footballer that he is.

Our two midfield boys were magnificent but there's only so much that they can do. The sad truth is that despite Shane Long having a really really good game, he didn't threaten the goal once. The three players that we have the furthest forward are not the same standard as the rest of the team. It's like having a knife where the handle is absolutely magnificent but the blade is fucking useless. It looks absolutely great until it comes to practical use. Don't get me wrong, I love Steve Davis as a footballer but I thought the first substitution today was quite telling when he was removed to bring on Gabbiadini. We have needed Davis to knit everything together but maybe now, with Lemina and Romeu in midfield, I wonder if we need a Davis style player at number 10.  We could go with someone who is more of a goal threat. It's not about individual players but about what makes the best team.

I thought that Pellegrino did all that he could today and his substitutions were spot-on. We had JWP on for the last 10 minutes playing at right back but on the pitch to deliver the set pieces and we chucked on the extra striker with Austin coming out. I would however have argued that it would've been better to throw Virgil on and stick him up front.

We are not far away. It is just a matter of time before it clicks into place.

Unlike last home game against Watford, there are a number of players that we can talk about as having had really good games. The most eye-catching display was from Mario Lemina again and he truly bossed the game in the second half. Whilst less eye-catching, Oriol Romeu was fantastic.. The two of them were really trying to find a forward pass through the defence to one of the wingers of the fullbacks and were playing higher up the pitch which is what we hoped would happen when the back four got sorted. Talking of which, Wesley Hoedt is looking like a brilliant signing and one thing that really encourage me is that the one weakness that he was supposed to have, a lack of pace, didn't seem to be a problem when he was in a foot race with the allegedly quick Lukaku. Maya Yoshida also did a good job and was much more safety first than usual which is no bad thing. He knows that his place is under threat from van Dijk on the bench and he stepped up to the mark today. It would be incredibly harsh on him to be left out and that those of the decisions that the manager gets paid to make.

Shane Long put in a real shift today and the only time he annoyed me was when that big high ball went over the United defence and he was looking for the slightest contact before crumbling to the ground, rather than going after the fucking ball and trying to stick it in the net.  The ref knew it and was never going to give a penalty.  I was up that end of the ground and didn’t even get excited about it.

Post match I saw a tweet by Luke Shaw congratulating the proper players at his club on their win. See You Next Tuesday in the Under 23's you fat twat.

So – we’ve proved that we can get up for it and play a high tempo against Manchester United.  Now we have to do it at the National City of Inbreeding – Stoke.

 See You Later You Wiggy Twat

Premier League Match 5 - Crystal Palace 0 Southampton 1

Mauricio Helps an Old Man to His Seat

After the dismally shit performance against Watford, we travel to Selhurst Park to play a Crystal Palace side who have made it being dismally shit the norm over the past year or so. Fat Sam masterminded their survival last year and then fucked off in the summer for slightly strange reasons to be replaced by Frank de Boer who was given the task to change the way that Palace play which is basically always been long ball and chucking in loads of crosses from the wings.  De Boer introduced a more possession based game which lasted for four games and four defeats and no goals and he was then sacked.  Rumour has it that he told various players and the chairman that they basically weren't fucking good enough to play in a team that wanted to keep possession of the football and the writing was on the wall from that moment on. So, chairman Steve Parish who had appointed de Boer and given him his instructions, decided to appoint Croydon boy and pensioner Roy Hodgson - last seen masterminding a truly pathetic 2-1 defeat for England against Iceland in Euro 2016.

For all the talk of Hodgson having a decent managerial record, let’s not get away from the fact that he was fucking useless as an England manager taking four years to not build a discernible pattern of play, getting knocked out of the 2014 World Cup after two matches and being equally fucking abysmal at Euro 2016. To cap it all, he was fired and then sat in the in the press conference after the tournament saying I don't know why I'm here. He looked and sounded like a resident in a rest home who was sitting in a puddle of his own piss.  There were 7 million reasons (per year) why the hell did he should've been there to explain himself. Anyway, off he went into the sunset and I assumed that no football club would ever be stupid enough to give him another job. Granted his record and club football is not too bad with medium-size clubs but at 70 years old, has he really still got it?  If you could ask that question of Roy Hodgson, you could also ask it of John Motson who has mercifully decided to retire from commentating on football matches. This is at least 10 years too late but at least he has taken the decision and fair play to him.

I've always thought that Palace had a slightly strange squad in that they appear to have players who commanded either a huge transfer fee or would be on huge wages like Benteke and Cabaye and they offset those with players who quite frankly, would not get in any other Premier League team like Jeffrey Schlupp, Jason Puncheon and ex-Skate Joel Ward.

As for us, this week saw the return of the Virgil van Dijk to Saints colours as he played for the under 23’s is against Aston Villa, where he was crap, partially at fault for at least three of the goals that went past Alex McCarthy in our 4-0 defeat. Still, he played 90 minutes and all the indications are that he would be involved in some way at Palace this weekend.

We of course had massive issues with the front half of our team last week against Watford so it would be interesting to see what Pellegrino did this week.  In my opinion, even if not in anyone else's, there was a huge question mark over Jack Stephens as well. In the event, the back end of the team looked very strong with Yoshida preferred to Stephens and Lemina coming back into the midfield. The front for saw Davis preferred to JWP and Tadic instead of Boufal.  I have been calling for the inclusion of Shane Long but assumed it would be in one of the wide positions but he took Gabbiadini’s place upfront.

One of the rules I hate most in football is the one that allows you to loan players to/from clubs in the same division.  With the money available to clubs these days there is absolutely no reason why this should be allowed but it is and Palace have two – Loftus-Cheek from Chelsea and Fosu-Mensah from Manchester United.

There’s the reassuring presence of Roy Hodgson on the touchline as the game starts.  Reassuring for us that is.  Palace have the first attack with the Chelsea player chucking in a cross that Townsend can’t control.  Palace haven’t scored all season and we only have one from open play so no one’s expecting a goal fest so what happens on 6 minutes is a major surprise.  Davis drives forward from midfield and slides in Tadic on the right, he takes on Schlupp on the outside and fires it across first time with his right foot, Hennessey pushes it out and there’s Davo to pass it into the corner of the net, past the ex-Skate who is on the line but going to wrong way.  Get in.

Hang on – we look superb in midfield and in defence.  Lemina is playing like a machine and the back four are well drilled.  Yoshida is competing well with Benteke and Hoedt is spraying the ball about.  This looks great.  It gives us the platform to build and following another Davo break, Tadic picks out Long with a superb cross and he tries to lob a header over Hennessey but gets it wrong and hits the crowd via the corner of his head.

This is Saints though and we can fuck up any situation and after Hoedt wins a challenge in defence, Redmond falls on his arse and Townsend plays in Chelsea and his cross is met by Benteke five yards out but he’s scooped it a bit and Fraser is there to block.  Good save big orange man.

As the half goes on, Lemina is the king in midfield, winning the ball back and driving forward.  The usually decent Cabaye and McArthur are nowhere for Palace.  Their only threat is Made in Chelsea and he combines with Benteke and drills a good low shot just wide from the edge of the box and then produces another decent driving run which ends with a shot which is well blocked by Bertrand.  For all our domination in midfield we are not creating much with a Redmond scuffer which goes wide being as close as we get.  The half ends with Townsend latching on to a Benteke flick and lashing it wide of the near post with his favoured left foot.  He’s crap really isn’t he?

With Saints having emphatically won the midfield battle in the first half, England’s finest changes the Palace shape and decides that it may be better if there’s a player somewhere near Benteke and pushes the Chelsea player forward.  To be fair it works and Saints looks a bit panicky.  Romeu gives the ball away on the edge of our box and Chelsea runs at the left side of our defence and his low cross evades everyone.  Palace recycle it and Schlupp bends in a great cross from the left and Punch meets it about 5 yards out but Fraser has made himself into a huge orange starfish and blocks superbly.  If de Gea or Courtois makes that save then Sky are creaming off about it for years.

Palace’s frustration is beginning to boil over and they start kicking anything that moves.  Saints break up the right and Punch decides to just charge into Tadic with an NFL style block.  He then moans about the yellow card he gets.  Ward is up next with a bit of control that he obviously learned in Portsmouth and he rugby tackles Redmond.  McArthur takes time out from being schooled by Lemina and dives is to two ridiculous challenges in quick succession, seeing yellow for the second when they were both worthy.

It’s about 75 minutes before we make our first sub with Redmond being replaced by JWP.  It’s not been a great day for Nathan so it’s a solid looking substitution.  Roy then makes the managerial decision that has the most benefit to Saints that he could by removing the Chelsea player who has been their best player by a mile.  To be fair, he has been suffering with ‘qwamp’.  I feel that this game is comfortable for us now and then Yoshida smacks a clearance into Lemina which luckily bounces straight to Fraser.  Mario can even snuff our danger when the ball is smashed at him from 5 yards when his back is turned.

With 6 minutes left of the 90 came the moment that the media will be talking about over and above everything when Virgil made the appearance in a Saints shirt that he was never going to make.  On he comes for Tadic and takes his place in between Yoshida and Hoedt which is a sign of things to come for me.  It looks a tactically sound move as Palace are launching everything up to Benteke now.  I’m happy with this because Benteke clearly doesn’t give a shit.  Seriously, I’d take him off and try and play some football.

There are no more alarms as we get to 90.  Whilst the clock is ticking down and you have a 1-0 lead, it’s always nice to be camped up the other end of the pitch and we eventually work it across to Cedric who cuts in from the right and hits a shot at Hennessey which is well blocked.  With just seconds remaining on the clock, Palace attempt to break and the game ends in the same style as it’s had for the past 90 minutes with Lemina hunting down the ball and taking it off a Palace player like he was taking back his own personal property.  That’s my ball, this is my field, these are my rules, now fuck off.  Game over and Roy looks like he needs a blanket and warm milk back in the rest home.

In the end it was a win that showed exactly what we are about. We are resilient defensively and with the two beasts in midfield we should be able to dominate quite a few games. We still haven't got it going quite upfront because if we did have, this game would've been dead and buried at half time whilst we were dominating it. In the end it took two really good saves from Fraser to ensure that we won it. If Palace had got anything out of the game it would've been a fucking travesty but it’s an odd game in that if you just watch the highlights and incidents near the goal, it looks like we’ve survived a battering. Having sacked a manager who actually dared to play some football, they've gone back to a manager who instantly just reverted to smashing it long to Benteke who didn't have any players around him whatsoever, especially in the first half. In the second half, Made in Chelsea got close to him and causes a few problems but then he came off and Roy brought on a defensive midfielder. This pushed Cabaye further forward but to no effect.

Saints dealt with the one Palace tactic, the long ball up to Benteke, by Yoshida getting as close as he could to Benteke and not letting him bring the ball down and when he flicked it on either the full backs or the seriously impressive Wesley Hoedt tidied everything up. The area we completely dominated was in midfield where Lemina was absolutely immense. Romeu did his usual thing and that enabled Steve Davis to roam around, read the game and get the team moving. One thing I will say is that Palace were dirty bastards and fully deserved the five bookings that they got. Some really cynical horrible play combined with moaning about it to the referee afterwards. I know Jason Punch was the captain but he acted like a whiny little bitch right the way through the game.

Shane Long did what Shane Long does and hassled and harried and was a complete pain in the arse for the defenders and you have to say that team selection totally worked. Dusan Tadic had a decent first half before fading horribly on the second but Redmond was poor. He did have a couple of half breaks and efforts on goal but more often than not he was falling on his arse and just giving the ball away. Maybe bring Gabbiadini in to play on the left and make him and Shane Long interchangeable?

We have to talk about Virgil I guess. He came on for the last 10 minutes for the inevitable aerial bombardment and whilst I have no doubt his presence did help matters, his timing was way out getting our jumped for virtually every ball. It'll come I guess.  Even though he didn’t win much, his presence enabled us to have more players to sweep up the flick ons and he did look interested.

So, a great result for Pellegrino in terms of the fact that he obviously thought about what went wrong the previous week and changed it and today was much better. Mind you, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to put Mario Lemina in the team. He was absolutely fucking outstanding today and it was the easiest decision for the man of the match that there can ever have been. The useless wanker that is Philip Neville was saying on Match of the Day that some of the big clubs will already be looking at Lemina. It's so predictable that it's fucking hilarious. You have to laugh or else you get angry about it.  To give today a bit of context, which Phil Neville is obviously totally incapable of doing, it is the first game that Mario has played 90 minutes for us and we are playing against a team who are bottom of the league having lost all five games. Hey, I think Mario was absolutely brilliant today but it is only one game. Let's see how he gets on against a good side, like the Manchester United side that we play next week.

It was a good day for Mauricio - the charge upfront with Shane work very well as did the central defensive partnership. We just have to work out how to play home games now. It was great for Steven Davis to actually get a shot on target but the best bit of today for me was the two saves by Fraser. The Twitter army who have been slagging him off for quite a long time at every opportunity, were conspicuously absent straight after the game.  They’d still prefer us to pick McCarthy, who let in 4 for the under 23s in midweek and is never fit for longer than 10 minutes.  They also wanted to pick Mouez Hassen last year who no one had ever seen play.

Straight after the game, due to it being an early kick-off, we had shot right at the table to fifth-place which is rather cool. I was looking around at Ronald Koeman and Everton but they were fucking nowhere. I looked for Juergen Klopp and Liverpool and they were below us as well. It looked different at 5pm and we had dropped to 9^th but for now, happy days.

Next up, as mentioned, it's Manchester United at home and the moaning fuck that is Jose Mourinho. Bring it on. Someone's got to hand them their first defeat of the season so why not us.  I see us playing 3-5-2 with Virgil coming into the side in place of either Redmond or Tadic.

You Want This Ball?  Come and Take It.

Premier League Match 4 - Southampton 0 Watford 2

And You Can Stick Your Clappers Up Your Fucking Arse and all.

After the International break disrupted any early-season momentum that we might have had, we are back at St Mary's today for the visit of Watford. People have been commenting, although not always positively, about the fact that Saints have changed in that we are not selling all our best players this summer. Watford appear to have made a bit of a change as well in that they haven't thrown out absolutely everybody and replaced them like they have done in previous seasons.  Sure, the manager has gone with the very boring manager being replaced by a new, more dynamic one. Sounds Familiar. Marco Silva is the man who somewhat surprisingly took the Watford job and so far, they have the same record as ourselves with one win and two draws. Their are one win was away at Bournemouth and it was quite amusing because it shot down the notion that Bournemouth were going to somehow be much better this year having spent a relative fortune.  Watford’s opening day draw against Liverpool just highlighted that Liverpool need a centre back (ha ha ha) and a home draw against Brighton highlighted that Brighton have no strikers and that sometimes, a three-game ban is not enough for a red card tackle. Britos should have ended up in fucking prison for that tackle in the Brighton game which was and assault which is probably not allowed in the UFC. Watford have of course signed a few with Nathanial Chalobah looking like a decent buy from Chelsea. I really would've quite liked him at St Mary's but instead of him, we've got Mario Lemina. Talking of whom...

Our new boy scored a fantastic goal for Gabon against the Ivory Coast in the World Cup qualifier, picking up the ball on the left, going forward with purpose and then smashing a screamer over the top of the goalkeeper and into the far corner of the net from about 35 yards. That was the undoubted highlight of our players involvement in international week but Steve Davis and Northern Ireland had two more wins to all backed guarantee play-off spot and Ryan Bertrand played both games for England and scored his first international goal in the process when England put four past Malta. England were typically laboured but two wins out of two got the job done and we will almost certainly be in Russia for another tournament of disappointment in the summer. Bertrand himself, in the context of the England displays, had two pretty good matches and now, the media are beginning to talk of him in terms of being England's first choice left back.  Once Danny Rose has recovered from injury for five minutes, all the media will remember that he plays for Spurs and he’ll be their first choice again but the truly discerning know who the better man out of two very good left backs is.

Post transfer window and right on cue, Virgill van Dijk returned to training. The club didn't over play it with just a couple of photographs but they couldn't resist putting a video of him smacking a shot into the top corner and a shooting drill. Despite a plethora of experts and people like Paul Merson predicting that he wouldn't play until January, it seems that the reintegration has started well. Philip Coutinho, who was predicted to settle back into life at Liverpool straight away has so far shown no inclination to do so. The back injury that he had miraculously cleared up in time for him to play two games for Brazil and after that, according to Klopp, he was not okay to play for Liverpool this weekend, which on the face of it, is a pretty big two fingered at salute to Liverpool.

The other story of transfer window fallout was of great amusement to me personally with the director of Sporting Lisbon christening Gold and Sullivan at West Ham, The Dildo Brothers after they failed to sign William Carvalho from Sporting. I have of course been calling them that for years, since 2011 in fact.  I have of course taken it much much further with the suggestion that they strapped to free dildo to the underside of every seat in the Ann Summers Taxpayer stadium (better than a fucking plastic clapper anyway) and of course that they somehow incorporate a massive dildo into the structure to personalise the stadium when they took over the lease. One of the funny things about writing a blog for years is that all your opinions when you have been completely and utterly wrong are there in black and white but also it's amusing when moments like this happen, when you can look back and say that you actually said it first. I always wondered what being ITK felt like. Ha ha. Anyway, a director of Sporting Lisbon of course has more clout than I do and I have not made any money from copyright and I have not been sent any presents from the Gold and Sullivan range of products, which I am quite pleased about.

Back to today and it’s a question of perception in that a win will mean 8 points out of 12 which from those for fixtures will be pretty good. A defeat and 5 out of 12 will not seem quite so decent.  On the way to the game we’re heading over the Itchen Bridge in the sunshine and notice the bastard great black cloud over the ground and within a couple of minutes we are running for shelter under the trees or under a burger van canopy as it’s pissing down.  Awesome.  In the ground and there are loads of those fucking plastic clappers everywhere.  This is bad news but especially when you sit in the Family Stand and you’re never too far from a small child who thinks these are the best thing ever.  Everywhere you looked there was an adult with a pained expression on their face.

The team news is interesting… Hoedt for Yoshida and JWP for Lemina.  I assume that these are down to distances travelled on international duty for the two left out.  Also in the side is Boufal instead of Tadic.  Now Tadic deserved to be left out but Boufal in no way deserved to be selected but he really has to be given an opportunity sometime.  OK… on paper it doesn’t look too bad but as we kicked off it appeared that JWP was playing at 10 with Boufal on the wing and Davo was next to Romeu.  Straight away there looked to be a mismatch in midfield as Chalobah and Doucoure were all over us.

Boufal makes a decent start with a lovely touch and burst past the right back but his pull back is easily cleared.  After that brief excitement up the Watford end the game settles down and they’re all over us physically, closing us down and stopping us getting anywhere near their end of the pitch.  To be fair, they’re not doing much either up our end with Hoedt and Stephens comfortably dealing with Gray up front and Cedric and Bertrand dealing with Richarlison and Carillo respectively.  Cleverley is as shit as he always was when he was a regular in the England side because he was a Manchester United substitute.

So, Watford win a throw and Holebas hurls it in as we knew he was going to do.  Stephens, for reasons only known to him, doesn’t head it or kick it away but rather knees it out to the edge of the box and Doucoure wins a challenge because he wanted it more and the ball sits up nicely for him to smash low through a crowd and into the far corner of the net.  Good strike but shit defending and you can’t say Watford didn’t deserve it.

Far from provoking a response from us, there’s nothing.  Stephens gets bullied by Gray and the ball drops for Richarlison who smashes it just wide.  The rest of the half is just painful shit.  We do fuck all except get dominated all over the place.  We’re so far away from their goal and we lose it before we get anywhere due to their organisation and willingness to close down.  Quite simply, they’re better than us with Chalobah in particular just running the show.  Half time – fucking dreadful shower of shit.  Wankers.  Embarrassing wankers.  Has Gabbi touched the ball?  Probably not because he’s relying on JWP to give it to him.  You may as well put Fraser at 10 instead of JWP as he won’t do any fucking worse or be less suitable for the position.  I of course feel sorry for Gabbi but also for Redmond and Boufal who only ever get the ball on the half way line because our midfield two are getting fucked over without a fight.  Let’s see what we do to change it – the only positive is that it’s only 1-0.

Oh that’ll make a huge fucking difference – Tadic on for JWP.  How fucking tired is Lemina?  If he can’t play 45 minutes then what’s the point of him even being on the bench.  What’s gonna change with Davo and Romeu up against those two?  Away we go and guess what, we’re still getting fucked and they’re going in dry.  Watford are almost playing Olé football as they work it around and Chalobah bring a save out of Fraser.

Fuck me we’ve won a corner.  Tadic has actually made things a bit better and he puts Bertrand away who wins the said corner.  Watford are a team of massive fuckers and from corners they put five monsters in the vicinity of the near post and we obviously see it as a challenge to put the ball in the middle of them, which we manage.  Our height is Hoedt and we put our corners nowhere near him.  When Watford win a corner, which they do when Bertrand takes a shit touch and gives one away, there is carnage which we just about get away with in amongst falling bodies and appeals for handball.

Boufal links up with Redmond who makes a decent run and Sofiane smashes an effort miles over the bar but at least it’s a shot. Redmond puts an effort into the side netting following a corner and Watford have to change two defenders as Kaboul and the right back are both injured.  Surely the two subs will disrupt things and we can take advantage… not a bit of it.

A ball into our box and Stephens heads it straight up in the air in shit fashion.  Hoedt gets to it but because of Stephens’ fuck up he has to put all the power on it and can’t clear it too far and one of the Watford subs Janmaat, picks it up and with no pressing from any fucker, he can pick his spot and put it in the far corner as Fraser does the impression of a falling tree.  Two fucking nil.

Long is on for Gabbiadini and then Austin is on for Boufal and we appear to have gone for a 4-4-2 With Tadic and Redmond wide and Long and Austin up front.  Aside from a couple of runs from Long where no fucker gets up with him, nothing changes much.  Austin runs around as usual and bumps into defenders in that clumsy-arsed way of his.  On 93 minutes a ball breaks out to Romeu and he tees up Cedric who shoots from 35 yards and Gomes pulls out a one-for-the-cameras save.  It is however a shot on target and anyone who was still arsed enough to still be in the ground celebrates like we’ve scored.  It’s funny and fucking sad as well.

The last twenty minutes has been played at training ground pace.  No rush from Watford as they’re winning and no feeling that we were ever going to get back into it.  Waste of fucking time football again.  Remind me… did Claude leave?  Absolute bollocks performance.  Sort it out Mauricio for fucks sake.  Are we a pressing team or are we a play on the break team.  No, we’re neither.  We’re a tippy tappy slow paced sideways and backwards pile of shit.  We also have shit footballers, especially in the final third.  I was angry at half time, resigned in the 2^nd half and now angry again.

Well where do we start with that absolute pile of wank?  Let's praise the opposition. I thought Watford were superb, prepared to do all the hard yards and all the ugly stuff and take their chances when they presented themselves. They dealt with every situation that presented itself during the game with commitment and energy and teamwork. They lost two of the four defenders in the same minute and dealt with it with the absolute minimum of fuss because all the players knew what they had to do and were prepared to put the hard work in.  They’ve got some very good players with Chalobah, Doucoure and Richarlison particularly impressive.

As for us… fucking hell!

I thought that Cedric tried his best and showed a determination not to be beaten to the ball and he stuck to his task well… and he had a fucking shot on target – that almost qualifies him for legend status on its own. The central defensive pairing were passable but Stephens as usual got bullied a few times and if you’re being critical (and I am), had a hand in both goals with poor clearances.  Hopefully he’ll be dropped next week for Yoshida as he’s really not as good as he’s hyped to be.  Some of Hoedt's distribution was somewhat dodgy but in the main he did ok. The new boy wasn't bad but he wasn't quite as good as I was hoping he was going to be. I was hoping he'd be a real brute and dominate in the air. It is only his first game and he will have to get used to the physicality of the Premier League. 

That’s more or less it for any positives.  Here we go… I don’t blame Fraser for the first goal as it flew through some players but he was like a falling fucking tree for the second one and he saw that all the way, mainly because no fucker closed Janmaat down because no one could be bothered.  Ryan Bertrand looked like he really couldn't give a fuck and didn't want to be out there. He's look like that in a few games this season and it has generally been put down to his natural demeanour. However, I don't remember him looking so miserable and disinterested in his previous years with the club and there has to be a point where your body language does in fact betray what you are really thinking. Maybe a week away with England and talking to players who are on three times as much money as him has taken its toll.

Pellegrino fucked up the midfield it has to be said. I understand that that Lemina has been playing international in Africa this week but a tired player would have better than what we had out there.  Carillo for Watford apparently only got back from South America 24 hours before kick off.  He played so why didn’t our travellers?  Putting Steven Davis in the midfield engine room is a disaster and it always will be especially against physical opponents. I know Pellegrino wasn’t here last year but surely someone could have told him about Davo in the Spurs game last year agsint Wanyama and Dembele.  Davo was not helped by Romeu having quite possibly his poorest game in a Saints shirt and if you want to look at an area of the pitch where the game was won of lost, it was in the area where the excellent Chalobah and Doucoure smashed us to bits. I don't know what Hojbjerg has done but he is clearly well out of favour. He would've been a better option to partner Romeu today.

The front four was the same as usual. Gabbiadini made lots of runs and didn't get the ball, Redmond had the odd moment where he looked lively but Boufal and particularly JWP were fucking hopeless. Again, Pellegrino got it wrong here. Watching JWP trying to play when he was receiving the ball from behind was embarrassingly bad. He had no idea what to do with it and is not quick or skilful enough to operate in the tight areas that a number 10 has to operate in. It would have been better if he played on the right wing with Boufal in the middle and it would've been better if he swapped positions with Davis but even then we still would've got absolutely smashed to bits in midfield.  What bothers me slightly was that it was obvious from about 5 minutes in that the midfield was getting battered so why not drop JWP back in there to make a three.  Because we were being forced back, whenever Boufal or Redmond got the ball they were too deep to do any damage.

When Tadic came on at half-time, it was noticeable that we did improve but to me, that was more an indication of how bad JWP was. In short, we could have put any fucker on in that position and they would've done better. Cringe of the day was when Tadic had an opportunity in their penalty area that fucked it up and decided that the best way to make an excuse for this was to collapse holding his knee when there was absolutely nothing wrong with him.  Absolutely pathetic to be honest.

Shane Long came on and at least offered some urgency and some pace. I'm not his biggest fan but in the context of the team at the moment, he really has to start. Austin eventually coming on was fucking pointless. Charlie looks more and more like a fucking competition winner in a testimonial with every passing game. I think that's all I saw him do was let a ball roll under his foot and accidentally clatter into two Watford players in a ‘drunk weaving through a crowded bar’ kind of way.

I feel that the Claude Puel mindset is still ingrained in the players. They are risk averse and everything that they do. However, you can only go for so long blaming the previous manager. Mauricio Pellegrino has to sort it out and he has to sort it out quickly. That lot out there today didn’t look up for the fight which is never ever acceptable.

So, it is 5 points out of 12, from four fixtures where we should have reasonably expected to get 10 out of 12, is not good enough and sooner or later, the decent sides are going to come around and if we play like that, we are going to get absolutely smashed.  Everyone has to look at themselves. Some players don't appear to be put in the effort in and that is completely unforgivable and some just aren't fucking good enough. A few of the decisions regarding who we loaned out now beginning to seem a bit questionable. Personally, I would rather have kept Sam Gallagher than Charlie Austin for example.  We always seem to leave one issue unaddressed in transfer windows and this time it’s glaringly at the expensive end of the pitch.  When he comes back, maybe stick Virgil up front. We spent most of the transfer window talking about him anyway.

Next week – Palace away.  8 league games between us – they haven’t scored at all and we’ve only scored in one game and only one goal that wasn’t a penalty when the opposition had 11 men.  What are the odds on a 4-4 draw…?

PS – Palace have sacked Frank de Boer and appointed the Senile Old Goat Roy Hodgson. Will it be new manager bounce or will the useless old fucker have no effect.

Premier League Match 3 - Huddersfield 0 Southampton 0

It Must Be The Winner.... No.

 

Our first away game and a trip to Huddersfield where we haven't been since out League 1 days. Those with short memories will remember nothing much but those with slightly longer memories remember that Huddersfield was the team putting pressure on us at the end of our League 1 promotion campaign, winning something like 10 games in a row and generally not doing what they were supposed to and going away. We failed to catch Brighton but as you know, we eventually got over the line and Huddersfield fucked it up in the Play-offs. Last year they were in the play-offs again and ended up playing the mega-money match to get promoted into the Premier League in which they prevailed against Reading in one of the most tedious matches I've ever sat through and believe me I've sat through a few. They won on penalties and were most peoples tip to get fairly smashed in the Premier League. 

 

That they haven't so far it's down to the good work of David Wagner, a German coach who has proved to be a breath of fresh air. On the opening day they went to Crystal Palace and stuffed a shambolic looking Palace by 3-0 before nicking a 1-0 result against Newcastle. The manager was saying that we were a step up in class from those teams and will therefore be Huddersfield’s biggest test yet. Let's hope he's right and we can hand them the first defeat and a realisation that the Premier League isn't always that fucking easy.

 

Of course, we are coming off the back of a diabolical performance in the League Cup. Even three days later it is quite hard to digest just how shit that was. It appears that Mauricio Pellegrino has decided to ignore it and pretend it didn't happen as he's reverted back to exactly the same team that started the West Ham home game. I can't say that I'm not a little disappointed with this and I did groan audibly when I heard that Tadic had yet again managed to convince the manager that he was worthy of a start. Big New Wes made the bench and we persisted with Jack and Maya. During the week came the news that Maya Yoshida had been awarded a three year contract extension. Whilst I still remain to be convinced that I want him as a first choice centre back, the news made me smile as whatever your opinion of him as a footballer, it cannot be denied that he is a really decent bloke and it just would not ever behave in the way a certain shithouse centre back at our club has behaved.

 

To the game and Huddersfield have the better start, playing at 100mph.  We created the first chance however as the home right back is miles out of position and Davis puts Redmond through on the left.  He takes a superb touch inside and cuts in towards goal and with the whole goal to aim at, passes it wide of the far post.  As the ball hits the advertising board, you just know that we aren’t going to get many better chances than that.

 

Huddersfield are a physically imposing side and the game plan is to put crosses into the box as soon as possible.  They have the tactically impressive idea of having a left footer on the left and and right footer on the right and this enables early curling crosses away from the keeper.  This might catch on.  Van la Parra puts a great ball in from the left and Mounié is met with a superb block by Maya.  We don’t really clear it and in comes the same ball again from the left and this time it’s Fraser who is down at the feet of Mounié and this time we do clear it properly.

 

We’re our own worst enemy when we win a corner through decent play between Redmond and Davis and then Berty’s corner is caught by the keeper, one long throw and we’re in the shit again with Huddersfield building on the right and van la Parra gets a shot in which is blocked by Davo who has made it back 80 yards in no time.

 

The rest of the half is all Huddersfield as we struggle to get a foothold and at times, struggle to clear the ball.  Mounié scuffs wide when well placed and Fraser has to make a decent low save from perennial ‘not as good as he thinks he is’ Tom Ince who has latched onto a long ball over the top which Maya has missed and Jack hasn’t covered for.  If Fraser looked good there, he looked bad a minute later when he made a complete mess of another one of those curled crosses from the left and gets lucky as Kachunga’s (sp.) shot hits him on the ground and goes wide.

 

The second half starts with a bit more intent from Saints with Lemina suddenly making runs ahead of the ball.  This gives Romeu an extra option to pass the ball to and the new boy lays off his pass to Gabbiadini who gets a shot on target but comfortable for the keeper.  We should try this ‘making forward runs’ thing more often.  Gabbi would slap me for saying that as all he does is make runs without anyone giving him the ball usually.

 

There’s not a lot going on in the second half to be honest.  We are struggling to get anything going up front so the subs that eventually come are all at the top end.  Lemina has put in another promising display but he’s first off for JWP which means Davo dropping deeper.  To the disappointment of many, Gabbiadini is next off for Long and to the disappointment of no-one, Tadic is off for McQueen which leaves both Boufal and Austin sat on the bench.  Don’t get me wrong, I’m not his biggest fan but Austin is more likely to get a goal than those who have come on and Boufal is probably more likely to create one.

 

Anyway, Huddersfield have blown themselves out and there are still 15 minutes to go.  An Ince shot that deflects straight to Fraser is the best they’ve got as we take over.  The first bit of excitement is Long putting JWP in on goal on the right.  He cuts past the last defender and just falls over.  A half arsed appeal for a penalty but no referee in the world is going to give that.

 

Long is again the architect as he gets away on the right and intelligently gets his head up and picks out Redmond on the edge of the box.  He goes for placement rather than power and places it perfectly straight at the keeper.  All those shooting drills from the training ground that we see every week and we still hit the keeper.  The intent is there from us now with Yoshida breaking from defence and the ball gets worked to McQueen, a first time cross (left footer on the left) and our favourite Japanese man throws himself at it but the flag is already up against McQueen.  Again though, it showed that when the shackles are off a bit and you commit bodies forward, things can happen.

 

Shane Long has been superb since he came on and in the last minute he pulls out a superb cross (right footer on the right) and it’s right on the incoming Bertrand’s head.  He has a choice to either put his forehead through it or place it past the keeper and he goes for the latter and gets it past the keeper but there’s not enough on it to beat the defender on the line.  Fuck.

 

Another bloody 0-0 and another missed opportunity.  5 points out of 9 isn’t bad but it should have been 9.  Huddersfield blew themselves out after 70 minutes and 20 minutes should have been long enough to find a goal but no.  I can’t help but feel that with a bit more conviction and belief in the opening 70 minutes we could have won that game.  Missing sitters like the one Redmond missed in the first half doesn’t help either.

 

The positives today were Fraser Forster looking decent and confident and also Mario Lemina showing signs of growing into the Premier League.  I liked when he was prepared to break ahead of the ball and look for it further up rather than just sit in front of the centre backs.  He’s only going to get better.

 

One of the main problems with Saints is the three players behind the striker.  In my opinion, Gabbiadini is a superb stiriker and with the right supply, he’d be scoring 20 a season.  However, he’s neither getting the ball often enough, nor getting enough support from players.  Of the three behind who started today, Redmond looks dangerous in patches but his finishing and final ball is often all over the place. Davis links well with the defensive midfielders but provides very little in terms of supply for the striker and also, can’t shoot for shit.  Tadic is just dreadful at the moment, providing the odd glimpse of his undoubted talent in an area of the pitch where it doesn’t matter and then disappearing for 30, 40, 50 minutes.  He’s turning in Fabrice Fernandes where you sometimes think that his only function is to slow everything down.

 

Today, I wondered what the hell the manager was doing when we ended up with Redmond, Shane Long, JWP and Sam McQueen as the front four.  On the other hand, at least he was trying something and not just sleepwalking through to the end of the game and it has to be said that whether this was down to Huddersfield being tired or not, we were better in the last 15 minutes.  To me – and I can’t believe I’m saying this – Shane Long seemed to make the biggest difference, picking up the ball in wide areas and stretching the defence.  He also got over some really decent crosses which should have led to a winning goal from Bertrand.  There simply has to be better options than Tadic and I’d say that Shane deserves a start on the right in the next game with Redmond on the left  - at least that gives us pace on both sides and the ability to turn the opponents around.  Other options could of course include Boufal, JWP or even someone out of the Under 23’s like Tyreke Johnson.  Tadic needs to be dropped to see if it kicks him up the arse – is it a coincidence that Fraser has just had his best match for a while having been dropped from the England squad?

 

As we enter the last week of the transfer window, I feel that we have to either replace Mané or replace Pellé.  Either sign a pacy creative player or sign a target man centre forward.  Doing nothing and doing neither will achieve nothing and the Board will be expecting Pellegrino to make a silk purse out of sows ear regarding our forward options.  Hopefully, with all the attention being focussed on whether or not a certain shithouse will leave, we can sneak one in under the radar….

 

Transfer Deadline Day…

 

So Thursday is here and the transfer window has closed and guess what, Virgil van Dijk is still a Saints player as the club received precisely zero bids from anybody.  Liverpool had exhausted their supply of ex-players of any consequence and were even calling up their complete nobodies to say their bit like David Thompson who I vaguely remember playing about 10 games in the 90s.  Now it’s over we can all say ‘fuck off Liverpool’. 

 

To recap and summarise, they illegally met the player, promised him the world to get him interested, agreed personal terms which promised him the world, released this to the media because they wanted to show off, had to apologise and then left the player to it and never made a single bid.  All that happened was that ex-Liverpool players in the media and the ‘Big Club’ media in general kept the story in the news when there was in fact, no story.  We’d said he wasn’t for sale and that was that.  Basically, Liverpool have treated Virgil like shit and I’m sure that once the dust settles and he gets his head round it all, he’ll realise this and he won’t be signing for them any time soon. 

 

 

Someone was a bit Premature

 

So, if indeed it was the case that Liverpool’s interested ended with their grovelling apology, why is Virgil not back playing yet?  Either Liverpool were still in his ear giving him the pillow talk or he decided that it was ok for him to sit it out until now.  Both are probably true.  Hopefully, when we say in January that he’s not for sale, the media might believe it.  Then again, I might manage to pull Miss World or Donald Trump might stop being an arsehole.  There’s a chance, albeit too small to even register on the most sophisticated of machinery. 

 

The key moving forward will probably be the promise that Virgil can leave this time next year.  A good season for us and a decent World Cup for Holland (if they qualify) and with the transfer market being as it is now, we’ll be selling a player with 4 years left on his contract for about £100 million.  To give this season the best chance of being decent, the fans need to support the players that we have – all of them – even the one’s who’ve acted like twats.  Giving grief to a player in a red and white shirt on a match day is never going to be productive – ever.

 

Now, get your head right son and get out on the pitch in a Saints shirt.

 

Disappointingly, we didn’t get any attackers in so Mauricio is left with trying to get goals out of what we’ve got.  I’m hoping that the potentially much stronger Dutch centre back combo will enable us to play more expansively in front of them and this makes something click farther up the field.  We can but hope.  On paper though, a back 4 of Cedric, Bertrand, Virgil and Wesley, screened by Oriol and Mario looks mustard.  It’s the three behind Gabbi who need to step up and if they do we’ll have a good season.

 

Once again, Fuck off Liverpool #FOL J