Premier League Match 30 - Southampton 2 Tottenham 1

All Aboard the Ralph Express

Tottenham at home and apparently we haven’t beaten them at St Mary’s for 15 years? Can that possibly be right? Certainly feels like it. Whisper it quietly but we might be playing them at a good time as they have lost three out of the last four league games but on the other hand, they got through to the Champions League quarter-finals despatching Borussia Dortmund 4-0 on aggregate.

Mauricio Pochettino was of course a manager who we all respected and he did a great job at Southampton until Cortese left and he basically decided that he was not going to stay past the end of that season. He joined the list containing Van Dijk, Lallana and Fonte by trying to justify his exit in the build up to the game, saying he cried when he left Southampton. I’d cry too if my bank balance suddenly went through the fucking roof.  Does anyone seriously believe this bollocks? Fuck off. I wonder if when he cried, he cried in Spanish because he didn’t do anything in English when he was our manager but soon as he went to Spurs, hey presto, decent English. I wonder if he cried when he looked round Spurs training ground with Daniel Levy, whilst he was still contracted to be our manager? You’re a decent manager Mauricio and in the main, a fairly stand up guy but spare us the bollocks.

Earlier on in the season, Tottenham at Wembley was the first game that Ralph Hasenhuttl watched before becoming the Saints manager. Wembley Stadium - a gift from the FA. No doubt they will find a stadium to Coventry City to play in so they are not threatened with expulsion out of the league. As I write, the new Spurs ground is still not open on the site of the old White Hart Lane - a building delay which will probably mean that Harry Kane, Christian Eriksen and possibly Dele Alli will hang around for another season on lower wages and they would get at any other Champions League club in this country.  To be honest though, the fact that Spurs can be in the top three all season was having a wage bill that is a fraction of all the other huge clubs, is a glowing tribute to their manager and a tribute to not making too many huge mistakes along the way.  It won’t last forever though unless they start winning things.

Aside from Pochettino, Spurs have a couple of our ex’s in Toby Alderweireld and Victor Wanyama. Alderweireld seems to be in and out of the side with injury these days and Wanyama seems to be in and out of the seven players on the bench. Such a waste.

To the teams and Ralph has gone same again with Charlie Austin continuing up front with Shane Long being the only forward on the bench. Josh Sims is preferred to Elyounoussi and Callum Slattery is included ahead of Sam Gallagher. Spurs appear to have rested a couple with Son Heung-Min on the bench and Lucas Moura starting. Alderweireld is not included so Davinson Sanchez partners Jan Vertonghen. A front for of Kane, Eriksen, Alli and Moura looks a bit scary.

Pochettino is in the stands today, serving the first game of the two game touchline ban for confronting the referee at the end of the game last week. Hopefully someone has had the nous to leave him a big box of tissues by his seat in case he starts crying when memories of Southampton come flooding back.

The game starts and we look shit scared and dreadful. As routine as you like, a long ball forward is flicked on by Alli and Kane is clean through as no one is picking him up. It’s a good chance but the England captain lashes it wide.

We show absolutely no signs of learning any lessons as Eriksen then picked the ball up in midfield and has time to chip forward to Kane again. Kane this time juggles the ball on the shoulder for a little bit before attempting to score goal of the century, smashing it on the volley but well over.

Surely we are going to learn our lessons now but no as Redmond pisses around around with it in our own corner until he loses it and again, Kane is found in acres of space. This time he crosses it and Yoshida, in desperation to stop the ball reaching Alli, succeeds only in diverting it against his own post, from which the ball pings out and hits the sliding Yoshida on his arse and he eventually clears it. Not far though as it comes back in and finds its way to Danny Rose who is closed down by both Valery and Romeu and so of course decides to dive, like the horrible twat that he is, in between the two of them and get a very cheap free kick out of Kevin Friend who has failed his first “is he going to be an arsehole?” test of the day. It’s twitchy arseholes all round as Eriksen steps up and it’s over the wall and pinging off the top of the crossbar and over as Angus Gunn and all the defenders look on.  We have been very lucky.

20 minutes gone and we can easily be 4-0 down and Austin has not touched the ball yet. The first time I noticed him is when he tries a shot on the turn which is blocked and we eventually recycle it back to JWP whose shot is also blocked and suddenly we are in the shit and Spurs are on the break. Kane gives it to Alli who waits until Kane has run off the back of Vestergaard and plays him in. Only one result here, goal, 1-0 to Spurs. Can’t really say they haven’t deserved it.

The rest of the first half was spent in a kind of drowsy acceptance of what is going on but we dig in and get to half-time just the one goal adrift which is a bit of a result I have to say. At least we are still in the game and Ralph has a chance to do something. Personally, I can’t see us coming back out with three centre backs in the second half.

Ralph is not fucking about. Romeo is off, probably because he’s been booked and Austin is off as well, probably because he’s been shit. Watching a team try and press the opposition defenders when Charlie Austin is the furthest forward? Just no. Austin is replaced by Shane long (sigh!) and also on is Josh Sims.

Sims immediately makes a difference running at Danny Rose who suddenly doesn’t look like the overconfident arrogant little shit that he looked in the first half. Aside from that though it doesn’t immediately get any better as Kane beats both Valery and Yoshida with a run down the left wing and curls one for the far corner which Gunn gets finger tips to and pushes it for a corner.

In one incident though, you suddenly see that there might be a route back into the game for us as Sissoko loses it in our half and suddenly we are away at pace. Long tears down the right and crosses it in and the ball finds its way to Redmond on the left hand side and he jinks past Sanchez but it’s on his wrong foot and he lashes into the side netting.  Fuck.  Bearing in mind that we have done absolutely fuck all in this game so far, I’ll take this as an encouraging sign.

Sims is running at the defence at every opportunity and we are committing lots of bodies forward so even if we lose the ball we have a decent chance of winning it back very quickly and from one such incident, Captain Hojbjerg has a chance but again, it’s on the wrong foot so he leans back and smashes it over the bar.

It’s ramping up a bit now and Valery chips a ball forward, over the top of Vertonghen. Sims is there first but Vertonghen boots it away from right in front of Sims nose and kicks him in the face at the same time. Anywhere else on the pitch, that is a free-kick and a yellow card but it’s in the penalty area and it’s Kevin Friend of Spurs so absolutely nothing gets given. Again we win the ball back and Long again picks it up and finds Redmond with a cross to the near post but Redmond again can only hit the side netting.  Kevin Friend – He’s One of Your Own

There are 15 minutes to go and it’s not happening despite us being much the better side now. Kane has another glorious chance and chips over the bar in amateurish fashion and Shane Long has picked up a knock and has to go off to be replaced by Stuart Armstrong with Redmond becoming the central striker. Spurs have bought on Son to replace Lucas Moura so both teams have got stronger.

Four minutes later, it happens with Bertrand playing a lovely ball in behind Kyle Walker-Peters to Armstrong and the man with the fabulous hair pulls the cross back. Sanchez misses it, Vertonghen misses it and then hilariously, Danny Rose decides to step over it, not realising that Yan Valery was right behind him. The comedy doesn’t finish there though because Valery completely mis-hits it and bobbles it into the ground and it loops up over Lloris to make it 1-1.

How the fuck are we still in this game, let alone level? Stranger things have happened so let’s go and fucking win it. Another quick break and this time it’s Redmond streaking away down the right. He goes to cross the ball to where Armstrong is steaming through the middle, hair looking magnificent in the wind but Kyle Walker-Peters just brings him down. Professional foul, all day long, no attempt to play ball whatsoever so even with the new rules that’s a red card. Hang on, it’s Kevin Fucking Friend of the Top Six refereeing again so he just gets booked.

Meanwhile, we have a free-kick, about the same distance out as last week against Manchester United but a little more central. Up steps JWP and fuck me he’s done it again. Same technique, same corner, same result and another world-class keeper grasping at thin air as it flies past him. Bloody hell, we are winning and there are 10 minutes to go.

Not content with having been fucking useless so far, we now get peak Kevin Friend. Redmond receives the ball and shields it but Sissoko doesn’t like this so he just rakes his studs down the back of Redmond’s achilles. Friend sees this and gets his yellow card out of his pocket but before he can show it, Redmond has given Sissoko a little tap on the back and he has responded by giving him a double handed shove in the chest followed by head-butt. Redmond to his credit, doesn’t hit the deck but the esteemed Premier League Referee is looking straight at it so no bother, surely a second yellow or a straight red is coming out. Just the one yellow for Sissoko and the same for Redmond. What a fucking joke.  So a slight tap on the back is exactly the same as raking Achilles, a double handed shove in the chest and head butt. Utterly ridiculous and this goes past incompetence territory and in to outright cheating.

Pochettino stops crying about leaving Southampton for a minute and makes two substitutions with Ben Davies coming on for Horrible Little Shit Danny Rose, to give him his full title and Fernando Llorente is on for Dele Show Pony.

We are known for not managing this sort of situation particularly well but in the main, we don’t do too badly. Bednarek is in the right place to head a Sissoko shot over the bar and there is the loudest cheer of the afternoon when Gunn catches the resulting corner. There is one minor alarm when Armstrong needlessly and with maximum stupidity, fouls Kyle Walker-Peters out near the touchline when he was going nowhere but Vestergaard gets his head to the resulting freekick and we survive. Kevin Friend has one job and that is to blow the final whistle which he actually manages to fucking do correctly, the useless twat.

What a win – get in there.  The players are going mental in front of the fans and it’s glorious stuff.  I’m very cynical about professional footballers and their motives but these guys seem to really be on board with the club and what Ralph is trying to achieve.  It’s fantastic to see.  The tactical changes from Ralph at half time turned the game around after a first half where Spurs were so much better than us. If we had come off 4-0 behind then we really couldn’t have complained. The fact that we weren’t 4-0 down was mainly down to Harry Kane repeatedly missing decent chances. He did score one of course, which later turned out to be offside.  More on the officiating later.

The second half was a different game because Ralph reacted to the half-arsed rubbish that he saw from us in the first half. Oriol Romeu was slightly unfortunate to be substituted as he was certainly no worse than Hojbjerg was but I guess having already been booked was a factor. By taking Charlie Austin off, we weren’t actually removing anything apart from a hologram. Josh Sims did more in the opening five minutes of the half than Elyounoussi has contributed all season and suddenly, Danny Rose was shown up to be the dodgy defender that he is when faced with a proper winger.  We seemed to target the full-backs as on the other side where the youngster Kyle Walker-Peters was playing, we kept finding space in behind him.  Shane Long was an improvement on Austin but he didn’t have time to contribute much before he got injured but it was a bit of a lucky break when he had to go off because Armstrong changed the game and had a major hand in both of the goals. I’m sure that Shane would’ve made an equal contribution if he had stayed on.  

We are also helped by Spurs and their attitude. They were so cavalier and arrogant in the first half and they didn’t know how to react when it suddenly got difficult. Dele Alli was the personification of this as he was gliding about and playing like he was 20 times the player of anyone else on the pitch and then he hardly touch the ball in the second half and was eventually substituted.  It was also great to see Danny Rose royally fuck up for the first goal.

Couldn't find one of Pochettino crying about Southampton - so here's an old one 

What can you say about JWP.  Cometh the hour and all that – a 6th goal in 9 games.  He’ll end up as our top scorer if he keeps this up.  Spurs fans are going on about how he pinched about 5 yards for the free kick but it’s hard to take that too seriously when you look at the balance of the referees decisions today.

Shitting on about the referee after you have lost is always going to sound like sour grapes no matter how valid your grievances are but shitting on about the referee after you have won has to carry some weight. Kevin Friend was absolutely fucking useless today. Southampton have won this game despite 1) Tottenham‘s goal being offside, 2) Sissoko not being sent off for a combination of deliberately raking Redmond’s achilles, followed by a push in the chest, followed by a head-butt, 3) Walker Peters not been sent off for a very deliberate last man professional foul and 4) no Penalty/free kick being given against Vertonghen for kicking Sims in the head. So, a big six biased referee for the second week in a row - yes, will anything be done about it by the FA - no. Well played Kevin - Shame that you lost.  The more I look at it, the more the Sissoko decision in particular is appalling.  He was going to book him for raking Redmond’s achilles as the card was already out.  He then was looking straight at the head-butt and did nothing.  He surely can’t have seen it then as all he handed out was the original yellow card.  Retrospective action then?  Nope.  The FA will hide behind the bullshit “The referee has dealt with it” clause.

Kevin Friend of The Top 6

The two teams who are the most likely candidates to finish below us before the game were Brighton and Cardiff. Well they both won today so it was majorly important that we did as well. With Newcastle also winning, Crystal Palace and Burnley have been brought right back into the mix. When it all resumes in three weeks time, it is certainly going to be interesting.

Finally what can you say about Ralph Hasenhuttl. Under him, with exactly the same squad of players, we have beaten two of the big boys whereas under the previous three managers, we couldn’t beat any of them. To think that the more clueless “I want it now“ elements of our fan base were beginning to get restless and were threatening to jump off of the Ralph Express. Don’t let us stop you guys, you go ahead and jump.

Premier League Match 29 - Manchester United 3 Southampton 2

VAR Will Show You To Be The Useless Prick That You Are

Manchester United at Old Trafford, the Theatre of Wet Dreams. Rumour has it that the press room at Old Trafford as a sponsorship deal with Kleenex, just in case the world‘s media gets a bit too excited. They’ve been getting a bit excited recently because since Ole Gunnar Solskjaer became the manager and The Grinch got dispatched into the world of punditry, United have been nothing short of excellent. I am not having it that he is some sort of Messiah because when you’ve got a squad of  players that cost as much money as theirs did, it’s not the most difficult challenge in the world but it has to be said that he is getting a hell of a lot more out of that squad then Mourinho ever did and fair play to him. Also, disturbingly for a Manchester United manager, he is extremely likeable and this is not something that I have managed to get my head round yet. I want to hate Manchester United and I still manage that but Solskjaer just makes it a little bit more difficult.

If Mourinho was still in charge I would’ve been going into this game thinking we had a really good decent chance of grinding out a point because you can set up teams to defend against Mourinho’s United and they would have very little inspiration and would play none of the clever quick football that United are known for. You would basically have to defend the percentages and inevitably deal with both Lukaku and Fellaini and balls being rained down on top of them when the going got desperate in the last 15 minutes. Now, it’s a little bit more difficult so today is going to be a proper test.

The morale boosting win over Fulham in mid week seems to have crystallised things in Ralph’s mind as we have exactly the same starting at 11 and there is just one change on the bench with Shane Long dropping out for some reason to be replaced by Callum Slattery.

United start very fast and Lukaku turns and finds space to get a shot away and it looks for all the world like a goal but Gunn gets down superbly to tip around the post. Lukaku then manages to miss his kick in front of goal which Gunn smothers and then had another shot from 3 yards which Gunn once again gets in the way off. Three saves in the first five minutes. Help.

After we’ve survived the little flurry we do have a chance when we win a corner and it comes over from the left and Vestergaard meets it with a free header but can’t keep it down and it flies over the bar. The big man really should’ve done better there.

We start to play well with Valery and Bertrand doing well. Redmond plays a quite fantastic pass in between two defenders which meets Bertrand’s run in behind Chris Smalling. As usual Smalling is all arms and shirt holding and down goes Bertrand. Referee Stuart Attwell, well known for being fucking useless, waves it away without any thought whatsoever. I mean, this is instant. He is not giving a penalty even if the replay shows that Bertrand has a knife between the shoulder blades. Not a prayer. As far as penalty appeals go it is well out of “seen them given“ territory and is one that you absolutely know would have been given up the other end.

On we go. There really is no point in complaining about it because you know there’s another shit decision just around the corner. What we didn’t expect, was what happened next. United have a throw-in the right back position and we win the ball back through Romeu. Redmond passes the ball across to Austin and he’s sends it right to Valery who takes one touch and then bang.... fucking hell... he hits a fucking howitzer into the near top corner from about 30 yards. De Gea, one of the best goalkeepers in the world gets a touch but he hasn’t got a prayer of keeping it out. Usually you blame the goalkeeper for getting beaten at the near post like that but he had absolutely no chance.

United try and get back into the game but there’s nothing going on with Saints snapping into every midfield tackle and not giving an inch. It’s great stuff. The referee has entered a new phase of ridiculous biased home town big club shiteness. United aren’t getting anywhere apart from when Attwell decides not to give clear fouls by United players to allow them to attack. He is letting them get away with fouls and giving them every freekick that they appeal for. It’s fucking scandalous. One attack was started with a blatant foul on your Yoshida and Bertrand, still pissed off from not being given the penalty, attempts some sort of fucking flying ninja kick on Lukaku out on the wing and luckily for Ryan, Lukaku is such a big unit that he didn’t even notice and just steamed through it and carried on up the wing without breaking stride. Ryan does get a yellow card though.

Despite Attwell, we are still the better side and we win the ball and break with purpose with Austin finding Redmond and again he plays Bertrand in behind the full back and this time both shoulders are pulled by Ashley Young inside the area and Bertrand once again hits the deck. Once again Stuart Attwell is not having any of it nor does he book (and therefore send off) Bertrand for diving which kind of means that he is saying that Bertrand just fell over accidentally. Utter bollocks.

United go close when Smalling’s header is going wide but Rashford keeps it in, causing a mild outbreak of complete panic which we manage to survive.  Half-time

You know that United are coming in the second half but first they catch a bit of a break when Sanchez, who has been completely fucking useless, gets injured in a tackle with Bednarek. The Chilean may well be injured but you know that even if he wasn’t he’d be wanting to go off, rather than actually earning his money and so he limps off to be replaced by Diogo Dalot. Immediately, Dalot combines with Parreira down the right hand side and Parreira swings in a superb cross which Rashford meets at the far post any really should score but we get lucky as he nods just wide of the post.

For the first time, we are beginning to look stretched as a long ball forward from Young finds Dalot and he exchanges passes with Lukaku before finding Parreira who curls a superb shot over the top of Angus Gunn and into the top corner-ish. If you are being hyper-critical you would say that the shot hasn’t exactly nestled in the postage stamp so maybe the keeper was a bit too far off his line but either way, it’s 1-1 and now it’s about to get really difficult.

Saints still fancy this though and pour forward and Richmond shanks his shot wide. It’s a temporary respite though - Pogba out to Shaw, into Dalot who beats Yoshida to it and plays it into Lukaku who looks offside. Needless to say, there’s no flag and he chops inside Bednarek before passing the ball into the far corner. Brilliant goal, probably offside, definitely more offside than Gabbiadini was at Wembley and yes I’m still bitter…. and more or less the first time Lukaku has kicked it in the right direction all game. Surprisingly, Stuart Attwell isn’t joining in with the United celebrations. I half expected him to be there, whirling his shirt above his head.

Armstrong is on for Austin and his first contribution is to compete for a high ball with Young and for once. Attwell has given it to us. He couldn’t not really as Armstrong got the ball and Young wellied Armstrong. I should report however that Stuart’s hair was unaffected. 25 yards out to the left of centre - JWP. I know where he’s aiming and I’m sure de Gea does as well - no matter, JWP takes it and it is perfect, over the wall and swinging away into the near top corner. 2-2 and fucking have that and a few tissues get put away in the press box.

15 to go becomes 2 to go and United build up patiently. Shaw plays into Fred and he finds Lukaku via a kind little deflection and the big fucker turns and smashes it first time into the far corner past Gunn who hasn’t a prayer. For fucks sake. Flashbacks of the Ibrahimovic winner at Wembley, yes, still bitter... gutted.

Yoshida is off and Gallagher on for a desperate assault but no good, Pogba breaks away and feeds Rashford on the left hand side. He reaches the penalty area, Bednarek holds hold him up and wins the ball and turn him away from goal and then Armstrong steams in and brushes against the back of his leg and Rashford predictably collapses like a heap of shit. Needless to say there is no way Attwell is not going to give it. Up steps Pogba with his wanky stutter step and chips it down the middle and Gunn dives and boots it away.

Bollocks. Miraculously, Stuart Atwell - wanker - gets a decision right and blows for the end of the game and United have won 3-2 and all is right with the world again. Wankers. In the press box, the Great North West Tissue Shortage is under way. Wankers.

Firstly, we were bloody good and deserved a point from the game. We didn’t sit back and we weren’t scared, no players froze and as usual, there is a sense of injustice about the way the game panned out. League Cup Final all over again.

From Gunn through to Austin, there were some superb performances. Yan Valery is going to be some player and his goal today will guarantee him a place in Garth Crooks team of the week and guarantee that he is being sold left right and centre by the media. On the other wing, Ryan Bertrand looks to be getting back to his best and should definitely have had one, if not two penalties. The back three in the main defended excellently though if you were being ultra picky then I’m sure you could find some aspects of the goals where we could’ve defended better. As I said against Fulham, that midfield three is beginning to look seriously good, capped with yet another goal from JWP. Redmond was dangerous upfront but didn’t have the end product today and I have to say, Austin worked really hard but didn’t provide a goal threat.

Even though United have a very likeable manager now, which as said, is really fucking offputting, they still have some players who are just wankers. Chief amongst them is Ashley Young. He gets away with fucking murder every game. Last year up there he punched Tadic in the stomach and got a retrospective three-game ban but of course it wasn’t seen on the day so we didn’t get a penalty and we didn’t get to play against 10 men. Today he got away with pulling back Bertrand which should’ve been a penalty. Then you have Marcus Rashford. I think he’s great when he plays for England but soon as he puts that United shirt on he turns into a petulant little twat, always appealing for fouls and strutting around and giving it the big one. It was so typical of him to absolutely collapse for the penalty in the last minute. If Chris Smalling played for a side but wasn’t in the top six, he would be giving away at least one penalty every single game. I think the guy has something wrong with his hands in that he only seems happy he’s got a handful of another players shirt. Having said that those three are twats, Diego Dilot was brilliant when he came on and he changed the game which was a stroke a fortune for United because if Sanchez hadn’t got injured, he probably wouldn’t of been substituted. Andreas Pereira was also very impressive, putting over some really good crosses from the right hand side and then of course scoring the equaliser.

The shithousing by Manchester United players is allowed by piss weak referees like Stuart Attwell. In the first half, not only did he turn down two penalty shouts, his general officiating on the small decisions were so one eyed, it was bordering on the farcical. United couldn’t get a foothold in the first half after we scored and virtually every attack they had had an infringement in it from a Manchester United player but he just waved it on to enable them to get further up the pitch. It was no surprise at all that he gave a relatively soft penalty to United in the second half. Okay, it made no difference at the end of the day because Gunn saved it. Sure, there was some contact from Armstrong on Rashford but as previously said, he just collapsed like he had been shot.  Our two shouts were just as much penalties as that was but guess which one got given. Bring on VAR – it won’t be perfect but it will struggle to make things worse and it will highlight which referees are fucking dreadful – we know anyway but it will be highlighted.

Ralph’s quote after the game was “I don’t know what you have to do to get penalty here“. I can answer that one - Put a red shirt on mate. Welcome to playing away from home against the top six. Not only do you have to deal with all the multi million pound players on the pitch and all the advantages that brings, but as we know, you also have to deal with the officials. Ralph can be proud of the boys though and we are still outside the bottom three, with Cardiff getting beaten by Wolves reserve team today. Annoyingly, Brighton managed to scrape a typical 1-0 win at home to Huddersfield but they are still absolutely shit.

Next up is Tottenham at home, a game we always manage to get nothing from. If we put in a performance like today then we are going to have a decent chance but all I wish for, is for Danny Ings to be fit. If he is fit then we have a potentially very good starting 11. Spurs have wobbled of late so let’s believe.

Premier League Match 28 - Southampton 2 Fulham 0

Saints Reveal the Formation Dancing Celebration from Tenerife

Fulham at home and I don’t care what anyone says. We have to win this game. The reason we have to win this game is because we have lost to them once already and they are shit. It was of course the Wesley Hoedt game at Craven Cottage where he tried to show everyone what a hero he was by shielding the ball in his own corner.  He hasn’t played for Saints since and it got Mark Hughes sacked as well.

If ever there was a blueprint for how not to survive your first season after promotion then Fulham are showing you how it’s done. Spend a fortune on a load of attacking midfielders and strikers and somehow end up with a defence which is worse than what they had in the Championship.  They did sign Alfie Mawson who is currently not playing and also, once promising defender, Calum Thingy who was at Southampton for 12 years before fucking off as soon as he could when he was just about to maybe pay some of the investment in him back. 

So, if you have a shite defence and a decent attack, what happens is that you win the odd game but most the time, you will get completely battered. The manager they got promoted with, Jokanivic, lasted until the first losing streak and then got sacked because the defence was shite. He was replaced with Premier League winner Claudio Ranieri who has somehow stopped them from scoring without making the defence any better. The chances are that if they lose tonight, Ranieri will be on his way again and Fulham will be relegated, seeing as there is already an eight point gap between them and the team currently in fourth bottom, which in case you had forgotten, is one place above us. The team in fourth bottom is Cardiff who played yesterday and got stuffed 3-0 at home by Everton so with that and last weeks 5-1 home defeat by Watford, they seem to having a little bit of an implosion which we need to take advantage of today.

Most of the talk around the team has been about the inevitability of Maya Yoshida coming back into the side in place of Jack Stephens and whether McCarthy would displace Gunn. In the event there are three changes from the Arsenal game with the defensive no-brainer being one, Bertrand for Targett being number 2 the third being Austin being given a start with Armstrong dropping to the bench. On paper it looks like a better side. Fulham have Mitrović upfront who I wanted us to sign in the summer but some of their big-name players like Seri, Mawson, Sessegnon etc are not in the starting 11. Who the fuck is Bryan? Who the fuck is Ream? Who the fuck is Chambers? Oh yeah, that’s Callum Chambers, wanker.

There aren’t many Fulham fans here considering it’s only just up the M3 and a vitally important game to them. Are they always this badly supported down here or have I had such a shit season that vast majority have given up?

The game starts and in truth, we don’t look that good. We look wary and let Fulham have the ball around the halfway line and as predicted, with Austin playing, we are not really pressing them. It’s all a bit pedestrian. Fulham don’t look very good at all as you would expect but we are not asking enough questions.

The first chance comes on 15 minutes when Valery tries to feed the ball and low into the box and it gets cleared straight up in the air and comes down on top of the goalkeeper Austin stands his ground and the keeper, Rico kind of falls over him and the ball gets nodded into the net by Saints beer and kebab talisman. It’s always going to get given as a foul and after a momentary moment of excitement when it looks like van Gerwen with the whistle has given the goal, it’s a free-kick to Fulham.

Something weird is happening down on left hand side where Bertrand has half of the pitch to himself. He sends over dangerous cross which is just missed by three onrushing Saints players and flicked out for a corner. Bertrand himself takes the corner and the keeper flaps it out to the edge of the box where Romeu meets on the volley. It’s not the cleanest strike but it goes through a crowd of players and ends up in the net so who fucking cares. 1-0, Come on!!

One of the main beneficiaries of Ralph being in charge has been JWP who is doing all the things that he used to do but he is now not a complete liability when we haven’t got the ball. Fulham try bringing the ball out down the left hand side and JWP absolutely smashes into a 50-50 and comes out with the ball. On it goes to Austin and Redmond, then back to Hojbjerg and he drives it just wide with a keeper doing an impression of a statue.

There is a minor scare as Fulham actually get some possession which ends with Mitrović getting in behind Bednarek and smashing the ball over the bar from a narrow angle.  Straight after that though, Fulham give us another goal which all starts with a shit clearance from Rico that doesn’t reach the halfway line. We win a couple of headers in midfield and it eventually breaks for Austin to tee-up Redmond and his shot is pushed out by the keeper but JWP is on hand to knock the rebound into the net from about 10 yards. Christ they’re shit but who cares. We are 2-0 up, we haven’t even played very well and we haven’t had to.

Second half and we need another goal.  The chances of Fulham scoring two are remote but we know how this works – they get one and then we shite our collective pants.  We need a third to close it out but no, instead the ball bounces in the box and Babel, resplendent with his red wig, has a shot deflects off Bednarek and hits the bar.

Fulham throw on a couple of subs including Sessegnon and look a little bit dangerous for a brief spell but we look calm in defence with Yoshida in particular leading the way.  Austin has reached the stage where he has to be subbed or he’s going the throw up and I hear myself uttering words I never thought I’d say – “this could suit Long today”.

As it panned out, the boy Shane put in a decent shift but the game panned out without any more goalmouth action and to be honest, that was exactly what we wanted.  No fuss, no alarms, 2-0 win and thanks very much.  I noticed that there were many more times when we cleared the ball properly with a proper foot through it, seventy yards, fucking have it.  Yan Valery nearly killed someone in the crowd with one such clearance but they can’t score if it’s 70 yards from our goal so that’ll do.  Gmae management I think they call it, or common sense.

Up the fucking Saints. A comfortable win which is nice.  It could, with more ambition in the second half have been a more emphatic win but the bottom line is, until we can find a striker who can score 15 goals a season in this league, we are always going to struggle to even put away the worst of opponents and Fulham were quite possibly the worst of opponents. They certainly had the worst defence. A relatively competent attacking display today and we would’ve scored six. As it is we will certainly take the 2-0 win and be delighted with it. Three points on the board and I know that Ralph will impress on the players that we are going to have to improve to beat virtually anybody else.

It was the day that really illustrate to me that no matter how good your manager is, it is totally down to the players that he has at his disposal. Ralph, as we all know, wants to play a game where we press from the front but that is impossible to do when you have Charlie Austin upfront so you have to find other ways to win the game. In the first half in particular we allowed for them to have the ball on the halfway line and it was painful watching Austin jog across the pitch getting nowhere near. When the ball aws worked out the full-backs then either Redmond or JWP closed down. I think this is part of the reason why Redmond played wider instead of primarily at the middle where he has been since Ralph arrived.

Talking of wide areas, I have never seen a game where a team give a player of the calibre of Ryan Bertrand half the pitch to himself. Fulham didn’t seem to have anyone at right back or anyone on the right hand side of midfield. The player furthest to the right was the fucking goalkeeper, especially in the first half. It’s just a shame that Ryan isn’t fully fit yet because if he was he would’ve had an absolute field day. The midfield three today were all excellent with two of them getting the goals and the skipper driving everybody on for 93 minutes. There is some serious potential in that midfield three in an attacking sense as well if we can find a better solution upfront.  JWP continued his resurgence under Ralph and whisper it quietly… there’s an England game soon.

Defensively, there was the odd wobble but in the main, the return of Maya Yoshida added that element of calm that has been missing. All three of the central defenders had excellent games to reduce Fulham to just the one chance. Angus Gunn didn’t really have anything to do and I’m still struggling to understand Ralph’s preference for him over McCarthy but I guess this is a situation that’s not going to really resolve itself until the start of next season.

As for Fulham. Fucking hell. They know that they are getting relegated. The fans, the players and the manager all know that they are getting relegated. Hardly any fans turned up which for a vital game just down the M3 is poor and the players were just hilarious. I was watching Tim Ream in the second half and I’ve never seen anything like it. He just ambled about, looking for another one of his defenders to take responsibility and do his job for him. They were garbage. I’ve already touched on the Tinkerman’s tactics and how the fuck can you leave Sessegnon out? What was particularly telling was that when they lost the ball they had Mitrović, Cairney and Babel not even trying to get back. Back to the Championship you go and we have to make sure that we do not join them.

With the van Dijk chatter from last week it was interesting to see another one of our ex-players, Calum Chambers playing for Fulham today. Since he left us five seasons ago he has had three seasons not playing much for Arsenal, a season getting relegated with Middlesbrough and now, a season getting relegated with Fulham. In addition to that he has no settled position. He was a right back with us but wanted to be a centre back so he played there a few times are Arsenal and now it’s midfield because he is not big enough to play at centre back and he also is not good enough on the ball to play in midfield. He is basically Jack Stephens and like Jack, he should have stuck with being a right back. If he had stayed at Saints for a few years then I’m sure that’s where he would’ve ended up and he would be a lot better player now than he is but he chose to be the richest player he could be instead of potentially the best player he could be. I have no sympathy at all, in case you haven’t worked it out.  Relatively speaking, we are pretty weak at the moment and he wouldn’t get in our side at all.  He was an England captain at under age level and came through at the same time as JWP. Which one of those two is a decent premier League player now and which one isn’t?

Our next game is Manchester United away so we could well find ourselves back in the bottom three after that one but we have to go there with the ambition of doing a lot better than we did away at Arsenal. Still being in the game after 20 minutes would be a good start. They are decent of course but they have a lot of injuries so we have a chance. For now though, let’s just enjoy winning this game and being above the line rather than below it.