FA Cup 5th Round - Wolves 0 Southampton 2

We Love You VAR, We Do.

As luck would have it, following our Arsenal double header around the time of the 4th round of the FA Cup, we have a Wolves double header now the 5th round has come around.

Wolves have struggled to repeat last season’s heroics with the main reason being the loss of Raul Jimenez to a horrible injury of a fractured skull. In his absence, Wolves have tried a number of solutions upfront but have yet to find anyone who can hit the net regularly. They have compensated for this by making themselves incredibly miserly at the back so you would think the goals are going to be in short supply today, given our struggles in front of goal over the last few weeks. Pedro Neto has had a run in the side over the last few weeks and he looks like the fearless direct running winger that we could do with. Him on the left and Adama “Doesn’t do Weights” Traore on the right will ensure that our defence is kept on its toes. We had difficulty earlier on in the year with a midfield three of Neves, Moutinho and Dendoncker but hopefully Dendoncker is needed in defence tonight with Willy Boly being injured.

Saints are without Takumi Minamino who is cup tied but the photographs from training this week seem to be telling us that Stuart Armstrong, KWP and Mohammed Salisu will all be available. That old question of which game we should prioritise has come up again this week and the answer is, as always, “the next one“. Personally, I think we have three players who are looking a bit shellshocked at the moment after the trials and tribulations of last week so it wouldn’t be surprise to me to see McCarthy, Bednarek and Stephens all left out.

In the event, Bednarek plays, probably because Ralph didn’t fancy giving Vestergaard two games in a few days after returning from injury, but his partner was the man, the myth, the future legend, Mohammed Salisu. KWP is back, Armstrong is back and the only other ‘rested’ player is Che Adams, with somewhat surprisingly, Nathan Redmond starts up front.  I can’t see that working but there you have it.  Nuno has done an Arteta with the first choice front three of Neto, Willian Jose and Traore all in the bench. Up front they have the £40 million (cough) money laundering (cough, splutter) Fabio Silva... who is shite. Conor Coady has also been rested as Nuno prioritises a 12th place finish... strange…. They're not going down and not going to qualify for Europe either.  Maybe he’s on a bonus for every league position.

Away we go and it’s all us.  There is an early chance from a corner as Redmond takes a quick one to JWP and gets the ball back before bouncing a pass to Armstrong who manages through good technique, to hit a half decent effort on target and Ruddy blocks it and spills it.  it looks like Danny Ings may be able to backheel into the net but Ruddy falls on it.

Djenepo‘s cross is headed away and then back in by JWP and Ings produces a brilliant bit of skill to ball juggle it over Dendoncker and as he shapes to karate kick it at the goal, Roman Saiss ruins the moment by getting across to block.

Bertrand puts over a superb cross on the left hand side in between the defence and the goalkeeper and it ends up with Redmond at the back post and he makes a total fuck of it and just chips at straight to Ruddy from about 6 yards out.  We really should be ahead already but though we continue to be the better side, half time arrives with the score still level.  At the back, Salisu has been decent.  He got hurried up by the Wolves press a couple of times but managed to just about get the pass away whilst we all hid behind cushions watching on TV.

The second half starts with Saints carving out another glorious chance from another Bertrand cross and this time it’s Stuart Armstrong arriving in the middle of the goal, 6 yards out and he passes it wide of the post.  Fuck me – sitter!!! No wonder we don’t win many football matches at the moment.  It’s like we have a fucking allergy to white posts and netting.
 
Ten minutes later, unperturbed, Bertrand is at it again, sliding in a lovely ball inbetween the right back and right centre back for Ings to run onto.  Out comes Ruddy and blocks the initial shot but it pings back on to Danny Ings and rolls apologetically into the net. No one celebrates because the fucker with the flag has waved at straight away and off to VAR and Simon Hooper we go.

“Hi there Hoops, it’s Mossy – give me a chance to get my breath back man, I’m knackered”
“I’m checking the offside mate – what’s that noise?”
“That’s me blowing out of my arse Hoops”
“Looks tight to me Mossy… am getting the etch-a-sketch out”
“No worries mate – take your time, the twat stuck his flag up so no pressure”
“Onside Mossy mate, Kilman has played him on”
“Take your time dickhead, I’m knackered and hungry, look again”
“Big Mikey D told me to draw lines randomly through his arm and he’s still not offside”
“OK Hoops, gonna give the goal – might call you later when I’m knackered again.”

Fuck me, Jon Moss is only gone and given the goal - what a ref, always liked him.  It’s all a bit flat. A combination of no fans, VAR and the flag going up and all the bollocks that’s gone on the last few weeks means that hardly anyone celebrates.   Anyway, let’s get on with it.

Wolves are like a flatlining patient on a hospital bed and not showing any real signs of life.  Armstrong breaks superbly through midfield and slides a wonderful through ball through to put Redmond one-on-one with the keeper.  He chops past the last offender and… you know the rest, hits the goalkeeper and it’s disappointing and predictable in equal measure.  Good composure up until the important bit.  BT Sport show that replay of the manager as the move develops and Ralph gets more and more interested and animated and then…. Fucks sake despair.

Wolves have sent on Neto and Traore to try and spark themselves into life.  Traore has a run at Bertrand but he’s going nowhere – too predictable, all right foot.  The threat comes from the other side as Neves puts Neto away down the wing and he crosses it low, Salisu plays an air shot and Traore on right hand side manages to hit it goalwards Fraser sticks out a big size 15 to boot it away.

Nathan Tella is coming on for Saints in place of Djenepo, who knows he is about to be taken off so he does a runner over to the other side of the pitch and then walks back very very slowly. Top quality shithousing. Tella makes an immediate impact from the left he is looking very lively when Dendoncker tries to play it back to the keeper and Ruddy tries to give it straight back to him but I guess Ruddy is shit at the training ground rondo’s and succeeds in passing it straight to Tella. There is no route to goal as Ruddy has sprawled out at his feet but Tella turns round and knocks it back to Armstrong who takes a touch and then passes it beautifully into the far corner via the post whilst Saiss on the line weighs up whether he should punch the ball away or not. Thankfully he doesn’t and that’s 2-0. Game over

There are a couple of minutes to go in enough time for Tella to burst into the left hand side of the box and be turfed over. Moss gives a penalty but we’re going to VAR.

“Hi there Hoops – I’m knackered – got to blow the final whistle and I’m out of puff”
“Looks outside the box to me Mossy”
“Oh it definitely is mate, I just need a breather”
“How could you tell from the centre circle?”
“My missus got me some better contacts for Christmas”
“How long do you need Mossy? – you’re a legend”
“Minute or so will do – don’t let Big Mikey D hear you calling me that”
“Good point – he doesn’t like other referees being legends”
“Have you got any cake?”

No penalty, outside the box. JWP attempts to be a shithouse and move the ball into a position where he can shoot but eventually the angle is too narrow when it’s taken from the right place so we just play into the corner to eat up the last few seconds and through to the Quarter Final we go.

We won a game. Such as been our recent form you’re grateful to get over the line in any game but to be honest, this was a pretty comfortable win with Wolves offering next to no threat at all. I find it amazing that Nuno went full Arteta and has obviously prioritised the league game on Sunday rather than this one. Arteta probably just about earned a grudging reprieve from the Arsenal fans when they won the league game and now Nuno has got to do the same. However, even when Wolves brought on Ben Johnson and Neto in the second-half, Saints defended well and kept them reasonably quiet. You know what the deal is with the Adama. He is going to run headlong into the space and try and beat you on the outside before crossing it. He doesn’t want to cut in because he hasn’t got a left foot and you could tell that Ryan Bertrand had sussed that.  Bertie had a brilliant game at both ends of the pitch - setting up the first goal, the Armstrong sitter and the Redmond first half sitter and also, handling Adama well  It did mean that he had to put his body in the way on occasions and it was going to be like getting hit by a fucking runaway train but he did the job.  

Elsewhere for Wolves, who the fuck signed off spending £40 million on the 18-year-old Fabio Silva. He looked like the kid that no one liked at school.  Surely the Christ you only buy an 18-year-old for £40 million if you think that one day he is going to be worth more than that? I don’t often feel sorry for opposition players but I felt sorry for the lad as he looked completely out of his depth. Also, why do Wolves players roll around on the ground after every single challenge. I know it’s not uncommon for players in the Premier League to do that but it was every fucking one. The first half should’ve lasted about 55 minutes.

The returning KWP showed what a key player he is for us and dealt with the threat of Neto in the second-half really comfortably. Jan Bednarek was back to near his best and didn’t look like he was playing with shellshock, like he did against Newcastle at the weekend.  Whilst not the busiest, Fraser Forster kept yet another clean sheet and did the sweeper keeper thing well and must be pretty close to getting the nod in league games now.  He at least is giving Ralph a decision to make.

He Lives!

We of course had Mohammed Salisu playing his first game for nearly a year and though he had a couple of ropey moments, in the main he did really well. I don’t think he’s ever going to be the most comfortable with the ball at his feet but he is a unit and he looks ideally suited to the Premier League from a physical point of view. All you need to do is realise how quickly everything happens and once he does that, he will be fine. I liked the fact that he clearly wanted to defend. Also, the fact that he has some quite serious pace which is unusual in the context of Saints central defenders. The small lapses were mainly down to not having played football for months.  The only slight concern for me was that he looked very one footed. The airshot was with his right but then he put a good right footed tackle in later on. Very promising and only 21.  For me he is a bit like Diallo in that he has been brought in to be cover this season but watch him go next season.

They say when strikers are having a bit of a goal drought that you want a goal to go in off your arse or off your knee or something and that is certainly what happened for Danny Ings today. Hopefully, having a gold bouncing off him via a deflection of the goalkeeper and to be flagged offside originally, will set him off on a run of goals again. By the way, we didn’t have the luck from VAR tonight, we had a correct decision that was proved to be correct.

The experiment with Nathan Redmond upfront didn’t really work and Moussa Djenepo didn’t have a great deal of success over on the left hand side. The impact was provided by Nathan Tella who came off the bench with 10 minutes to go and did exactly what an attacking substitute is supposed to do. He had an impact, setting up the second goal and very nearly winning a penalty as well but for another correct VAR call.  Jon Moss had a good game.  Never thought I'd say that.

Leaving the best til last, our best player was the Scotsman with a magnificent hair.  He just makes the whole team tick when he is playing well which is what he did today. We will ignore the absolute sitter he missed just after half-time but if ever a man deserve to goal, it was Stuart Armstrong today.

The draw for the next round took place directly after the game and in the quarter-finals we got a brilliant draw away to Bournemouth. Not far to travel and a Championship side away from home. Win that and we are in the semi-final where we will doubtless get the winners of the Leicester vs Man United game and if all that comes to pass, I’m sure the number nine Will be mentioned quite a lot.

We march on, as the advertising slogan goes.

Next up is of course Wolves again in the league at St Mary‘s. We really need to win that one as well.