Premier League Match 20 - Southampton 4 Brentford 1

 

All Smiles Before Semmens Tells Solak How Much Broja Will Cost

Brentford at home on a Tuesday night and I’m back to loving evening games again. With the Covid pandemic I am now working from home so it’s a lot easier to get to the game on time than it was before. Can’t wait.

We had to wait a couple of weeks of course because this game was supposed to be played in mid-December but was one of the first ones to get called off because of the bizarre new ruling that the Premier League have put in place, which enables teams to request the game be called off when they have a few Covid cases.  I say “a few” because no one knows the actual number and for some reason, injuries, suspensions and international call-ups are now a factor when teams are trying to justify getting a game called off.  Absolute bullshit.  

Initially, I didn’t have a problem with Brentford requesting that the original game got called off but that was before it became abundantly apparent that teams like Leicester, Newcastle and especially Liverpool, we are basically manipulating the fixture list for their own ends. That reached a crescendo this week with Liverpool getting their league cup semi-final against Arsenal postponed because they had a Covid outbreak which, as Jurgen Klopp explained yesterday, was in fact a massive batch of false positives. When he says false positives, he possibly means, utter bullshit. What are the chances of the one in a thousand false positives that you get statistically, happening to about 10 players in Liverpool squad all at the same time? It’s a weird one and no mistake. It’s a bit like the 80% Covid rate that they have in Newcastle when their best striker gets injured and they are about to sign about 10 new players in the transfer window and the spike in Covid infections at Leicester whenever a few of their defenders are injured.

Anyway, here we are and Brentford will be eyeing up Saints as a team they can get something out of in their quest to survive their initial season in the Premier League. So far, they have looked like they will survive it comfortably, sitting as they do, about three places above us in the league.

To be honest, they have been an absolute breath of fresh air this season, picking up points without grinding the shit out of it and their manager, Thomas Frank seems to be a very likeable character. Of course, we are more interested in Brentford these days because of the takeover that we’ve just had with Rasmus Ankerson, one of the three men behind our new ownership, being one of the main men behind Brentford‘s rise up the leagues.  Apart from when they play us, I wish absolutely no ill will to Brentford and hope they achieve their aims for the season.

Ralph Hasenhuttl has the right back conundrum to solve tonight and I fully expect Captain JWP to be deployed there. There are a couple of interesting choices to make assuming everyone is available who we expect to be available.  I’m early to the ground, through the “rigorous” Covid status checkpoint and the team is announced.  Lyanco’s presence means it looks like 3 at the back with JWP at wing back.

Fast forward an hour and we line up and it looks weird.  JWP is in the centre of midfield and it looks like Tella is at right back – OK then.  It’s weird - in possession it’s almost a 3-3-4 with Perraud and Tella pushed really high.  Diallo doesn’t look comfortable out on the left of the midfield three with no full back behind him.  Interesting.  Anyway, it’s Salisu long throw time, gets headed back to him and he wins a corner when he tries to cross it back in.  JWP curls it in from the left hand side and Bednarek just walks forward a yard and flicks it in for 1-0.  How easy was that?  Where was the keeper?

As the game settles down we look kind of clunky as players get used to the formation.  When we get it down near the Brentford defence, we look dangerous.  Broja picks it up on the right and as he does, decides to run straight towards goal and he pisses past the left back and makes his way along the goal-line but no one makes the run to the back post for a tap in and his cross misses everyone.

Brentford aren’t offering much about from hopeful chips into the box which are meat and drink to Salisu, Lyanco and Bednarek.  One such chip is headed out by Salisu, picked up in midfield and spread wide to Mbeumo.  We don’t get across quickly enough in a clear hybrid defence failure and he gets a cross in which is expertly volleyed home by Janelt.  Bollocks – literally their first attack, 1-1.

Diallo begins to grow into the game and confidently runs forward down the left and combines with JWP and Perraud for the latter to find Romeu with the cross about 10 yards out and he spoons it into the crowd.  Good move, wrong player on the end of it.  Before we have time to get too down about it we win a corner on the right, JWP plays it in, everyone misses it and Diallo picks it up and for no logical reason, decides to hit it.  It goes near post and fuck me, it’s gone in.  How on earth has that happened?  Bearing in mind I’m up the other end, it takes a big screen replay to tell me that the keeper Fernandez has had an absolute mare.  Not only was he too slow to get over to the bouncing near post effort, it has come off the post, hit the back of his hand and gone in.  That’ll be an own goal, which is a bit of a shame for Ibra but I’m sure he won’t mind too much.

There is one more incident before half time as Redmond produces his one bit of decent play for the half with an excellent first time volleyed cross, which Perraud went up for at the back post and Fernandez clawed away from near the angle of post and bar.

It’s a bit strange to be at half time and winning and whilst at the same time, not being over impressed by what I’ve seen.  We experimented with this hybrid defence thing last season and it didn’t work and we’ve just about got away with it so far tonight.  I can’t help but think that Thomas Frank will work out a way for Brentford to be more dangerous in the second half, maybe by switching play more often.  Against that though is the realisation that Brentford are not very good or most certainly, are not playing well.

Any doubts about things are more or less dispelled three minutes into the half as we break up a Brentford attack on our left, Diallo and Salisu play us out of trouble and then Romeu gets his head up and plays a straight ball between two defenders into the path of Broja who is clean through on the half way line.  There is no way a defender is going to catch him as he bears down on Fernandez from the left, shoots, the keeper gets a piece of it …. but it carries on and into the corner of the net.  3-1 – get in.

Gentle Nudge to New Owner

Having returned to the bench today after a dose of Covid, Che Adams is the first sub on 65 minutes, replacing the ultimately disappointing Redmond.  Fresh legs against a tiring and slow defence – like it Ralph.

Five minutes later, boom, Diallo smashes it forward and his clearance turns into a chance as no defender heads it and Adams gets enough of a touch to give him a chance and as Fernandez comes out and attempts a Schumacher challenge (look it up kids, 1982 World Cup), Che gets a toe to it to lob it into the net, 4-1 and this is all going rather swimmingly now.

Stuart Armstrong is on for Tella and Stu’s presence means of course that we are going to win.  JWP has now gone to right back and it’s shame that we have to take Broja off a few minutes later when he gets totalled by a clearance which smashes him straight in the face.  I say it’s a shame because it would have been nice to bring on Simeu or Small as the third sub as the game is won bit instead it’s Adam Armstrong.

Nothing much happens from an attacking point of view in the last 10 minutes but we do slacken off a bit defensively when we get caught on the break down our left and Toney’s cross to Wissa looks perfect for a tap in until JWP appears at the end of a lung busting recovery run and gets a foot in.  The resulting corner is missed by everyone, Fraser then has to save from Toney as he bundles through.  Before we clear it properly, it’s crossed back in by Jensen and Mbeumo looks certain to score before The Wall is put up in front of him again.

Well that was an incredibly strange experience. Watching the last 20 minutes of the game without a care in the world knowing that we’d won. Saints were basically far too good for Brentford, especially in the second-half and we were absolutely clinical when we got our chances and if you are clinical then you can cover up a few deficiencies elsewhere.

There were undoubtedly some deficiencies in the first half. We were switching all the time between a back four and are back three and we didn’t seem to know what we were doing half the time.  The one time that Brentford got their attacking play right, our defensive system broke down and the cross came in and they scored from it. It all looked a bit disjointed in attacking sense as well and to be honest, I thought Ralph had over-thought it again. You have to remember though that the changes were born out of necessity with us having no right back available. The second half though we played it really well and put the game to bed.

I do feel that against a better side than Brentford, we may have had a few issues defensively when trying to switch between systems, if Brentford had switched the ball from side to side with any urgency and accuracy - but the way we played tonight was more than enough to beat a very poor Brentford side. From what I had seen of them and with their results, I expected them to be a lot better than they were but keep playing like that and they could still be in the relegation shake up. I feel a bit sorry if their two forward players, Toney and Mbeumo, who hardly had a sniff all evening apart from a little three-minute spell when the game was already won, when Fraser had to bail us out on a couple of occasions. With a fussier referee, Toney could well have been sent off and his frustration was clear. Brentford’s main issue though was the defence and the goalkeeper. The goalkeeper seems to spread panic amongst the defenders and the central defenders were so slow, Pontus Jansson in particular.

There was some absolutely outstanding performances for Saints today. JWP has certainly gone up another gear in the last few weeks. Ralph has often mentioned that he is captain by example, never shown more than with the sliding interception he made in the 82nd minute to prevent a certain goal for Brentford. To show that level of commitment to defending at 4–1 up is quite something. Oriol Romeu was absolutely immense today, which went along way to dominating the midfield and set the platform for us to win the game. Ibrahima Diallo seemed to be a bit lost, position wise in the first half but had an excellent second half.  I was also very impressed with the shift that Nathan Tella put in, basically operating with a lot of discipline as a right wing-back and the back three were aggressive and confrontational and basically, very difficult to play against.

Romeu is Not the Maddest Bastard in this Photo

I love Lyanco, who is an absolutely mad bastard. He is a throwback to a previous era of big characters. He takes some chances at times and makes things ridiculously difficult for himself, like the time he tried to bring the ball down on his chest when he had to players up is arse and another time when he lost the ball and then chased round like a Jack Russell trying to get to the ball as three Brentford players passed it around. He was great. Cult hero stuff.

And another goal for Armando Broja, another good goal to and when he broke through from the halfway line you knew that A) they were not going to catch him and B) there was a 95% chance that he’d score. Dragan Solak was in the crowd today, equalling Gao's appearance record at the first opportunity. Welcome Dragan, I hope you had a good day and enjoyed the game, please can we have £25 to £30 million to sign this centre forward.

Just think, if we had been a bunch of shithouses like Newcastle, Liverpool or Leicester, we could probably have fabricated a few Covid cases, you know, false positives, that sort of thing and got this game postponed. There is irony in the fact that Brentford got this game postponed once. Justice has been done and we have been rewarded and though the league table is somewhat uneven in terms of games played, mainly because of reasons just outlined, we are up to 11th place.

It is undoubtedly another good day for Ralph. In front of the clubs new hierarchy, we romped to our biggest win of the season just a few days after 120 minute slog with 10 men against Swansea. It’s another one of those days where I didn’t quite understand the methods used to get the result but that doesn’t matter, we don’t have to understand them, we just have to be pleased with the result, which was excellent.

Next up is a trip to Molineux to play the minded numbingly dull and rigid Wolves side, who are still the only team to beat us at St Mary‘s this season. We owe them one. Bring it on. Up the fucking Saints.