FA Cup 6th Round - Southampton 1 Manchester City 4

 

Saints Try and Persuade Mike to Retire Right Now

Every club of our size wants to have a decent FA Cup run at the start of the season. You win a couple of matches and once you get to the 5^th Round the excitement begins to grow and you begin to think that maybe it’s your year.

Then you win in the 5th Round are you into the quarter-finals and then the draw gets made.  Warmed up balls allegedly mean the big clubs are kept apart and some ex-footballer trying to make it in the media pulls out your number…. and you get fucking Manchester City. Tremendous.  You wanted another mid-table Premier League club or a Championship club in the quarter-finals but no, you get fucking Manchester City. Balloon punctured, optimism gone, expectations zero.

That’s how it is these days sadly, with the big boys getting ever bigger. Of course there is always a chance in a one off game and we have got draws in both league games against them this season but it’s still a massive task ahead for us to get through.  Expectations have been lowered further by the fact that our league form since the draw was made has been shit, with 3 defeats in a row.  So how do we win this? Stay in the game as long as possible and take our chances.  Staying in the game is easier said than done because they are capable of scoring unpreventable goals and if they do that, fair enough.  What we can’t afford to do is ‘give’ them something for free.

We all know what Manchester City are these days and with the situation going on at Chelsea at the moment, people are suddenly taken a lot more interest in how these mega rich clubs are financed.  Manchester City are living proof that FFP is in fact FFB, Financial Fair Bollocks. At a time when everyone suffered big losses due to the pandemic, City somehow increased their income. Strange that.

However, no investigation into their finances is it going to help us today today but it’s another reminder that the game starts with 11 against 11 and beyond that, the sporting integrity ends.  I actually saw the City line-up first.  They’ve managed to pick a world-class 11 and leave out Bernardo Silva, Phil Foden and Riyad Mahrez who are probably their best three players this season.  Actually in the team are Kevin De Bruyne, Rodri, Ilkay Gundogan, Gabriel Jesus, Raheem Sterling and Jack Grealish. It’s all relative and you look for the weak links. To me, Jesus and Sterling playing instead of Foden and Mahrez is a definite plus point.  Both Kyle Walker and John Stones have got a mistake in them if you can put them under any pressure as both can be a little casual at times. Goalkeeper Ederson has been left out in preference of Zach Steffen – Team America Fuck Yeah!

Ralph’s FA Cup tombola has not been too bad.  It’s a relief when Fraser Forster‘s name is read out first, followed by the first choice back four aside from Stephens in for Bednarek.  The first choice midfield is next up and then the surprise up front, where it is Shane Long and Adam Armstrong.  To be honest I can see the game plan straight away, which is for those two to press and chase and harry like mad for as long as they can and then for us to bring on Adams and Broja to try and nick something late on in the game.  Playing the two quickest players to put them under pressure is not a bad shout on the face of it.

Off we go and the first team to show are unsurprisingly, the men from Manchester with a move that started with Cancelo at left back and went through Rodri, De Bruyne and Grealish and eventually sent Sterling away with a shooting opportunity from the left hand side but in typical Sterling fashion he lashed it with his left foot and it went well wide. This is the kind of thing that I mean when I say I don’t mind if they score a brilliant goal because if that ended up in the net there would’ve been absolutely nothing that we could’ve done about it.

Livramento has started well and breaks through a couple of challenges on the right hand side and the ball ends up with Romeu driving through in the centre of the pitch. He cleverly slips the ball through to Adam Armstrong, who swings his right foot at it and scuffs it past Team America Fuck Yeah! and time seems to stand still as it rolls towards the goal before hitting the post and bouncing out. Fucks sake. The fact he didn’t hit it properly meant that it gave the goalkeeper no chance and to be honest I thought it was rolling well wide until it hit the post.

So we missed a decent chance and then guess what?  Straight up the other end and De Bruyne is breaking through there right-hand channel when he tries to cross it but he scuffs it, but not as badly as Jack Stephens who comes across and virtually falls over the ball instead of hitting row Z with it and it drops to Grealish, who rolls across and even Sterling can’t miss that one.  Fucks sake - an absolute gift.

With just 12 minutes gone, Saints carry on with the same game plan with Shane Long linking up well with Stuart Armstrong but namesake Adam shows it’s probably just not going to be his day as the spoons the shot horribly over the bar. Though we are still behind I’m encouraged by the fact that we are still creating.

However, it’s nearly 2-0 from the next attack as Cancelo beats Livramento on the outside before firing a low cross in which is met by Gundogan at point blank range, who as usual had arrived untracked and it pings off the post. We got a bit lucky there.

As we approach half time it’s quite a relief that we are going to be going in, in all likelihood, only one goal behind.  Just before the break, City try to play out and Cancelo plays a crappy ball forward which just gives it away to Salisu.   JWP turns in midfield and finds Stuart Armstrong and he picks out Elyounoussi’s run across from the left behind the defence.  Team America (Fuck Yeah!) comes out to meet him but stop and Moi turns, passes it across and it deflects into the net off Laporte. Fucking hilarious. Can’t decide if he’s French or Spanish and can’t decide which way he’s kicking either.  Get in.

Everyone seems to assume that Elyounoussi is offside, not least the Manchester City players and the resulting VAR check obviously doesn’t give them with the result that they wanted, so Kyle Walker spits his dummy out in spectacular fashion as when the half time whistle blows from Mike Dean, he picks up the ball and wellies it over the Itchen Stand. What a prick. He’s joined in that regard by Jack Grealish who has rolled around and generally feigned injury, whilst not contributing a great deal to Manchester City's attacking effort, which is a bit of a problem when you are deployed as a false nine.

What a bonus that is just before half-time. Overall, we’ve done really well with our harrying are closing down forcing mistakes with some regularity by the likes of John Stones who has developed a liking for just passing the ball straight out of play.  Shame about the shit goal we conceded but at least we’re back level.

So, we start the second-half well again, nicking the ball in the City half, when JWP and Romeu combine to give Adam Armstrong another shooting opportunity from about 25 yards but again he doesn’t catch it cleanly and it goes well wide.

On about 55 minutes it turns into the Alamo around our goal as De Bruyne, Sterling and Rodri all have efforts blocked by flying defenders and City end up with a corner.  We survive that and from the next attack Raheem Sterling proves why he’s shit by getting past Tino and then with about four players to pick out he just keeps on running with the ball until he loses it and we break up field with Elyounoussi breaking away at the right hand side. Shane Long is streaking through the middle ahead of him and trying desperately to stay onside but perhaps surprised by this, Elyounoussi does a Sterling and fails to deliver the ball and eventually gets tackled. Opportunity butchered.  If you get it to Shane anywhere within 40 yards, it’s a goal innit!

Again we are punished for missing an opportunity - straight from that, City bring it forward and Grealish plays a simple ball forward to Jesus, who is about a foot inside the right hand edge of the penalty area and Salisu dangles a leg in there and over he goes and my stomach feels like it about to fall out of my arse.  Sinking feeling – that’s a penalty all day.  Mike Dean pauses for dramatic affect and then points the spot.  Can’t argue really.  If your first instinct is that it’s a penalty against your own side, it probably is.  Don’t worry, it’s only Kevin De Bruyne on the spot kicks.   Up he steps, keepers right low down, Fraser gets a touch but can’t keep it out.  Fuck.  Another gift of a goal.

"Miss It Ya Twat..."

Adams on for Adam Armstrong and Broja on for Long as we try and get back into it.  Saints play out from the back with Stephens finding Livramento, on to Stuart Armstrong and back to JWP who switches it first time to Elyounoussi on the left hand side.  A great touch and pass inside to Adams, who smashes it straight at Team America Fuck Yeah! KWP then picks it up in curls an effort wide of the far post.  Shit!!!

When we made our substitutions, City made a couple as well, bringing on Foden and Mahrez for the underperforming Jesus and Grealish.  From City’s next attack you see the difference as to Mahrez and De Bruyne combine, de Bruyne’s chip is headed out by Salisu and Foden takes a touch before absolutely creaming it on the half-volley and it fizzed into the net from 20 yards giving Fraser not an earthly. 3-1 game over.

We know it’s done now with 15 to go and we are notably not getting as close to them any more - Cancelo pings in a ridiculous ball into the box on the outside of his left foot which is chested down by Gundogan and played out wide to Mahrez, who shapes to shoot across the goal with his left foot but instead cuts it inside the near post and once more, no one has hope in hell of doing anything about it. Bollocks.

The final few minutes is played out with City missing a few more chances and Make-a-Wish Moussa coming on for the last 5 because what we needed at that stage was someone to fall over the ball and dribble it out of play.

Firstly, perspective. We are playing a ridiculously talented ridiculously expensively assembled side, who have a ridiculous work ethic, instilled in them by possibly the best manager of all time - and we matched them for over an hour as we have matched them in two league games over 180 minutes this season. Unfortunately, our weaknesses came to bite us when we gave away two bad goals. I have no problem with the third and fourth goal that they scored because they’re both brilliant in their execution, but the first two goals were preventable. For the first goal, Jack Stephens had an absolute mare with his clearance just popping straight to Jack Grealish and one pass later it was in the net.

The second goal of course is a needless challenge by Salisu on the edge of the box against Gabriel Jesus who was going absolutely nowhere. Even though the contact was slight and he made a meal of it, the chance was given to Mike Dean to give the penalty and you can’t really argue with it.  Apparently it is Mike’s last FA Cup tie as he’s retiring at the end of the season.  In that case it was nice for him to have a game where he wasn’t a twat.

Off You Fuck, Mike

Going 1-0 down early means that you carry on playing the same game and hope to get back into it which is what we did but going behind in the second-half means that there is more urgency to chase the game and that left us open for goals three and four. You could sense that as soon as we went behind, we kind of knew the game was up and the intensity went out of our play for about 10 minutes, in which time the game was buried.

We at least today looked like we were back at it, having not been great in the last three league games. The midfield for I thought were largely excellent and Tino looked to be back to something approaching his best at right back. KWP again gave ammunition to throw at Gareth Southgate and really the only two players who don’t usually get a sniff of the league side were Adam Armstrong and Shane Long who both worked ridiculously hard with Armstrong in particular unlucky not to score with that bobbler that hit the post when it was still 0-0.  It is frustrating though that he had three decent chances and spooned every single one.  Elsewhere, Jack Stephens had a mare.  He does seem to struggle whenever he’s pitched into these one off games and only seems to play well if he has a run of games in the side.  Apart from the mistake on the first goal, there were three or four other big errors that he got away with though he must be applauded for getting on Mike Dean’s tits so much that JWP was clearly told by the ref to tell him to shut up.

As I said, I think Ralph‘s team selection was pretty sound and it’s unfortunate that the second City goal went in around the time we were looking to bring Adams and Broja on.  The second goal of course was the one that killed us.

Though they are what they are regarding the fact that they are controlled by a State, City are an incredible football team.  Kevin De Bruyne was absolutely ridiculous today, as were Riyad Mahrez and Phil Foden who luckily, only played about 20 minutes each. Different level. Jack Grealish was pretty average and it was no surprise when he was substituted and Kyle Walker is a massive bell end.  Why he felt the need to book the ball out of the stadium just because they let it a goal just before half time is beyond me really. It was nice that it was Walker who played us onside and also nice that the own goal was scored by Laporte, who is a bit of a dickhead as well.

As I was getting home from the game, I heard that Manchester City have been drawn against Liverpool or Nottingham Forest in the next round. Barring some sort of Forest miracle, it’s going to be Liverpool so that’s a consolation for getting beaten today that we don’t have to play them.

More important for us is to get back on the horse and start picking up some points in the league starting with a trip to Leeds next week, where we got absolutely battered last year.  Performance wise if not result wise, there was a bit to be positive about today.  It was certainly a better performance than the last three league games.

Premier League Match 29 - Southampton 1 Watford 2

Great Work Guys 

Watford at home and a definite chance to bounce back after the disappointment of the defeat against Newcastle in midweek.

As I say every time we play them, Watford are ridiculous club with a ridiculous model that seems to rely purely on “new manager bounce“. This is basically starting the season, lose a few games, sack the manager, replace him with an Italian bloke you’ve probably never heard of, win a few, lose a few, sack him, rinse and repeat.  They have deviated a little bit from that this year and whilst I don’t know who the manager was at the start of the season, they appointed Claudio Ranieri, who was in charge the last time we played them at Vicarage Road and then sacked him and replaced him with enthusiastic youngster Roy Hodgson, who has basically become the new Sam Allardyce. I find it amusing that I don’t know who the manager was at the start of the season. The fact is, I didn’t care and never bothered to find out because it takes up available space in your brain and no one has enough space in their brain to remember a list of Watford managers. In fact, I wonder if there is a Watford fan anywhere who could name all their managers in reverse order from Roy Hodgson back to say Graham Taylor in the early 80s.

However ridiculous Watford are at boardroom level, it’s the 11 on the pitch that we’ve got to worry about today. They have undoubtedly been better since Hodgson came in so I’m expecting a tough game, not least because we haven’t played well the last two matches. It will be a game where it’s important to get the first goal.  If we get it, their heads may well go down, if they get it?.... we we all know we struggled against Newcastle when we went behind.

The team news is odd – Broja has been left out which is not altogether surprising but the replacement is not Adam Armstrong, Nathan Redmond or Shane Long – it’s Will Smallbone.  I’m guessing he’ll be on the wing with Elyounoussi behind Adams.  Either way, it seems very left field especially when Long scored a couple of weeks ago and Armstrong played well against Newcastle.  Tino is rested so Perraud comes in but otherwise it’s as you’d expect.

Away we go with some nice play by JWP, switching it out to KWP on the right and side who played it inside the full back for Armstrong to chip in from the by-line.  The perfect cross is met by Elyounoussi at the back post and he heads it past Foster but unfortunately, there was a fucking defender on the line to clear it.  He heads it up in the air and Adams jumped next to Foster which was of course enough for the Graham Scott to give goalkeeper a free kick even though there was next to no contact.

Watford’s first attack sees a cross into the box which Salisu expertly cushions down to Joao Pedro on the edge of the box. Luckily Bednarek is alive and chucks himself in front of the inbound shot. Not a great piece of defending by Sali, it has to be said.  We didn’t know at the time but he was about to go one better though…

The next major talking point was us loading the gun and trying to shoot ourselves. We missed the first time and then decided we were gonna have another go.  First of all, Bednarek knocked the ball back to Fraser, who played it back to him and came within inches of it being intercepted by Joao Pedro.  The ball is safely with Bednarek and he played it across to Salisu, who then bobbled it back towards Forster allowing Hernandez to nick it around the goalkeeper and roll it into an empty net from a tight angle. Fuck me. Shite by all three of the Saints players involved to be honest. Fraser‘s initial pass was shit and then he seemed to make no attempt to stop Hernandez walking round him and didn’t try and dive in front of the shot. Salisu, who obviously gave away the stupid pass in the first place but Bednarek, having seen Forster get away with a sloppy one, should’ve just turned and whacked the ball up the park rather than play across the back four. I never mind too much of a team score a good goal against us but this is a fucking disaster and absolutely gift wrapped.

Back to it and Armstrong wins a free kick on the right hand side when Samir tries to tug his arm out of its socket. JWP swings over the freekick and Salisu meets it well and heads it over the bar.

We don’t have too long to dwell on it though because a few minutes later a cross is swung in from Watford’s left hand side and there is Hernandez again stealing in behind Perraud,  unmarked and with a free volley at the goal from 10 yards. He connects pretty well and gives Fraser absolutely no chance. Two nil down at home against one of the worst teams in the league. We are making them look like a prime Brazil. When the cross came in, Romeu, Salisu and Bednarek were all in the penalty area but not marking anybody and Perraud was left with two men at the back post and unfortunately, he chose the wrong one.

Far from getting better, we get worse as Armstrong gave the ball away midfield and suddenly it’s a four on three break for Watford.  Kučka goes through on the inside left channel and it takes a decent block from Fraser to keep it to two. This game could be over by now.

Still time for a lifeline before half time though and it predictably has to come from a set piece as Armstrong is fouled needlessly by Kamara on our right.   In it comes from JWP, flicked on by Adams and it dribbles into the net off of Elyounoussi’s foot to make it 2-1. Not the best goal but it doesn’t matter and it feels like we have got out of jail to only be going in 2-1 down at half-time.

The experiment of playing Smallbone as a second striker has predictably not worked so As expected, he makes way for Armando Broja at half time. 45 minutes should be enough time to get back into this game but we all know what Watford going to do. They are going to attempt to strangle the shit out of it and camp on the edge of their own penalty area and it will be interesting to see if we’ve learned anything from the Newcastle experience.

Early signs are bad and Salisu heads wide from a JWP delivery but again it’s a set piece and nothing from open play. Mind you it’s hard from open play when Watford are hitting the deck at every opportunity and wasting as much time as possible. They still find time to cause us problems with Forster having to make another good save as Kučka cuts in from the left and fired at the opposite top corner.

Another break for Watford as Dennis burns off Bednarek before knocking it back for Hernandez who has a decent shout for a hat-trick from the edge of the box but puts up a balloon and smashes it high into the Northam.

Redmond is on For Romeu and combines with Armstrong to pass it to Adams on the edge of the penalty area and he wins/buys a free kick as a Watford player closes down from behind. It’s very close to the edge of the box and for me, JWP chooses the wrong option and flips it over the wall but it lands on the roof for the net skimming just over the crossbar.

Roy Hodgson Aged 145, waits for the Game to End

Time is nearly up. Well it would be – 9 minutes extra to be played because Watford have wasted so much time that Roy Hodgson will be getting a telegram from the Queen before the game is over.  The 9 minutes can’t start yet because Broja has been pole-axed by Foster, who has punched one away and his elbow has caught Armando in the face.  There is one more incident of note with Redmond working his way into the box before eventually chipping a left-footed cross over, which Adams headed goalwards but unfortunately straight at Foster who defies his Zimmer frame to tip over the bar.  From the corner, Bednarek heads goalwards and it hits a Watford player.  We all appeal but I’ve no idea what for – there is slapping of the arm going on so I guess they think it’s handball.  Oh yes – off to VAR.

“Hi Scotty, Banksy here at Stockley Park”
“Hi Banksy – Bednarek has just shouted something in Polish that sounded like ‘Cryzdjziwichsjszk’”
“OK – Google translate says ‘Handball you fucking twat’”
“Is it though? – I didn’t see shit”
“Which variant of the handball rule are we playing today Scotty?”
“The ‘Deliberate and he has to catch it and it has to be Wednesday’ variant, I think”
“Scotty – if it’s the ‘Hits his arm in an unnatural position’ variant, it’s a penalty”
“Nah – that’s the ‘Big Club at home’ handball rule variant – we’re playing the ‘Not if You’ve Been Shit and Don’t Deserve It’ variant.
“And he is facing the wrong way even if he is waving his arms about like a twat”
“What would Big Mike Dean give in this scenario – 93^rd minute, 2-1 down?”
“Dunno Scotty, Mikey loves a bit of last minute action – makes it all about him”
“True, but he hates those soft Southern Bastards more and besides, I’m not making this game any fucking longer – I’m not being responsible for Roy missing his Horlicks”

No penalty, the end. In a word - dog shit. That might be two words.

Piss poor performance and only losing 2-1 actually flattered us. We were fucking dreadful from the moment that Elyounoussi chance was headed off the line.  Watford played within the rules if not the spirit of the game and got the job done with maximum shithousing but who can blame them when their survival is at stake.  Until referees start booking players early for time-wasting and every time the ball is kicked away, it will never change.  However, shithousing is not the reason we lost.  Giving away shit goals is the main reason – without those they wouldn’t have been able to shithouse it.  The first goal is just hilarious.  Try to give a goal away, get lucky, have another go, succeed.

There are other reasons of course - let’s start with the team selection. After the game against Newcastle and mid-week, I don’t think anyone would’ve been surprised if Adam Armstrong had started ahead of Armando.  Starting Will Smallbone was an absolute leap of faith, based on something that’s obviously been seen on the training ground.  Also, it meant we were playing with one less striker than usual against one of the worst sides in the league at home. His selection meant that we couldn’t press very well because we only have one striker and Che Adams is not suited to play upfront on his own because he always wants to go and run the channels which of course means, there is absolutely no one in the box. The halftime substitution of Smallbone might have seemed harsh in some regards because it wasn’t really his fault but to be honest, we should’ve put on a proper striker from the moment we went behind because it was pretty obvious we were going to need every single bit of attacking strength to get back into the game at that point with Watford prepared to just sit deep.

We’ve tried Will as a number six and it doesn’t work. We’ve tried him as a central number 10 like today and that doesn’t work either. The reason it doesn’t work is because he is too lightweight and looks like he’s going to snap any time there is any sort of physical challenge. This inevitably means that he loses the ball. Today, he chased around a lot but barely had a touch.  He’s JWP pre-Ralph where you can see there’s a player in there but he has to nail down one position and keep to it.  He has to toughen up.  In my opinion he’s a wide player who should be looking to take over from Stuart Armstrong one day or targeting a place on the other side to Stuart where none of Elyounoussi, Redmond, Djenepo, Walcott or Tella have really nailed it down.

Elyounoussi put in the kind of performance that gets you in Garth Crooks team of the week despite being pretty shite.  Scored one, nearly scored another and other than that, constantly gave the ball away.  He’s the best of a bad bunch of wide Number 10s that we have, all miles behind Stuart Armstrong.

We’ve course played straight into Watford’s hands by not getting our press right and leaving ourselves way too open to the counter-attack. Their second goal was another disaster class of people watching and marking space but Watford also managed to butcher two more clear chances. The fact that we got in at half-time only to one down was an absolute gift.

In the second half with a conventional formation, we showed small signs but ultimately didn’t play with enough urgency to break down the packed defence for the second time in a week. There were a few playing with urgency like KWP and Armstrong in the second half but the general play was too narrow and we kept funnelling into the defenders. Even with the natural width on the left hand side we just kept coming inside. Two games in a row where we tried to tiptoe our way through a packed defence in central areas and it just hasn’t worked. We had a couple of late chances and the penalty shout but nowhere near enough in that second half.

A few will complain that we didn’t get a penalty when the ball hit Kabasele. There have been a few interpretations of the handball rule over the last couple years which means that it would’ve been a penalty. His arms are in an unnatural position but he has his back to where the ball is headed from from very close range so there’s no way it could be deemed to be deliberate. I feel that he if he was facing towards the ball then it would’ve been given but I don’t really see any grounds for complaining about that not been given. As I said, if we had equalised, we would not of deserved it.

We Never Get A Last Minute Handball against Watford

This feels worse than Newcastle because we didn’t learn any of the lessons from Newcastle which was only four days ago. The worrying thing is we’ve gone from playing like Europa League qualifying side to playing like a relegation side all the space of a couple of weeks. Players that were playing brilliantly a couple of weeks ago are now painfully average. Romeu and JWP have shown the biggest drop off and for the second game in a week, the midfield barely won a second ball.  We looked like a very well oiled machine a few weeks ago with everyone knowing what they were doing. Today, the automatism's as Ralph calls them looked very laboured. We didn’t seem to know when to press, we didn’t seem to know when to pass the ball, when to make third man runs, when to compress the formation when to spring it wide.  The gaps between the lines looked too big to me.  Is it a fitness issue or did we all start believing our own hype and thought we only had to turn up today?

A side issue - the half-time DJ thought it would be funny today to play songs relating to going down, clearly aimed at Watford. I’ve got an idea for you mate, if we are fucking losing to the team that you are about to ridicule with your song selections, play something different. I thought that both the West Ham and Newcastle selections were fine for different reasons and I’m all up for a laugh but today’s selection and reasons for it just made us look like dicks. If we had been winning then it would’ve just been unnecessarily goading but as we were losing and playing terribly, we are basically making just twats of ourselves. That’s the thing, the Watford fans were chanting “We’ve got the ball“ every time they had it in the first half along with regular renditions of “We're fucking shit“. They were still far too good for us and in that first half, should’ve been three or four nil ahead.

Next up is Manchester City in the FA Cup quarter-final. The key to that game will of course be staying in it until half-time and if we defend like we did today, we will have absolutely no fucking chance. Up the fucking Saints

Premier League Match 28 - Southampton 1 Newcastle 2

Che Tries to Break the Crossbar

To tell the story of this game, we have to go back to New Year, when of course, this game was postponed. I wrote this as a preview for that game and it of course went unused. Might as well use it now.

December 2021

Most of the build up to the Newcastle game has been centred around whether the game will actually go ahead or not with Newcastle crying about not having enough players available to fulfil the fixture. This is of course complete bullshit. There is a clear and obvious advantage to Newcastle potentially being able to call the game off with the transfer window about to open and them having billions of pounds to spend.

They don’t make the rules of course, but it certainly doesn’t help that Eddie Howe starts bleating about getting game is called off as soon as his two best players, Wilson and St Maximin get injured.  As a football manager, your default reaction to a couple of injuries is to be thinking about who you can play where in the next game, but Howe had clearly given thought to getting the game called off beforehand.

How the fuck can they say they haven’t got enough players when they have 25 senior players and 47 under 21s registered with the Premier League? Glad I don’t live in Newcastle because the Covid rates are there must be horrendous.  Absolute bullshit

Fast forward a few days….

The Premier League have called the game off and then said that they are frustrated because they don’t have specific information.   Anyone would think it wasn't their league with their rules!  If the Premier League are saying that they don’t have information then of course, they won’t be able to implement any restrictions on who these teams can pick in the return game.

“We’d like to call the Southampton game off please”
“Can you tell me how many players are missing because of Covid?“
“No but if you add those to the number of injuries we’ve now got, we can’t raise a team”
“Okay then, permission granted”

There is no way that is anyone who is injured for non-Covid reasons should be allowed to play. What happened to integrity of the competition? Saints rested Armando Broja against Spurs because we wanted him to play against Newcastle. We put Shane Long in the team. We took Broja and Tella off against Crystal Palace because we thought we were playing Brentford in three days time. Where is the fairness? Does anyone care?  No.

As we know on the South Coast, Eddie Howe has always been a depressive whinger when things are not going his way. When you turned on Radio Solent on the way home after a game and Bournemouth had lost, it was like listening to a person it was about to jump off the Itchen Bridge. Every time, I wanted to call the Samaritans to put him on suicide watch.

Saints are quite rightly casting the memories back to playing Manchester United last season when we lost rather heavily. Kayne Ramsey and Alex Jankewitz were making their full debuts and we had people like Will Ferry and Allen Tchaptchet on the bench, who had never played a minute of Premier League football. We also had two goalkeepers on the bench. We got on with it, we played, we took our medicine and thanks to a stupid tackle in the first minute and the Mike Dean going in dry, we got beat 9-0, again.

We’ve had two called off now, Brentford and Newcastle. In and around those games, Brentford have been happy to play against Manchester City with a patched up team and Newcastle were happy to play against Manchester United. It’s almost as if they knew they were unlikely to get anything out of those games anyway but a game against Southampton Is a better chance of three points so we want our strongest side out to play that one”

Today…

And here we are with the rearranged fixture - unlike Brentford, which was rearranged with a few weeks of the original date, this game has been left for a couple of months.   In that time, Newcastle have signed a load of players and are a much better side now and no longer in the bottom three.  None of the new arrivals are players that particularly get the pulse racing but they are considerably better than what they had before, which is all that matters.  Where I have to give whingeing Eddie credit, is that a lot of the players that were there before are now playing a lot better and they were under Steve Bruce, in particular Joelinton, Ryan Fraser and Jonjo Shelvey. The additions of Kieran Trippier, Dan Burn, Matt Targett, Bruno Guimaraes and Chris Wood have done the job they were brought in to do. It’s easy to spend money unwisely (see “Everton” for details) so Newcastle have to be congratulated for what they have done since January.

Saints are coming off the back of the 4-0 gubbing we got off of Aston Villa on Saturday, so in an ideal world, this will be the game to get us back on track. There hasn’t been a lot of news out of St Mary’s since the Villa game, other than it looks like Mohammed Salisu’s injury is not that serious and he’s been back in training.

Personally, I’ve only gone and caught Covid for the first time so I won’t be in the crowd tonight.  I was fine for the original date.  Ironic isn’t it?

To the teams and Saints are back to full strength with Tino being preferred to Romain as the second full-back. Newcastle have a few missing with St. Maximin being the obvious one that I’m pleased is not there.  It’s an even opening to the game with not a lot happening until Romeu gets his head up and pings a ball over the defence to put Broja clean through. However, it needed an instant touch for it to be a decent chance and the subsequent poor touch meant Dubravka could save relatively easily. The resulting corner is headed away by the giant Burn and Oriol Romeu shows that Norwich is not the new normal, by lashing it into the travelling Newcastle fans.

Saints and begin to take over as a half moves on and Jonjo Shelvey gets caught in midfield by Romeu. The ball moves on to Che Adams, who again, plays in Broja in the inside right channel but once again, he takes a poor touch and lashes over the bar as Dubravka closes him down.

No matter as we carry on being on the front foot and eventually KWP gets the ball down the left, cuts back in and crosses to the back stick with his right foot, where Elyounoussi competes with Targett and knocks the ball across and there is Stuart Armstrong right in front of the goal to flick his magnificent hair at it and the ball hits Dan Burn and bobbles into the net.  Get in, 1-0.

Newcastle don’t respond particularly well but we switch off and allow them to walk the ball at the left-hand side under no pressure and there is still no pressure as the ball gets rolled back to Shelvey who takes a touch and has time to pour himself a pint, drink it, go home, have a bath, put his kit back on, look up and cross it into the box to where Chris Wood has lost Salisu and plants an easy header into the net. Fucks sake. What a shit goal.  Easy to point the finger at the defender who lost his man and that’s part of it for sure but the lack of pressure on the ball during the entire move was shocking.

No Goal for 6 Months, No Problem

Saints do the best to try and make this just a blip with another mistake in the Newcastle defence presents the ball to Stuart Armstrong and it eventually goes out to Tino on the right hand side.  His low cross it’s cleared up in the air and when it comes down, Che Adams unleashes the volleyed Thunderbastard but unfortunately it smashes off the bar and bounces out.

Newcastle remind us that they’re still here in the last minute of the half as Bruno Guimaeres is again given time to knock over across from the right wing this time and Joe Willock arrives unmarked on the back stick but heads well over.

Half-time and a game most definitely still there to be won.

I very much doubt the halftime team talk had anything to do with defending like a team of Under 10s but that’s what we are doing and we are all over the place as Jacob Murphy shoots and it hits Elyounoussi and deflects over. Matt Targett swings in the corner from the right hand side, Burn loses Livramento at the back post and heads down and despite facing the wrong way, Guimaraes manages to backheel/mule kick the ball into the net giving Fraser no chance at all. Fucks sake.

In the five minutes after the goal, we carry on defending shambolically and there are shots pinging in from all over the place which we are thankfully alert enough to block, which keeps us in the game.

Newcastle are now defending really deep and we really don’t look like we have a clue. There seems to be a lack of movement up front and if Armstrong doesn’t create anything, it doesn’t look like anyone will. There seems to be a lack of energy apart from the aforementioned Armstrong and KWP. The first substitution arrives with the disappointing Armando being replaced by Adam Armstrong.

We kind of create a chance after that with JWP finding Tino on the right wing but in all honesty, it’s a poor cross that Dubravka has to tip over the bar, rather than an effort deliberately fired at the goal.

Another substitution with Shane Long coming on for Romeu which kind of means were playing 433 but there doesn’t seem to be any width with KWP coming in on his good foot every time and Tino seemingly reluctant to take anybody on. KWP does get a cross in with his right foot following a half cleared corner and there is Salisu getting up for a header but it comes off his shoulder a little bit and bounces down which allows Debravka to scramble the ball away.

The one final substitution is Make-A-Wish Kid time, with Djenepo coming on for Elyounoussi. Needless to say it doesn’t produce anything and the one chance during injury time is when Stuart Armstrong cuts in from the right hand side and has a left footed dig from the edge of the penalty area which unfortunately is too central and Dubravka tips over.  The End.  Shit… but only our second home defeat of the season.

Well that was grim. I have a bit of an irrational hatred for Eddie Howe and his little pet dog Jason Tindall. However, they’ve done us today.  Standard Howe tactics today – timewasting in the extreme from the first half.  Fuck me, how many times was Schar on the floor, only to get up time and time again to complete the game.  To think that we got criticised for the energy drink break a few weeks ago.

I don’t often do sour grapes but I’m going to do it today. With all the shithousery that went on over the original postponement from Newcastle’s side, it was absolutely inevitable that they would prosper today. There is irony all over the place in that the goals were scored by two players who weren’t on their books when the original game was supposed to be played. It’s also amusing in some way, that on a day when Roman Abramovich and all his dirty money got sanctioned and Chelsea were plunged into turmoil, Newcastle, funded with a money from a very dodgy regime, come to town and beat us. Ironic too that Amanda Staveley was in the crowd as well, after saying in the week that she felt sorry for Roman Abramovich.   All Newcastle have done though is played the system - the Premier League should’ve done something when these dodgy owners came to the table and the Premier League should’ve done something about the blatant chicanery that went on around the Covid postponements. They never do though because they don’t care about integrity, so we’ve just got get on with it.

Forgetting all that though, as for the game on the pitch, we were shocking and probably deserved to lose despite Newcastle only really having two efforts on goal.  The second half as a real return to the bad old days when a team sat back against us and we would have absolutely no clue how to break them down. When a team sits deep, you need to go round the defence or over it.  Trying to pick your way through is definitely the most difficult option. We couldn’t go round it because we didn’t make the pitch wide enough because we didn’t have any natural width on the left hand side where we had two right footed players.  KWP was our best player today by considerable distance but he would have been better on the other side. On the other side, Tino Livramento barely ran at Matt Targett once and the obvious substitution was to bring Perraud on and switch KWP to the right but instead of that we brought on Moussa Djenepo for reasons that only Ralph knows. We ended the game with a narrow 4-3-3 formation which played completely into Newcastle’s hands.  For their part, they defended well and managed the game well in what they will see as a textbook away performance, especially in the second half.

Elsewhere, JWP and Romeu struggled to get to grips with Shelvey and Guimaraes in midfield and when they did when we were to one down, the creative limitations were there for all to see which is why Romeu got taken off in the end. However, you can only be creative and pass the ball forward, if your strikers are on it.

Not a Good Day for Chelsea

Whilst Che Adams had a good first half, he disappeared somewhat in the second and Armando Broja, sadly, barely got out of the changing room. Elyounoussi and Armstrong both tried hard to create something but nothing really came off and from about the 70th minute, the two of them were mostly just giving the ball away every time they tried to do anything progressive.  Of the subs, Djenepo and Long didn’t do anything but Adam Armstrong at least added some energy.

The two Newcastle goals were both shite from a defensive point of view. There was absolutely no pressure on the ball when Jonjo Shelvey had about 20 minutes to weigh up his cross on to Chris Wood’s head.  Salisu should probably have done better as well.  The second goal was just a lack of reaction to a second ball. Great finish but we should’ve had a man putting his foot through Burn’s knockdown.  Ralph’s main focus at full time was on us not being clinical with our chances.  I reckon he was looking at the two that Broja missed in the fist half through poor touches.  For me, in the second half in particular, we just didn’t create enough.

In response to our DJ playing money related tunes at half-time, Newcastle hit back with posting a team photograph from the changing room after the game, which is right up there with the most tinpot things you can do after a league game.  Also, a tweet about the impact of their new signings tonight, is another dig which we just have to take and fair play.  As I’ve said, make the most of the upsurge you’re on at the moment bceause you’ll get yours - don’t know when and it might take years but it will happen.

No time to dwell on it because on Sunday, we have got Watford who are generally looking like they are going to fighting it our with Norwich for last place.  Since our “We are Fucking Massive” moment after the West Ham FA Cup game, we have lost twice, with two poor performances.  This is they way it always is for teams like us.  We shouldn’t be surprised.

Premier League Match 27 - Aston Villa 4 Southampton 0

 

Fraser Makes His 75th Save of the Game

Saints go to Villa Park today to take on Champions League chasing Aston Villa. Villa, managed by Villa fan Dean Smith and inspired by summer signing Danny Ings, have already won the Carabao Cup this season and are through to the 6th Round of the FA Cup and have been in and around the top for all season.

Hang on a minute, I’ll get out of the time machine that transported me back to August 2021 and deal with the reality.

Saints go to Villa Park to take on underachieving Aston Villa. Villa, managed by Steven Gerrard, who replaced Dean Smith after he’d lost 5 in a row, culminating with a defeat away at today’s opponents Southampton.  In truth, they don’t have a lot to play for this season. Summer signing Danny Ings has not provided the goals that were needed for them to do any better than they did last year.

There was an initial new manager bounce under Steven Gerrard, helped by the transfer window in which they signed Philippe Coutinho who of course was a brilliant player at Liverpool, when Gerrard was still playing.  That was a while ago now and since then Coutinho has largely been a fringe player at Barcelona and out on loan at Bayern Munich. Villa have looked decent in some games when the likes of Emi Buendia, Coutinho or Ollie Watkins have shone, but basically they’ve been very inconsistent, hence their lower mid-table league position. If Saints manage to finish above them this season, it would send another message to members of our current squad that the grass is not always greener in terms of football, even though the bank account will be considerably greener. It’s the age-old question? Do you want to be the best player you can be or do you want to be the richest player you can be?

Martin Semmens gave an interview recently where he talked about succession planning for when Ralph moves on and he mentioned that one of the managers they would’ve been looking at he is newly into the Premier League and probably out of our reach now. Basically, that fell down to a choice of three between Frank Lampard, Thomas Frank and Steven Gerrard.  I don’t think that Thomas Frank would be out of our reach and neither Lampard or Gerard will be employed by the current clubs if they don’t turn around the massive underachievement going on at Everton and Aston Villa respectively.

After the remarkable win against West Ham in mid-week, there are a couple of question marks against the fitness of KWP and Mohamed Salisu, out of the players who have been in the Premier League starting 11 recently. It transpired that neither were playing today so Jack Stephens steps in and KWP has been left on the bench with Perraud starting. Gerrard has obviously got a few problems of his own because Villa’s back four looks incredibly ropey with Matty Handball Cash, Tyrone Mings, Ashley Young and Calum fucking Chambers in the line-up.  I’ve said all I’ve got to say about Calum Chambers to be honest but how on earth he has got a move to another semi-decent club where he’s mostly going to be a substitute is absolutely beyond me. Ashley Young’s presence means that little shit Lucas Digne is not around. Little shit he might be but he is a threat going forward. Danny Ings has chosen this game not to be injured and he partners Ollie Watkins who has been suffering from second season syndrome. Nothing to fear in that Villa line-up. If we play well, we have a real chance and the thought of Armando and Che against that back four is an appetising one.

We make a decent start without creating anything but it’s an even game with neither side creating anything.  On 9 minutes Villa decide to create something and shit.  Ings comes short away from Bednarek who doesn’t go with him and plays the ball round the corner in to Watkins, who turns past Stephens who over-commits himself.  Watkins is left with a simple task to clip it past Forster into the net. Great fucking start and the first examination of our Salisu-free centre back pairing ends with us 1-0 down.

Saints respond in decent fashion and create a chance as Broja nicks the ball off of the dopey Mings, bursts past Mings and Young before pulling it back to Armstrong, who makes space for himself, before curling a left-footed effort about a foot wide of the far post.  Would have been nice to have an instant response but not to be.  It’s a sign that we can get at Villa’s somewhat makeshift defence as well though.

Any decent attacking play is going to be made irrelevant by our defending when not in possession if we don’t sort it out.  We are all over the place defensively.  I mean absolutely fucking wide open and it’s so easy for Villa to get to the edge of our box and still be in possession.  A clearance from the back goes to Watkins who walks off of Stephens, who isn’t tight enough and therefore making it easy for him.  Watkins finds Coutinho-Unmarked who has lost Romeu, picks up the return pass and he’s clean through again.  This time, Fraser sticks out of big size 15 and blocks the shot. We are getting absolutely nowhere near them in midfield or in defence when they’ve got the ball.  

Saints are still a threat though, with Armstrong having a shot blocked from a central position and via Romeu, the ball finds its way out to Tino on the right.  A first time cross into a good are and Adams climbs to reach it but can only head it on the stretch, over Martinez and narrowly over the bar.

If you compare how dangerous each side looks when they attack, Villa look the much more threatening though and as if to emphasise the point, Cash gets to the line really easily, the cross is half cleared to the Coutinho-Unmarked, who absolutely lashes it and it only goes about a foot wide of the far post.

Seconds later and Watkins easily spins past Livramento and Fraser is called into action again to block Coutinho’s shot, which is from 10 yards, completely unmarked.  Any hope of getting to half time just the one down and being able to change things then goes to shit and the final piss-take of the half is that when the inevitable second goal does actually come, it’s courtesy of the vision of Calum fucking Chambers as he plays a ridiculous ball over the Saints defence with the outside of his right foot to meet the run of Coutinho-Unmarked at the back post.  He slides it across where Douglas Luiz cannot miss. We look for the linesman‘s flag and there isn’t one and then we hope that VAR will save us but it doesn’t. 2-0 and no more than Villa deserve.

With just a couple of minutes to go to half time, we try and throw in another one.  Long ball, Watkins easily wins a header against Bednarek, flicks it on and there is no covering player and Coutinho-Unmarked is clean through against Fraser.  I shut my eyes and wait for the inevitable but somehow he puts it wide with our centre-backs breathing from 10 yards away clearly putting him off.

Half time. What a load of shit that was.  Ralph has to do something, so decides that the anonymous Elyounoussi should be removed and replaced with Yan Valery. This of course means us going to three at the back with Perraud and Livramento pushed up the wings. It will be interesting to see with this gives us anymore of a foothold in the game.  Get one back and we may well have a chance.

Needless to say, it didn’t fucking happen as virtually from Villa’s first attack they win a free kick out on the right, we half clear the ball in amongst McGinn having his usual dive but it finds Coutinho in the middle of the penalty area and he works himself an opening before crashing it through a forest of legs to make it 3-0. Game over. Fuck off.

Can it get worse? Oh yes it surely can – Ings hasn’t scored yet.  Another fluent passing move without us getting near them sees him crash a shot which is well saved by Fraser but a few minutes later, Cash gets to the by-line totally unhindered by anyone and pulls it back. Bednarek is ball watching not marking anybody and he’s not alone but Danny Ings is all alone and meets it first time to side foot it past Forster. A typical finish by Ings. To be fair, he doesn’t celebrate too much which is small consolation for the fact that we are getting absolutely smashed here.  We have 4 players nearby – a square of Bednarek, Stephens, Romeu and JWP and Ings is stood in the middle of them, in loads of space – Dogshit.

There is a chance to make it 4-1 with Che Adams fastening onto Livramento’s lovely through ball but as he comes in on the angle towards Martinez, he does the right thing and smashes it across him but Martinez gets a glove on it and it loops up and over the bar. We are never going to score today.

For the last 25 minutes nothing really happens.  Villa are content to keep us passing the ball around in front of them and we haven’t got it in us to create anything.  There’s a bit of an issue with Broja and Young which looks like nothing and it all gets a bit fractious but that’s just frustration from us because we’ve been shit.  Fraser has to get off his line sharply to prevent another certain goal from Buendia and that’s it.  Crap.

Well, what a wet fart of a performance that was. Outplayed, outfought and outworked. It is very rare that happens with us so we have to write it off as a bad day at the office.  Timid, passive, bollocks.

It wasn’t just the defence that was bad, but your defence sets the tone for the rest of the team. The partnership between Stephens and Bednarek never works and didn’t work today. The last time we played it was in the 3-0 defeat at Arsenal.  Both of them are too passive and with Salisu missing, we had no defending on the front foot. Bednarek seems to take his cue from his centre back partner.  When Salisu plays, Bednarek defends aggressively and gets tight to strikers.  When Stephens plays, instead of leading the way, he copies Stephens and plays on the back foot.  So, we stood off and allowed Villa to pass the ball into the feet of the strikers and cause us endless problems. The amount of times that Ings dropped deep into a space and absolutely no one went with him was ridiculous in that first half. The problems were added to by the fact that both Romeu and JWP had an off day and were largely bypassed in that first half, neither of them getting close to Coutinho-Unmarked who basically ran the game.  Sure, he’s a great player and great at finding space but we didn’t lay a tackle on him all game.  Nor did we lay a tackle on the snake Ings.  If I'm a centre back playing against an injury prone striker who used to play for us - I'm putting a tackle in - not Stephens or Bednarek though.

Coutinho-Unmarked.  Saints Players Out of Shot

Neither Armstrong or Elyounoussi had any impact in a defensive sense either and we just looked like we were going to concede every time Villa had the ball. The fact that we didn’t was down to the goalkeeper with Fraser Forster standing tall whilst everybody else fell away. It could’ve been 4-0 at half-time and there won’t be anyone out there who doesn’t think that Fraser was our best player, keeping the score down to a respectable level.  If we have a better goalkeeper lined up to be No 1 next season, he's going to have to be amazing.

The much-anticipated duel between their defence and our attack was a damp squib.  Adams worked hard for no reward and Broja had one of those games where he just wasn’t involved.  Nothing Stuart Armstrong tried really worked, though he was unlucky with that left footed effort in the first half that went narrowly wide.  Elyounoussi was anonymous and it was no surprise that he was hooked at half time.

Without naming players individually, Ralph seemed to be coming to the same conclusion that I did that there “was a problem with the duels in the back line in the first half”.  That points directly at the central defenders. If Salisu is missing for any further games then another solution has to be found.  Yan Valery has not been trusted to start a Premier League game as yet but he is more aggressive into the tackle than the two who played today so maybe that will be the way we go.  That will probably give us more problems aerially from set pieces and the like but with Lyanco still miles away from being fit, we need to hope that Salisu will be back soon.  In an ideal world, he be back for the rearranged game against Newcastle on Thursday night.  It’s a game that we need to win to get back on track and also because of the stunt Newcastle pulled to get the game called off on the original date. Predictably, they have been a lot better since the transfer window so that is going to be a much tougher game than it would’ve been back in December.  It is what it is though.

As for Villa, they were decent it has to be said and Gerrard got his tactics right and gave us problems. To be honest, I don’t think it would’ve mattered what tactics were employed against us today as we were just not on it, but credit where it’s due. Calum Chambers played a major part in one of the Villa goals and Danny Ings got a goal. It truly was one of those days.

The unbeaten run was always going to come to an end at some point and in some ways, it’s not surprising that we got a bit of a stuffing. We have to respond to this in the same way we responded to the Wolves defeat and start another run, which we are perfectly capable of if we get back to doing the good things that we’ve been doing the last few weeks.  It was nice to be able to strut around for a couple of days shouting “we are fucking massive“.  Maybe the players believed it a bit as well.  As we all know, we are not fucking massive and we will have days like this occasionally.