EFL Championship Match 8 - Middlesbrough 2 Southampton 1

Right Lads, Now We're in Front, Let's Do Nothing

A long trip to Teeside and the Riverside Stadium for a game against Michael Carrick‘s bottom of the table Middlesbrough, who have endured an absolute shithouse of a start to the season, having last year finished in the playoffs. A new season brings new problems however, with the players they had on loan last season not returning and maybe, Carrick had a bit of beginners luck last season in his first full-time managerial role.  Regardless of the why’s and wherefores, Middlesbrough are bottom of the league and should therefore be the sort of team that we should certainly be looking to get back on track against having lost our last three games in pretty dismal fashion.

Boro’s points haul this season stands at two and they are closest to us in terms of conceding goals so surely you would expect us to have enough up front to win this one.  Who can tell though with the current form of Saints and the somewhat random team selections of Russell Martin.

As the team news was announced, all I really wanted to see was things that were obvious being put into place, starting with the back four that finished the game against Ipswich. I also of course want to see a completely different midfield, which we certainly have the opportunity to so today, boosted it as we are by the return of Flynn Downes from injury.

And no…. My wish regarding the back four didn’t happen.  Yes, Jan Bednarek came into the side to partner THB but KWP has switched to the left to bring in Mason Holgate on the right. Ryan Manning had dropped to the bench which on the face of it seems like a right collection of strangeness. The midfield seems to contain Shea Charles, Flynn Downes and Will Smallbone. How the fucking hell Smallbone keeps his place is beyond me but he clearly is going to have all the responsibility for creativity today given that neither Stuart Armstrong or Charlie Alcaraz are starting. There’s another change on the wing with Sam Edozie left out to accommodate Adam Armstrong, who of course has to play somewhere, so it’s Arma on one wing and Ryan Fraser on the other. Not convinced by that I have to say and I would guess that this is another lineup that absolutely no one else would’ve picked.

Middlesbrough look understandably edgy at the start of the game and give the ball away in midfield too Smallbone who looks up and sends Adams running thorough and he does exactly the right thing in taking it early from 35 yards before the keeper gets set, but this time he passes it just wide of the post which makes a change I suppose from smacking it straight at the goalkeeper. Really should’ve scored however.

Smallbone’s positive start of the game continues with a good ball out to Adam Armstrong who takes it down well and then forgets that he is very unlikely to bend in the top corner with his left foot and puts it miles over the bar.

So it’s good-ish start and it continues with Downes picking up the ball in midfield on the left-hand side after some decent pressing and playing it forward to Che’s feet and he turns and plays a great ball in between the defenders to pick up Armstrong who is coming off the right hand side and he takes a touch and smacks in the near post.  Get in.  That’s the blueprint… win it, pass it forwards quickly, goal.  That’s the fucking way to do it.

Having shown everyone the way to do it, we then show the way not to fucking do it as KWP sells Charles an absolute pup in the centre of midfield and he gets tackled and away come Boro with Coburn, who knocks forward and finds Jones who slides it across goal and it evades Baz and has just too much on it for the player sliding in at the back post. Somewhat fortunate to get away with that one.

The early ball up to Coburn is suddenly causing us all sorts of problems in defence and another one is dealt with by Harwood-Bellis who gets the ball to Holgate who has not seen the Boro player behind him, who slides in and knocks the ball to McGree about 30 yards out and he takes a touch and smashes it through Bednarek‘s legs which means that Baz sees it late as it fizzes into the corner.  What happened to keeping possession and stifling the game?  Two minutes to half-time and more great game management. Fuck off.

Mason's Loan Spell Is Not Going Well

Half time and Holgate, like Edozie against Leicester is the fall guy and is replaced by Manning.   Saints should obviously be looking to impose themselves on Boro again at the start of the second half but we appear to be overcommitting, especially in the wide areas and when we give the ball away, one ball forward causes all sorts of carnage and we are fortunate when a Boro break ends with Jones putting a weak short straight to Baz. Straight away I’m wondering whether we have a left back on the pitch, watching on as Manning is, from the half way line.

Again we look vulnerable to the most basic play with Smallbone giving the ball away midfield, the subsequent boot forward being headed down by Harwood-Bellis and no one in midfield reacting to the loose ball, giving Boro another opportunity which McGree smashes straight at Baz again. So simple, just reacting to second balls.

Saints to try their patient sideways and backwards build up on the halfway line until Charles has no options and gets tackled and the ball finds it so I quickly out to Jones on the right for Middlesbrough and his cross into the box is behind Coburn who tangles with Harwood-Bellis and hits the deck, penalty.  There was absolutely no danger from that ball into the box but we’ve managed to give a penalty away for fuck‘s sake. Up steps Jonny Howson to pass into the net to send Baz the wrong way. Wankers.

Now we’re behind it time for the cavalry to come on with Sulemana, Edozie and Stuart Armstrong on for Charles, Adams and Fraser.  Now having to play with a bit more urgency, Manning lashes one wide from the edge of the box having been set up by Stuart Armstrong.

We win a corner and the crowd get excited but Boro’s nerves are settled by us passing the ball back towards the halfway line and then Downes plays a turd of an underhit pass to Stuart Armstrong in midfield with all our players ahead of the ball and Cockburn runs through and smashes it at Baz who manages to get it up and over the bar.

More desperation and another shocker in midfield by THB allowing the ball to bounce and Boro send Jones away on the right.  He finds Coburn who is this time slides it across to McGree who hits the post.  How the fucking hell are we still in this.  Usually you’d think Boro would pay for missing chances.

Aribo is on for Smallbone, showing once more that he’s ahead of Charly Alcaraz in the pecking order and he features in the next chance as KWP chips the ball in to Stuart Armstrong, who brings it down really well before burrowing into the penalty area and teeing up Aribo on the edge of the box but Slow Joe takes a horrendous touch and has to knock it on one further to Edozie, who takes a step inside and curls one towards the top corner but the keeper Dieng, gets up to flip it over the bar well.  The end and even with the most positive, biased goggles on, we deserved to lose and were outplayed pretty much by the team bottom of the league.

Yes Russ, You Lost to Michael Carrick

Well that was right up there with some more embarrassing defeats that we’ve had over the past few seasons. Going to a team that hasn’t won at all and has hardly scored a goal and we manage to cough up enough chances for them to have scored six. In all honesty, we were lucky to only lose by one.  To be fair to Russell Martin, he tried to be slightly more pragmatic today with the inclusion of both Downes and Charles in midfield but instead of leaving out Smallbone, he left out Edozie and we were far too sideways and backwards after the opening twenty minutes. Even with people making runs ahead of the ball, they never got it. Saints are not looking to pass the ball forwards enough and you could tell that Boro were just waiting for the lack of movement ahead of the ball and the delay in passing it and using that as their pressing trigger.  I didn’t watch Swansea play last year but it’s obvious that the other teams in the Championship did and they all know what to do against us.

Part of this new way of playing was to be able to control the game which especially comes in handy when you go a goal up in theory.  We were an utter fucking shambles once we went a goal ahead, again showing no management of the situation just before half-time, through some classic doziness by Mason Maitland-Holgate-Niles, we allow the softest of equalisers.  In his defence, he was thrown in to an unfamiliar position which makes no sense when you have James Bree who could have played.  I have a feeling that Martin feels he has to play Holgate when he can to justify having him here when he is clearly the fourth choice in his preferred position at centre back.  Did you know that Middelsbrough's old Ayresome Park ground had an end called The Holgate End?  I wonder if they'll rename the Holgate fuck up end at the Riverside.

There was a few minutes of intent at the start of the second half but then we stopped going forward again and allowed Boro back into the game and from another mistake, this time by THB, we give away a penalty and that was the end of that. THB’s response to have on his own shirt pulled by Boro forward Coburn, was to pull his shirt back and throw him on the floor.  Not exactly the most intelligent response.  He got absolutely played by the Boro forward who of course then made the most of the retaliatory pull.

Desperation substitutes were made in the last 20 minutes with Stuart Armstrong again making a difference when he was introduced, far too late yet again. Like with the Ipswich game, I really want to like Russell Martin but some of this is absolutely mind blowing and I can’t support it.  Joe Aribo as a final roll of the dice with 10 minutes to go when Charly Alcaraz is sat on the bench, is just fucking stupid.  He attempted to explain it afterwards, muttering something about Charly not being fully on board with the way we want to play, which seems basically to be a thinly veiled dig at the fact that he doesn’t understand English particularly well. You could well argue that not fully understanding the way Russell Martin wants his team to play would actually do some of the players a favour. There was more word salad regarding the fact that we were too passive once we scored a goal and didn’t handle a good moment well.  Against Ipswich it was that we didn’t handle bad moments well. Pretty impressive to have a team but can’t handle any positive or negative incident? One thing we certainly can’t handle is the last five minutes before half-time where twice in the last three games we’ve had an acceptable scoreline just before half-time and maybe the players were thinking about the segments of half-time oranges when we conceded crap goals just before the break.

Today was just weird. The selection of Mason Holgate ahead of Ryan Manning destabilised the back four that looked half decent in the second half against Ipswich. Even with the most defensive midfield structure that we could muster, we still gave Middlesbrough enough chances to score about six.  If he had picked Flynn Downes and Shea Charles with an attacking midfielder like Alcaraz or Stuart Armstrong, then I would’ve understood what he was trying to do but he left all the creativity in the hands of Will Smallbone who, unpopular opinion this may be, is not good enough to carry that burden from twenty minutes onwards today, doesn’t look to pass the ball forwards unless it’s almost a last resort.

Sam Edozie has been our best winger all season but he gets left out to accommodate Ryan Fraser and Adam Armstrong and though Armstrong scored and it was a good finish, you can’t tell me that that really worked, given the complete lack of cover he gave Holgate in that first half. Once Edozie came on for the last quarter of an hour, he certainly looked at the most likely to drag our sorry arses back into it.

For me, this was a fantastic opportunity to break the losing run and we fucked it and next up is a much harder opportunity with Leeds United at home and of course their ranks include a certain Joël Piroe, who we should have signed but of course, we didn’t, probably because we have Adam Armstrong to play that hybrid midfield/attacker role. Slow fucking handclap there.

There was very little encouragement given in today’s game to suggest that it will be anything other than a surprise if we’re not looking at the barrel of five defeats in a row after next Saturday.

Up the Fucking Saints.

EFL Championship Match 7 - Southampton 0 Ipswich 1

 

Chapel Arms, 6.45pm

After the shitshow of the last two games, we welcome Ipswich town to St Mary’s and it feels like we are properly getting into the Saturday, Tuesday, Saturday, Tuesday nature of the Championship. This means that basically, you have no chance to dwell on whatever result you got a few days ago.

Ipswich have been doing the tour around the Championship and League One like we did and in fact, the last time we played them in the league was in our Championship promotion season of 2011/12. In that season, we had a very significant 5-2 win at Portman Road earlier on in the season and the return was a midweek game at the business end of the season that saw us pick up a 1-1 draw. Around that time, their manager Paul Jewell had found himself on the front page of the tabloids for starring in his own porn films. It was funny and grim at the same time.

The Ipswich Town of 2023 got promoted out of League 1 last season and have taken that momentum into this campaign under Kieran McKenna and are absolutely flying with five wins out of the first six games. The only defeat was a narrow 4-3 reversal at home to Leeds. All that and our shocking form over the last two games makes this a very difficult assignment.

The question is how will Russell Martin approach it and if the press conference he gave is anything to go by, then we will go about it the same way as we have done every game this season and we just have to hope that we do it better. I think that if people can see that things are improving then there will be no problem but with the expectations that are on the team this season, losing three games in a row or getting hammered like we have done in the last two games, it’s going to see peoples patience wear thin very quickly.

I just hope we don’t give a goal away in the first five minutes and I wouldn’t be against going full Peter Kay mode and belting the kick-off out of the ground with 28,000 home fans shouting “have it“ as the ball disappears off into the River Itchin.

The quick turnaround since Friday means that Flynn Downes is a big doubt for this game through injury so the potentially“stable” defensive midfield of Downes and Charles will have to wait for another time. There was one bit of good news is that Bobby Madley was unsurprisingly, wrong and the red card against Sulemana was rescinded on appeal. This will only actually be good news if Sulemana can actually be bothered. There is no question over his ability, just his attitude and heart.

Hopefully, Jan Bednarek will be fit to add some stability to the back for and this will of course mean Shea Charles moving in the defensive midfield position. In theory, we should be more solid though it would be incredibly fucking difficult for this not to be the case.

So. I’m walking up from Ocean Village and the team news comes in. I stare at my phone and suss out the 11 names and I divert into the Chapel Arms as I need a drink.  What the actual fuck is that?  Having been outrun and outfought against Leicester, particularly in midfield, the one change is to bring in a player who can’t run in Joe Aribo, which leaves us with Will Smallbone as the defensive midfielder.  Amazing.  Other than that, there are no other changes with Bednarek and Holgate on the bench, meaning Shea Charles is at centre back again.

Saints start ok and by that, I mean that we didn’t let in a goal in the opening two minutes.  Progress.  In fact, we had the first meaningful attack with Fraser making a break down the left before turning out rather than crossing on his left foot and knocking it back to Manning. Manning knocks it inside to Captain Arma to hammer a shot at the near post but well wide and the keeper had it covered anyway.

The first Ipswich foray into our half ends in a corner and the ball ends up in the net but there is an attacker quite clearly holding Baz down which the referee mercifully spots.  We win a corner ourselves when an Ipswich defender needlessly passes it behind and once the delivery is nodded away to KWP, his cross back into the mixer sees Charles flick a header narrowly wide.

The Ipswich left-hand side is becoming more noticeable, containing as it does on-loan from Manchester United Brandon Williams and on-loan from Chelsea in Omari Hutchinson. Williams has always been a prick and Hutchinson seems determined to bring down KWP on every occasion that he runs forward which is going unpunished by the referee, who you know that in a few minutes is going to book someone for fuck all. Crosses are coming into our box at regular intervals, due to our tactic of not trying to block them and Williams heads one well over the bar.

THB and KWP and FFS

We try and play out from the back and Shea Charles dawdles and gets tackled by Hutchinson who takes the pass back from Skate Chaplin and fires it past Baz and in off the far post. Fucking fuck off.  And again.  In mitigation, Charles was trying to find a player in midfield and waiting for someone to run but of course, no one did so he should’ve made the decision just to belt it up the pitch.

Five minutes later and we’re at it again with Bazunu knocking the ball into Aribo’s feet but with Joe playing walking football as usual, an Ipswich player nips in and Skate Chaplin chips it over Baz and sees it bounce back off the bar and Hirst slams the rebound wide. Should be 2-0, should be game over. Again though, even though Aribo was in space, there was absolutely no one for him to pass to so it was inevitable once the ball was passed to him that he would lose it.

We are still not learning anything and Charles gets caught on the ball again in the centre of midfield with Hutchison finding Burns on the left hand side but he suddenly thinks he’s got the ability to curl it in with the outside of his boot and shats it wide. How hard have Ipswich had to work for these three chances that they’ve had?  Not very hard.

Half-time and what would Russell Martin do, bearing in mind we have been completely abysmal since we went behind? Against Leicester he just made a like-for-like replacement but today he doesn’t even do that and we got the same 11 ragtag bunch of arseholes out on the pitch for the start of the second half.

With ten minutes gone in the second half, KWP brings the ball forward into midfield and slides a great ball into Che Adams who takes a touch and he has to score but it’s Che we’re talking about and he smashes it straight at the goalkeepers face and it goes for a corner. I wonder if there’s an xHitTheFuckingKeeper stat measuring how difficult it is to hit the goalkeeper from your chance and the amount of times you actually do.  Che would be league leading.

Substitution time now with Aribo, Edozie and Fraser being replaced with Bednarek, Sulemana and Stuart Armstrong. This means that Charles has gone into midfield and Smallbone has pushed forward. There is no immediate effect though and Ipswich have another chance with Skate Chaplin trying a volley from the edge of the box which Baz gets down to save easily enough.

Adams gets put away by a bad pass from Ipswich and sets up Smallbone on the edge of the box but his shot has absolutely no conviction and we are fortunate to win a corner off it. Manning’s delivery ends up at the back post with Sulemana and he gets a low cross in which finds Adam Armstrong but with a first time shot needed, he tries to control it with both his shins and so the chance goes.

Smallbone’s put out of his misery with Alcaraz coming on as we get to the last 10 minutes and more in hope than expectation, Manning tries a pot-shot from a long way out which the keeper pushes wide easily enough.

There’s just doesn’t seem to be enough urgency about us, though Alcaraz and Stuart Armstrong have certainly been a positive change and Alcaraz slots are lovely ball inside the fullback for Sulemana to run onto... down he goes and it’s given offside before we can start howling for the Ipswich player to be sent off.  As time ticks by we are getting more and more desperate and Stuart Armstrong puts in a cross from the right which Alcaraz heads over and that is going to be that.

Well there you have it. What an absolute pile of shit again. It was a different strain of shit from the Leicester game but it was still shit nonetheless.

... with Will and Joe

Who could’ve predicted that the worst midfield three ever named in Southampton FC history would be absolute garbage?  Featuring as it did, three players who should not be near the starting 11. We persevered with those three in midfield for far too long. They eventually all got substituted but far too late. At least two of them should’ve been gone at half-time because we were going to need all of the last 45 minutes to manufacture something but then in truth, we probably could’ve played all night and not scored. It was so bad that Joe Aribo was probably the best of three as at least he started the game well until Ipswich scored and then he went to pieces. Smallbone showed his lack of pace, lack of defensive awareness and lack of tackling before moving further forward where he was almost as inept but he stayed on the pitch whilst Charly Alcaraz was on the bench. Adam Armstrong was dreadful in midfield and on both wings and when he should’ve been in midfield he spent time being dreadful upfront as well. He shouldn’t be in the team but will be because Martin has elevated him to captain. His record as captain is 100%, played three, lost three.

Of the forwards, Che Adams should be bossing this division and being the big dog but he is doing fuck all apart from hitting the goalkeeper yet again, with the one chance that he gets. On the wings, Sam Edozie, easily our best wide player, has been moved to his less favoured right side to accommodate Ryan Fraser who has done absolutely fuck all in the last two matches and Sulemana managed to not get sent off this time but was absolute garbage. There is no way he should be above Sam Amo in the pecking order but he is our Nathan Tella replacement so sooner or later, I’m expecting him to start chipping in with the 15 or so goals that Tella would have got this season.

We were better defensively today which is not saying much but we still managed to gift Ipswich three chances through our own carelessness.  What improvement there was, was partly down to Ipswich not creating much on their own and partly down to the defenders staying in position. Both Ryan Manning and KWP had better games and the second half pairing of THB and Bednarek points at better things to come in that regard. Shea Charles had a decent game apart from the goal which again was down to him taking too long to clear the ball and the team looked a lot more structured when he moved into midfield, where he of course should have started.

I don’t understand Russell Martin's thinking with that team selection and I don’t understand the inactivity at half-time.  He’s a very likeable guy but you will get no patience from anybody if you make batshit mental selections. There is not a single fan or pundit who would have picked that side that he picked today – not one ... and that causes a perception problem when no one can even see what the fuck you were trying to achieve and it's predictably bad and we get beat.  Though Aribo wasn’t the worst midfielder today, parachuting him in from absolutely nowhere when you have Alcaraz and Stuart Armstrong as options, is unfathomable, as was his selection of Sekou Mara up at Sunderland. It was painfully obvious that that midfield was not going to work and it was painfully obvious that something needed changing at half-time. He literally could’ve taken off all three at half-time and he couldn’t possibly have made the team any worse.

Ok, That Midfield 3 Maybe Wasn't the Best Idea

What the fuck has happened to our attacking play? Where is the movement ahead of the ball that we saw in pre-season? One of the things I’ll remember from this game will be Taylor Harwood-Bellis in possession of the ball looking for someone to pass to and then getting really annoyed when no one presented themselves. He learned the game at Manchester City of course and played for a very fluid, attacking Burnley side last year. He must wonder what the fucking hell he’s got himself into this season.  There was one incident in the first half where he passed it forward, broke the lines and then without even trying to turn out and go forward, Will Smallbone knocked it straight back to him and brought the three Ipswich players that had been taken out of the game, back into it.

You also have to look at the intensity of our play without the ball. Basically, there was none. A common feature in both the Leicester and Ipswich games has been how much quicker the opposition has got to us when we have the ball than the opposite way round. When you pick a midfield three were two of them can’t run and one is miles out of position all the time, what do you expect?

Lack of running power in midfield also extends to tracking runners. When you are in midfield and your opposite number runs past you, you have to sprint back to cover the run that’s been made. Have you ever seen Joe Aribo sprint? Have you ever seen Will Smallbone sprint? Can they even do it?  Do you remember a guy called Jermaine Wright who we, ironically, signed from Ipswich years ago?  I was reminded of him today - midfielders who can't run.

Despite winning six of their first seven games, Ipswich really weren’t anything special and we basically gifted them the three points. The winning goal was scored by Omari Hutchinson and it was a good finish but the most notable thing about his performance was how he managed to commit at least three fouls that should all have been bookings and he didn’t even get one. Twice he scythed down KWP in full flight and once he was literally dragging a shirt off a Saints players’ back after he’d gone past him.  Ipswich and their supporters will see this as the perfect away performance in that they got their goal and then soaked up our very limited threat without too many alarms. Like with Leicester on Friday though, they didn’t really have to do much to get over the line. Just being organised and not making any stupid mistakes was enough but fair play to them.  Should have been 0-0 really but we made the mistake and they didn’t.  Neither team worked the keeper much but once ahead, Ipswich didn’t have to.

So, three defeats in a row including two at home and now we go to bottom team Middlesbrough on Saturday. Patience is wearing thin already and lose that game and it will certainly be in short supply. If Russell Martin puts a proper team out on the pitch and recognizes that the midfield has to be able to run and be defensively disciplined, then we might have a chance.

EFL Championship Match 6 - Southampton 1 Leicester 4

Russ Glares at the Defensive Coach

Leicester City at home and once again we have been chosen for the Friday night game to get the ball rolling after the international break. It’s been a couple of weeks of relative calm after our drubbing up at Sunderland. No one has been checking every five minutes to see if we’ve signed or sold someone but there has still been the odd story to keep us interested.  The transfer window was now closed, only it wasn’t quite because there was still ways of getting rid of deadwood.

I’m not sure how it happened but Moussa Djenepo left to rejoin Standard Liège in Belgium. He has certainly been an interesting player over the 4 1/2 years that he’s been with us. The odd moment of brilliance mixed in with long periods out of the squad and cameo appearances where not a great deal positive happened.  When he signed, he was an absolute maverick winger who did everything off the cuff and started off with two brilliant goals against Brighton and against Sheffield United the left us thinking that we might have the next Sadio Mane on our books. Over time though, all that spontaneity was coached out of him in an attempt to try and make him more of her team player in Ralph Hasenhüttl’s system and basically all that happened was that the things he was good at were taken away and the things he wasn’t good at, didn’t improve that much.  

A brief renaissance at the start of last season by being versatile enough to play a couple of games well at fullback, lead to one of the most ridiculous decisions by the club in recent memory, in awarding him a new three-year contract and entirely predictably, he has delivered absolutely nothing apart from one goal in that ridiculous win against Manchester City in the Carabao cup. I’m not saying it’s Moussa‘s fault but that win did more harm than good because it kept Nathan Jones in a job for longer than he should’ve been. Moussa always seemed a very happy positive presence and you can never accuse him of not trying or not wanting to do well but it was never going to happen. The only way it could’ve turned out differently is if he had maybe been used in the centre of the pitch and just been told to go and create havoc but that was never going to happen. I don’t know who is going to take over the role of doing step overs multiple times until you tackle yourself, but I’m sure someone will.

Turkey, as usual, have different rules to everybody else but it’s handy in this case because it ebanled us to get Tall Paul out of the door and away to Trabzonspor. He’s gone on loan in the hope that he does well and Trabzonspor or anyone else signs him next summer.  £18 million we paid, just 8 months ago.  That’s what you get when you have a non-football person in charge of a transfer window making desperate signings for a manager that you are about to sack. As I’ve said many times before, you only get the best out of a player like Paul if you set the team up to play to have strengths and if you don’t, then you are going to get absolutely nothing out of him. I guess the financial hit is deemed worth it as the cost of getting this reminder of Rasmus Ankersen‘s incompetence at that time, out of the door and Sport Republic see it as a decent price to pay. Good luck to Paul and in Turkey.

Back to today and Leicester have had the same start as we have in the Championship, playing five, winning three, drawing one and losing one. However, the narrative around Leicester has been a lot more positive for some reason. I don’t really understand why to be quite honest because even in the opening three games where they had 100% record, they didn’t play particularly well. There are of course some decent Leicester fans but if anyone in this division as a fan base where the majority think they are too good to be in it, it will be them. I guess it’s understandable in a way having won the Premier League and the FA Cup within the last 10 years. Enzo Maresca is the new manager, in his first managerial role and it’s his job to try and repair the absolute shit show inherited from Brendan Rodgers who was down there with Nathan Jones and Ruben Selles as the worst performing manager in the Premier League last season given the resources at his disposal. A few of those resources, namely James Maddison, Youri Tielemans and Harvey Barnes have left for the Premier League.

This is a game where I feel that Russell Martin has to go out with a slightly more pragmatic approach so I’m really hoping to see both Shea Charles and Flynn Downes in midfield today to give our defence a little bit more protection.  In the event though, Charles was needed at centre back with Bednarek having picked up a knock playing for Poland in the week. He took his place alongside new signing Taylor Harwood-Bellis which left us with a midfield three of Downes, Smallbone and Adam Armstrong who was wearing the captains armband for the second game running.  Che Adams got a place upfront and Ryan Fraser made his full debut.

From the kickoff we pass the ball back to KWP is in the centre of midfield and eventually it goes back to Shea Charles who has rotated into Kyle’s place right back. His clearance is blocked and Leicester pick up the ball, pass forward, cross, open goal, Rat Bastard unmarked, 1-0, 21 seconds. What actual fucking fuck was that? How can you go from kicking off to 1-0 down in 20 seconds?

We Decided To Get the Obligatory Rat Bastard Goal Over With Early.

Having already conceded a goal and done the same straight away against Sunderland last time out, Harwood-Bellis tries to mark his debut with a horrific attempt at a pass through the eye of a needle into midfield from the 6-yard line and absolute carnage ensues and we just about get away with that one. What the fuck is going on?  You’ve shot yourself once, here’s a loaded gun – have another go.  What are we doing?

What we are doing is trying to get back into it and we work an opening for Che Adams on the edge of the box and his shot for the far corner is turned away well by Hermanson.  The Leicester keeper is at the centre of things soon after as he finds himself out of his goal after a ‘play out from the back’ fuck up and the ball breaks to Che who once again demonstrates his unerring talent for hitting the goalkeeper from every conceivable situation.

Playing out from the back has another fucking mare on 18 minutes as well have another go.  Smallbone has the ball out on the right and fires it infield at KWP but it’s lose and bounces free to Dewsbury-Hall.  One pass across to McAteer and he can’t really miss and it’s 2-0, courtesy of us giving the ball away twice in our back third.  Fucking brilliant.

When we do go long, it’s usually down to Baz to find his man, which he does with reasonable amounts of success.  His ball out to Fraser causes confusion in the Leicester defence and Doyle leaves it for Vestergaard who has the reaction spead of a slug, so Adams slides it through for Edozie, who neatly chips over Hermansen to make it 2-1.

Half Time Scapegoating on the Way

Saints are generally on top for the next twenty minutes or so without producing much, in contrast to Leicester who look likely to score every time they get close to our goal.  After a period of utter chaos in our area which we survive, you think that we can get to half time and regroup but oh no, of course not as Mavididi bundles past a piss-weak challenge from Edozie and finds Ndidi in the box and he sorts his feet out nicely to knock it round the sliding THB and past Baz to make it 3-1.  Dog shit.

Half time and we’ve fucked it.  All we had to do was manage the game and see it out for a couple of minutes and get to the break just the one behind, like any normal team would have done but oh no.  Defensively I have never seen anything quite like that – I can’t even see what is supposed to be happening defensively and nothing has changed over the 45 minutes.  I expected to see something sensible happen at half time, like Holgate brought on for Smallbone or Adam Armstrong and Charles moved to midfield but all we got was Edozie, who had been our best attacker, off and replaced with Sulemana.
 
Still, get the first goal of the second half and we might have a chance if we tighten things up and the first chance falls to Captain Armstrong as Manning’s cross is headed down by the giant in the air that is Ryan Fraser and Armstrong blasts it miles over from about ten yards.  Has to score I’m afraid.

With Downes having got injured and been replaced with Alcaraz, Smallbone is now our defensive midfielder, which is a disaster waiting to happen and sure enough, Leicester stroll though our non-existent midfield and luckily, Mavididi turns down squaring the ball for the unmarked Rat Bastard and puts it wide himself as Baz comes out.

Sulemana has started the half reasonably out on the left, giving Justin the runaround but with little end product.  After 15 minutes or so though, he loses the ball a couple of times and you can see the enthusiasm drain out of him.  With all our players up following a set piece, he waves a lazy leg at the ball and his attempted pass goes straight to Mavididi and though he has 70 yards to go, it’s only Smallbone between him and Baz.  He pisses past Smallbone’s lame attempt at a tackle and sprints away.  It’s now a training drill where you are through on goal with no one chasing you and on he goes and scores easily.  Embarrassing.

As the game peters out and the ground empties, Iheanacho should make it 5 but puts it over with just Baz to beat and then it’s over to Bobby Madley, who I haven’t mentioned yet.  He doesn’t give Sulemana a free kick and then when Sulemana chases back and tries to tackle Justin, out comes the red card, I assume because Bobby thought it was retaliation.  Absolute bullshit but it doesn’t matter for today and for all Sulemana’s contribution today, probably doesn’t matter even if he gets banned.  A perfect end to a great day.

I am struggling for words at the end of that, so I’ll use last seasons ‘go to’ description and say that it was absolute fucking shit. We lost the game in the first half of course with a defensive set up as shambolic as I have ever seen in my 50 years of watching live football matches. In summary, Manning was left back, THB was at left centre back, Charles was in between right centre back and right back.  KWP was in central midfield but not close enough to Downes to make any sort of defensive screen. Downes was playing where you would expect a defensive midfielder to be and Smallbone was absolutely fucking nowhere.  If it hadn’t of been for Bazunu then we would’ve been five behind at half-time.  I can only assume (and it is a guess) that it was supposed to be a back three out of possession but it’s impossible to tell because it was that shambolic.  

It didn’t get any better in the second half, when we replaced the injured Downes with Alcaraz and basically deployed Smallbone as the defensive midfielder - only he wasn’t really, he was pressing in the Leicester half, as was Shea Charles who was going up and pressing on the halfway line leaving THB completely on his own at the back, given occasional help by Manning but mostly relying on Baz to keep the score down. We were so open throughout that game that you could honestly say that if we play like that, we’ll struggle win another game between now and the end of the season and we will be letting in at least three goals every game, even against the weaker sides.

The thing today is the Leicester weren’t even that good and didn’t have to be. All they had to be was vaguely organised and they didn’t have to work for any of their goals as we just made it easy for them. A complete and utter shambles from start to finish, on top of getting beat 5-0 and vowing to learn lessons and all that shit that managers say after a heavy defeat. I’m sorry, but going for a lot of over-complicated inverted-full-back bollocks like that does not show that he’s learning any lessons.  Just play a fucking back four in traditional positions and have two midfielders as a defensive screen in front of them. Don’t fucking over-complicate it because our players are not good enough to do that and you can try and add complications when a team has mastered the basics.

There is a large section in the middle of the game either side of half-time where we showed that if we just set up with any sort of stable defensive set up then we could well have won this game. If we had the same system in place that we had at Sheffield Wednesday, when we were organised and disciplined then we may well have won this game but it looks to me like we were just trying to be too fucking clever today with players that weren’t capable of doing it. Ruben Selles did the same thing at the tail end of last season and it was ridiculous then and it’s ridiculous now.

Whilst most of the blame for this defeat lies with the management and the coaches, of course, individual players made some horrendous decisions and put in piss poor performances.  I’m not having Will Smallbone as a regular starter. He is a classic flat track bully in that he looks great when you have 80% possession and the opposition midfield don’t close you down but as soon as there’s any sort of battle in there then he’s next to useless and he doesn’t contribute defensively at all because he’s not quick enough to get about the park and he can’t tackle. Basically, I would not play him unless it’s against teams who you expect to be in the bottom six. 

Captain Adam Armstrong was fucking hopeless today. Occasionally he picked up the ball and darted into space and it looked like something was going to happen but it never did. The final ball or shot was always crap but like Smallbone, here is another player who has been elevated to almost undroppable status by the manager, similar to the way that Jack Stephens was when he was made captain.

Then we have Kamaldeen Sulemana, who everyone (including himself probably) assumed was gonna tear up this league if he got his head round it and actually got down to playing but we saw everything we needed to see of Kamaldeen today. To start with he looked sharp and interested and dangerous but then he fucked up and that led to the fourth goal and after that he completely disappeared, didn’t want the ball and then got himself sent off, harshly perhaps but that’s Bobby Madley for you.

The accusation that he can’t organise a defence has followed Russell Martin around his entire career and all he did today was added more fuel to that. Our defensive set up at our own corners involved basically leaving one player who can’t run or tackle - Smallbone, on his own on the halfway line. That’s suicidal. Mavididi running at him for the fourth goal was comical. 

Some of the defensive shambles was of course on the players. One of the most amazing (in a bad way) bit of play was from THB.  Having lost 5-0 to Sunderland last week, letting in two goals in the first five minutes and having conceded after less than a minute today - he then tried to thread a ridiculous ball in between to Leicester players from the edge of the 6-yard box.  Regardless of philosophy, if you are a goal down due to a fuck up after one minute, you grow into the game for the next ten and make sure you don’t fuck up again.

Russell Martin talked about learning the lessons from the Sunderland game and applying them today. Over two weeks he totally failed to do that.  We were playing the team that's likely to win the Championship and he sent us out with just one defensively minded midfielder and He now has four days before the next game, at home to a fairly strong Ipswich side. If we go out with that defensive set up against Ipswich - we will lose so for me, it has to be back to basics.  There was one line from Russell Martin’s post match interview which I found interesting, when he said something along the lines of anyone who thought we would get to where we need to get to without pain, was a little bit naive.  That’s all well and good mate but when you have two back-to-back hammerings, that is not going to wash with supporters and you have to remember that this is a season where it’s not okay for the club that you are managing to finish 13th. There will be a certain amount of tolerance and maybe if we’d lost these two games or a single goal then people would be more forgiving but getting annihilated twice running is really not a good look.  Another jarring statement was that we went 'toe to toe' with Leicester - absolute bollocks that one.

KWP was an interesting choice for the player to do the post match interviews and he came out in defence of the manager and put the blame the players for not carrying out the defensive instructions. I assume he’s referring to himself as he played in an area in between right midfield and centre midfield and spend the whole game looking completely fucking lost. 

All I can say in mitigation is that I hope that this was some sort of tactic that was brought in specifically for this game against Leicester.   It clearly didn’t work of course but hopefully, it will be back to basics on Tuesday night.  Please.

EFL Championship Match 5 - Sunderland 5 Southampton 0

It was Round About now that Russ realised His Starting 11 was Crap

Even this many years after it was named, I still cringe when I hear the name ‘The Stadium of Light’.  Stealing name of one of Europe’s iconic stadiums will always jar with me a bit. Roker Park just sounded so much better.  We could’ve called Saint Mary’s the Camp Nou or the Bernabeu but thankfully, we called it the Friends Provident Stadium before seeing sense.

Sunderland have generally struggled over the past few years, doing the well trodden trip from the Premier League down to League one and now trying to get back again. Having got out of League one, they had as very good first season in the Championship and sneaked into the final playoff place last season before being knocked out by Luton, who are of course completely drowning in the Premier League right now.

Sunderland have made a solid If unspectacular start this season and have been struggling for goals a bit this year, probably down to their main striker Ross Stewart having been injured. More on him later I suspect.

So, what’s gone on this week? The final week before the end of the transfer window started with a couple of outgoings with Lyanco departing online for a year to some club in Qatar whose name I can’t be bothered to learn.  He was one who always tried his best but there was always one too many calamities just waiting to happen and you knew that he was never going to be able to string together a few games without one happening. Good defending is all about consistency and doing the right things often, and Lyanco was never gonna do that. He was however a completely mad bastard and there were times last season when he seemed incredibly valuable because he at least showed the determination required in a relegation battle that others could’ve learned from.  He’s going out on loan for the season but I suspect he is never to return

I’ve heard it said that all the celebrating tackles and bringing the crowd into play was a little bit of a bluff to distract from the fact that he wasn’t very good and I can’t possibly comment on that. Good luck to him - he tried his best and wanted to be here but he just wasn’t good enough. The bottom line that his signing from Torino was a cheap punt for £6 million quid and for that outlay, he did okay.

Next out the door was Romain Perraud who moved on a season long loan to Nice in France. This one is slightly different because He didn’t really do anything wrong. He has fallen down the pecking order this season with the signing of Ryan Manning and the emergence of Jayden Meghoma means that it’s probably okay to let him go for the season. Again, I wish him well because he always put in 100% effort despite being messed around quite a lot last year by a variety of managers who picked players out of position, rather than play our only senior left back. It was all rather weird. Put all that together and this is probably a move that will benefit all parties.

And so we get to deadline day with a number of issues up in the air.  One was sorted with relative calm early on in the day with Taylor Harwood-Bellis joining from Manchester City on loan. The deal is that we have an obligation to buy at £20 million, if we get promoted. As a player who got promoted with Burnley last season, Harwood-Bellis will most definitely be hoping to do the same again. The most important thing about him is that even at 21, he’s already established leadership credentials by captain in the England under 21 side. I expect him to be a regular in the team sooner rather than later.

We were heavily rumoured to be signing the Sunderland striker Ross Stewart and we were also heavily rumoured to be losing Che Adams to Wolves. As the day went on it became apparent that Che was going to sign a new contract with Saints but move to Wolves on loan for the season which means that we would still get the £15 million quid for him this time next year plus a loan fee for this season.  

As the day went on, Ross Stewart still hadn’t happened and then some news spread by bellend Internet ITK wannabes suggested that the Stewart deal was off which probably came from the very definite news that Saints has decided that the Che deal with Wolves was a load of shit and they pulled the plug on it. At the end of the day, Stewart signed and Che Adams didn’t go anywhere so we now have the striking options sorted, even though Che is understood to be somewhat pissed off with his move to Wolves not happening. Hopefully when everything settles down, he will see it as a blessing in disguise.

Ross Stewart - Before and After the Game

When the transfer window finally closed, everyone realised that no one had bought Kyle Walker-Peters so we have by far the best right back in the Championship and also, no one had come in for Kamaldeen Sulemana , despite his agent desperately pushing out at the last minute that he had a £30 million release clause. No one was ever gonna pay that because Sulemana has not remotely done anything to warrant it. That one will be very interesting as it still wouldn’t surprise me at all if he sits on his hands until January. If he does get his head down and play then he’s the Nathan Tella replacement we needed, until January at least.

The other minor footnote regarding those brought in in the great Rasmus Plays Scattergun Football Manager Bullshit Transfer Window of January 2023, was that Tall Paul didn’t find an escape route, so the poor bugger is stuck with us with no prospect of getting anywhere near the match day squad. With a few countries still having open transfer windows, I hope a solution can be found for the big man.

Overall, on the face of it, I think the transfer window was a success. There was a lot of work needing doing and a decent percentage of it has been done. Some players who didn’t wanna be here have moved on and unfortunately, the real top level talent has inevitably moved on also. We have also got rid of some dead wood.  We have brought players in quite astutely and have two players for every position now so on the face of it, it’s not bad. Financials are boring obviously but we have balanced the books regarding the money wasted last season and mitigated a lot of the loss of income from getting relegated to the Championship.

So with the transfer window done and dusted and the squad all settled, what would Russell Martin’s first team selection be.  Interesting – on the face of it it’s a bit fucking weird with four changes from a winning side.  Out of the team go the injured Jack Stephens along with Charly Alcaraz, Sam Amo-Ameyaw and Shea Charles, the latter of whom has definitely not done anything to warrant getting left out. In came Mason Holgate, Will Smallbone, Flynn Downes and …. FFS Sekou Mara.

It’s the first time I’ve looked at a Russell Martin Championship team selection and wondered what the fuck is going on. Chucking Holgate in for his first game seems like a massive risk and I can’t help but feel that Smallbone would be better off coming off the bench in his first game back from injury. Mara didn’t exactly do much last week when he came on and with the 11 names on the timesheet today, I guess it’s either going to be him or Adam Armstrong playing out wide right.

The referee today is David Coote who like us, was so shit he’s been relegated down into the Championship but unlike us, he’s only there for a week.

Sunderland start the game on the front foot and build at their right and under no pressure, the cross comes in, bending behind our defence and under no pressure, Clarke nips in front of Edozie and has a free header at Baz from about 6 yards. 1-0 - Jesus Christ that’s pathetic.

Plenty of time to sell into the game let the next action is more unopposed Sunderland play down our left with Bellingham being allowed time to set the ball back for a simple pass across the top of the penalty area to Ekwah, who takes a touch and under no pressure drills it across Baz, into the far corner. To be fair to Baz, it was going wide until it flicked off of Flynn Downes but I would ask, what exactly are we trying to fucking achieve here and what do we expect if we just stand off all the time ?

We finally get a bit of possession until Holgate gives the ball away on the halfway line to send Sunderland away on the right. Again there is no pressure on the ball as Ba just advances to the edge of the penalty area before curling a shot just wide of the far post. You just sense that unless we get the next goal, which we don’t remotely look like doing, that this is going to be absolutely horrible because Sunderland are now just sitting in and playing on the break, which is the luxury but the 2-0 head start has given them.

We decided to try and put them under pressure a bit in their own half and our first chance comes because of it with Ekwah presenting the ball straight to Edozie 25 yards out and he barrels towards the edge of the penalty area and slams it just wide.  He really had to hit the target there and it’s a poor effort.  The game should change a bit soon after that as Edozie’s cross from the left is picked up by Manning and Dack runs across the back of him.  Looks like a penalty but not in David Coote’s eyes.

We’re back to our worst soon after though as Clarke is allowed to break through the centre of our midfield with players jogging alongside him before he gets carted over on the edge of the box by Holgate, who to be fair, had to do something. From the free-kick, Bradley Dack hits it and Baz manages to parry it away. Again, there is no reaction from any of our defenders and it takes an air shot from Sunderland forward before we managed to get a boot to it and clear it.

With a couple of minutes to half time, and Holgate on the ball, he gets closed down by a Sunderland striker and passes it 10 yards straight to Ekwah in midfield. Holgate goes charging after the ball and leaves the striker who closed him down but Ekwah however doesn’t need the striker because he jinks past Holgate as if he is not there, advances a few yards and then smashes it low into the bottom corner of the net under the wrist of the diving Baz. 3-0, game completely fucked.

Russell Martin has no choice but to ring the changes at half-time, with the ineffective Stuart Armstrong and Sam Edozie replaced with Ryan Fraser and Che Adams.  To be fair, he could have subbed any of the outfield ten and not many could have complained.  Any thoughts we may have had about any sort of unlikely come back I completely fucked within the first couple of minutes of the second half as a cross comes in from the left, a free header parried out by Baz but when the ball comes back in, Holgate swings at it and misses, and Bradley Dack stabs into the net from 5 yards. Our defending is so shit it is unbelievable. Mason Holgate is showing Alan Bennett levels of debut calamity. He is not alone in the air-shot stakes though with Ryan Manning having also wafted at fresh air when the ball has come back off of Baz in the first place.

Jack Clarke is proving to be a real handful on the left wing for Sunderland but then if you give any player acres of space that they are going to be a problem. Clarke drives straight to the heart of the defence before anyone could get to him and gets about 8 yards out before poking a shot which Baz does really well to get down and save. Our desire to get near them in midfield is non-existent. Downes is trying his best but Smallbone looks like he is running in treacle and is never near any Sunderland player.

Out of nowhere we came closest to scoring as we have done all game as Holgate tries a potshot from 30 yards and the Sunderland goalkeeper Patterson is very fortunate as he makes a complete bollocks of it but it bounces off his knee and goes wide for a corner. In it comes from Manning and Holgate has a free header at the back post but it goes well wide.

It’s more or less Holgate’s last involvement as he is taken off and replaced with a man who should’ve started, Shea Charles, also off is Smallbone who also shouldn’t have started, and he’s replaced with Alcaraz.

There is time for us to immediately add the dog leg offside trap to our list of shit things that we’ve done in defence which gives another clear run at Baz coming in from our left but once again, the goalkeeper is up to the task producing an outstanding so have to keep the score down.

As we get into extra time with no further calamity, we then allow Burnett in midfield to perform three or four roulettes and drag backs which really should’ve seen him booted into the stand - but no one does anything and he is allowed to swing over across and Rigg, a child, barely out of school, gets up to head across Baz to make the misery complete. Fuck off. So shit it’s actually funny.

Well fuck me we are shit again after that very brief four-game interlude of not being shit. We got hammered in textbook fashion.  If you just look at the timings of the goals then it’s the perfect recipe for getting mullered.  Two down in the opening 10 minutes and then just when you could think about regrouping at half-time, you let in another one. Though it’s very unlikely, it’s not infeasible to have a much better second half at 3-0 down but if you come out and immediately let in a fourth then you are completely fucked, so we did that. From then on it’s just damage limitation.  Four goals can kind of be put down to have a horrendous day but then you put a different slant on it all together by letting in a fifth in injury time and the goalscorer is a schoolboy that they have just thrown on for a laugh because the game is over and we are so shit that the schoolboys development can’t possibly be harmed. The only good thing about that goal is that a lot of your own fans will have left.

The tone was set by Russell Martin’s team selection. The negative headlines will all go to Mason Holgate and he was truly horrific but he should never of been selected because as was said earlier, Shea Charles deserved to start the game and has proved to be a very capable central defender when called upon. The other mystifying selection was that of Sekou Mara. He was 24 hours from leaving the club if the rumours are to be believed, yet he starts and unsurprisingly, he was shit, because he always is and consequently the attack had no balance. It’s no coincidence that it’s the first game this season where we haven’t scored. Will Smallbone also struggled massively on his return from injury so you could argue that that’s another selection that shouldn’t have been made.

Balance is a key word with this team at the moment. I don’t like the make up of our side in away games which is basically one defensive midfielder and five attackers. We are always going to concede goals playing this way and I would much rather see two number sixes, Downes and Charles and one other more attack minded midfield player - one of Stuart Armstrong, Alcaraz, Smallbone or Adam Armstrong in away games. We got away with it against Plymouth and Sheffield Wednesday but we got found out today.

Another balance issue we have is in central defence. I don’t know too much about Taylor Harwood-Bellis but I hope he’s comfortable playing on the left of the central defenders because all of Holgate, Stephens and Bednarek prefer to play on the right. That was probably the only mitigating factor for Mason Holgate today.

The finger of blame will also be pointed at Baz again today and the third goal was bad from his perspective as it sneaked under his arm. Again though, Russell Martin’s usual defence of him that it is more about those in front of him, largely stands up. He also made some very good saves today.

You can’t really blame the referee David Coote for much that went in today in terms of the result but he was easily the worst referee that we’ve had so far this season. All over the fucking place with a series of mystifying decisions against both teams. It would’ve made any difference today because we were that shit but the only thing you could maybe point out is the penalty we didn’t get at 2-0 for the foul on Manning which could certainly have changed things. Premier League referees who are used to operating with VAR shouldn’t be dropped into the Championship for a week, where you have no back up from the goons at Stockley Park and therefore have to referee the game differently.  Today though, we would’ve probably missed the fucking penalty and even if we had been given one, we would’ve thrown in another goal straight afterwards so it wouldn’t have ultimately made any difference.

Today’s capitulation should actually do us good. It should give some major learning points to Russell Martin and it should also instill in the players that you have to be on it in every single game otherwise this can happen. Everyone says the Championship is a tough league and I’m not sure that a lot of the players believed it. They had better believe it now.

Regarding this game, it’s time to be all Nigel Adkins about it and draw a blue line under it and move on. Next up is Leicester at home on a Friday night after the international break. What could possibly go wrong?