EFL Championship Match 37 - Southampton 1 Middlesbrough 1

The Reverse xG King does it Again

After a ridiculous amount of time without a game, Middlesbrough visit St Marys, trying to do a league double over us, having beaten us at the Riverside during our four game shitshow at the start of the season.

Middlesbrough to me this season have always been a team that are just there. They’re not going to make the playoffs and they are not going to get relegated and to me, having made the playoffs the last year, this season has been a bit of a disappointment under the management of Michael Carrick. I find it hard not to equate Carrick the manager with Carrick the player, who I was more familiar with. He was a classy operator in a disciplined, pedestrian kind of way and that seems to be a case that his team reflects that.

There has been a positive with having a long break in that it has enabled Ryan Fraser and KWP to get fit and there was even some news during the week about Ross Stewart who is apparently back training again. For context, there have been about five hundred sightings of the Loch Ness monster since Stewart last played.

Ross Stewart Mentioned in a Press Conference

In the big picture of this season, we have ten games left and we probably need to win eight of them to have any chance of making the automatic promotion places, bearing in mind the way that Ipswich and Leeds have been churning out results. Leicester City are also above us but they seem to have hit a wall, shit the bed and pissed their trousers.  They continued that today in the early kick off as I arrived at the ground and saw them on the TV in the final minutes of losing to Bristol City.  So, today is therefore a massive chance to catch up with at least one of the teams above us.

Our team has already been announced and it’s a bit strange. Sulemana has been parachuted straight into the starting line-up on the back of some good performances in training and no doubt, a healthy dose of blind faith. I would be very pissed off if I was Sam Edozie.  David Brooks and Jan Bednarek are both suffering from the exertions of playing and midweek Euro playoff for their respective countries and are on the bench, replaced with Jack Stephens and the aforementioned Sulemana. Elsewhere there is a chance for James Bree at left back with the fit again fullback being preferred to Ryan Manning. Let’s fucking do this and give us as a chance.

Our plan from the start appears to be to get it out to Sulemana as often as possible.  The man himself has started again brightly and appears to have a brief of just trying to make things happen. Twelve minutes in and Bree lobs a throw at him and he beats the fullback Ayling to the ball and from right in the corner, he manages to dig out a left foot across into the middle but it goes straight to Jonny Howson who swings a boot at it and send it up into the air and not very clear at all.  It drops to Adam Armstrong who takes a touch and then drills it back across the goal and it arrows into the bottom corner. Brilliant strike and 1-0 up and happy automatic promoition days.

It looks like it’s gonna be two as KWP gets down the right hand side and finds Adam Armstrong again but as he shoots and this time, if flicks off of the closing defender and flies over the bar.

We are looking good but then it stops and our offering for the rest of the first half can be summed up by saying it was slow and shit. Middlesbrough were happy to sit in formation and Saints didn’t inject any pace into things to pull them around and create anything. Every time we looked like we were going to break a line and get to the back four, we just turned round and came backwards.  We all know the plan and the style but we weren’t threatening the Boro defence at all.

We did however nearly concede when the ball was played up to Adams and it was time for him to demonstrate the art of holding the ball up but he just demonstrated how one takes candy from a baby and he lost it pathetically to the defender who was behind him and Middlesbrough broke with Azaz drilling it low past Baz and ping, off the inside of a post and away. Very fortunate.

Half time and not good enough.  Sluggish, lethargic, disjointed – call it what you will.  Even though we were winning, I was feeling slightly bored with the whole affair. We certainly gonna have to be a lot better in the second half so let’s hope Russell can sort it out..

The first team to show anything in the second half was Boro, with the confusingly named Latte Lath breaking through on our right with our absence of players, and shot straight at Baz, which he spilled and there was a bit of pushing and shoving between striker and goalkeeper before the referee blew his whistle and gave us a free kick.  The Boro striker then decided to block the free-kick and earn himself a yellow card.

Sulemana is still causing issues for Ayling at right back and he gets over a low cross which the keeper parries out to Adams, who taps in… offside.  He does look offside to be fair.

A feature of our play before he got moved to right back, was THB chipping the ball over the defence and from one such move he found Adams just at the right of the D with just the goalkeeper to beat and all the defenders gave up. He has to score surely… edge of the seats…  … no conviction in a shit side footed effort at the near post that the keeper easily palmed away.  Fuck me that was garbage.  Che looked to the linesman hoping that the flag would go up but it didn’t so that goes down as a fucking dreadful miss. Pathetic.

KWP finds Sulemana on the right, who tees it up for Stuart Armstrong and the gloriously haired one shoots, deflection, everyone appeals for handball and the ball flies to Adams, six yards out with a virtual open goal and with a swing of his boot he clinically puts it wide of the fucking post. It would be funny if it wasn’t so shit and if an opposition player did that, we would be in hysterics and a chant of “what the fucking hell was that“ would be ringing round the ground. Che’s first reaction was interesting because it was to appeal for a penalty. Just put it in the fucking net and no bother.

With that he’s off to be replaced with David Brooks.  Almost as predictably, Fraser is on for Sulemana. Brooks first contribution is to get down the left and fire a cross over which the keeper palms out straight to Adam Armstrong he just has to smash into the net but instead decides to side foot it a defender and it bounces back into the pile of bodies on the six yard line and Middlesbrough get away with it, big boot forward and Stephens is distinctly second favourite but makes enough ground on Jones to superbly block it away for a corner.

Time ticks by with Boro really not offering much but the nerves are shredded now.  It’s the sods law thing about missing chances and only being one up.  With five to go, we give an outing to Sekou Mara’s latest barnet with Adam Armstrong going off.  Strange that Rothwell is still unused.  There’s some pressure from Boro with a couple of important blocks in defence and a flap by Baz which he gets away with.

More Lethal Saints Sitter Technique

We have a chance to put it to bed as Brooks gets away and finds Smallbone.  A ball into Wee Man and his shot is blocked out to Smallbone but a no-conviction shinner is not required and over the bar it goes.

90 minutes are up in comes a cross from our left and there is Latte Lath, unmarked in the middle and he easily heads it into the net.  I can;t even get angry about it, such was the predictable nature of it.  Four minutes to go to play with some attacking urgency and Aribo and Edozie are on and we huff and puff and do show more urgency but nothing much happens. It feels like a defeat – it really does.  Only ourselves to blame though.

Whenever I thought about the 10 games that we’ve got in the task ahead of us, one phrase has always come to mind and it was “no margin for error“. Missing an open goal from 6 yards is an error. Being clean through with just a goalkeeper to beat with every defender having stopped and not having a fucking clue what to do – that’s another error.  What is it with Adams - the Reverse xG King.  The more difficult the chance, the more likely he is to score.  Gets the ball five yards out and it's lottery time.  What I don't get is how he looked so lost when the ball came to him on the first miss.  Surely as a striker, you train every day on 1v1 finishes against a keeper.  Surely you know what you're going to do when picking the ball up on the edge of the box, what finish you are going to go for?  He looked completely lacking in conviction and lacking in basically knowing how to approach it.  You can’t afford that sort of shit if you are hoping to achieve something as a team. Che Adams wasn’t alone. Adam Armstrong should’ve scored in the second half and so should Will Smallbone.

We created those four glorious chances to win the game despite a very lethargic performance seemingly lacking in attacking intent or urgency. There was very little intent to go forward at any time, especially in the first half when we were 1-0 up. We allowed Middlesbrough just to maintain the shape and didn’t stretch them and didn’t have a shot on target other than the goal that we did score, which was a brilliant finish by Adam Armstrong but came pretty much purely because of a horrible missed kick by a Middlesbrough defender. We got lucky in the first half when a dreadful lack of hold-up play by Che, gifted a chance which they smacked against the post.

So, all of this leading to the point at which we threw two points in the bin with an unmarked player in the middle and a free header. Shite.

And How Predictable Was That?

I did ponder whether having three weeks was a good thing for Russell Martin and he sprung a bit of a surprise from the start with Sulemana being selected. He’s great in training apparently.   If I had a pound for every time I’ve heard that, when a player is selected out of the blue, then I would be a rich man.   Doing well in training means precisely dick, other than the fact that you can do something when no pressure is on.  Kamaldeen did okay to be fair but once more, nothing at the end of it. All of our wingers have moments in a game, like Kamaldeen did today but the other wingers chip in with an occasional goal.  He’d still be behind Fraser, Edozie, Brooks and Adam Armstrong in my pecking order.

The back four looked decidedly makeshift, with Bednarek being left out after his exertions for Poland a few days ago, which meant that Stephens started but at least we had proper full backs and KWP and Bree. Bree had an absolute mare in the first half with every Middlesbrough attack coming down his side and if it was Ryan Manning, then he would’ve been getting absolutely slaughtered for it. He improved in the second half but it highlighted again that it’s still a problem position for us.  Not as much of a problem as centre forward but a problem nonetheless.

Substitutions or lack thereof was rather strange. Whilst we were struggling to kill the game off, we have a midfielder on the bench in Joe Rothwell who has proved beyond reasonable doubt that he’s got a goal in him. Stuart Armstrong was blowing out of his arse from the 70th minute onwards but substitution not made, even in the panic having conceded the late goal and having four minutes to play with some attacking intent. I have a feeling that there was an element of worrying about the next game and forgetting to worry about the one we were playing.  We did get to see Mara’s latest hairstyle for ten minutes after our leading goalscorer was taken off.  Adams and Mara are our two Number 9’s.  Let that sink in when you’re pondering how good we could be with a proper number 9.

Russell Martin bemoaned our lack of ruthlessness in both boxes and you can’t argue with that of course, especially in the attacking sense.  The goal we let in was pathetic as three of our players failed to close down the cross and KWP lost his man in the middle.  

In the evening, Leeds dropped points as well.  It could have and should have been a good day but we fucked it up.  Ipswich, who won today, grinding out a 1-0 win at Blackburn, are next up on Monday and we quite simply have to win if we want to get back on track with any chance of automatic promotion.  A draw or a defeat and it will pretty much be a canter to the end of the season playing glorified friendlies. A win and it will feel like it’s all back on.  Such is the life of a football fan.

Up the fucking Saints

EFL Championship Match 36 - Southampton 4 Sunderland 2

 

The moment Russell Realised What Joe's Best Position Is

Sunderland, remember them? Yes, that’s right… we thought we’re invincible at the start of the season and fully on board HMS Piss The League and then we went to the Stadium of Light, picked Mason Holgate and got drubbed 5-0 and deservedly so. 2-0 down in five minutes and then it got worse. Horrific from start to finish off and today is a chance for revenge.

The fact that our mid-week game against Preston got called off because of a fire within spitting distance of St Mary’s, is not gonna give us many advantages this season because of the fixture congestion which we will no doubt fall foul as a result, but the one good it will give us is that we will be fresher than Sunderland, who played in mid-week when they lost narrowly to Leicester.  They should have had a penalty in the last minute but when Leicester are going for the title, be in in the Premier League or the Championship, you don’t get those decisions against them.   

Sunderland have had a strange season in that they sacked the manager who beat us 5-0, Tony Mowbray, when he was doing pretty well and replaced him with Michael Beale who was an unmitigated disaster and saw Sunderland fall right out of playoff contention. There are certain similarities with Birmingham City who travelled the same road by sacking John Eustace and appointing old squirrel heading himself, Wayne Rooney.  In a strange twist of fate, Birmingham appointed Mowbray to replace Squirrel Head, before Mowbray himself had to be replaced due to ill health. As I said last week when we played Birmingham, get well soon Tony – one of football’s good guys.

Back in September when they hammered us, the main architect was Jack Clarke, whose name has come up a couple of times this season as being linked with Southampton in the summer. Agent bullshit I’m calling on that one because we have three left wingers as it is. Clarke is injured today so in his absence, Sunderland will be hoping for some magic from Jobe Bellingham brother of you know who.

It's got to the stage of the season now where we need to start looking at the results of other teams around the automatic promotion places and the mid-week postponement meant we watched all of Leicester, Ipswich and Leeds put in ropey performances and all managed to win by the odd goal. This means that it’s now eight points between us and Ipswich and second place, which is more or less what it was when we started our long unbeaten run. From that you can see just how little margin for error we have now if we want to make the top two. Sunderland at home is a must win.

Russell Martin made the admission in the week that he was changing the team to accommodate Jack Stephens.  I think this is dumb but there you go, so it’s no surprise today that THB is going to be right back as we break up our proven and effective clean-sheet keeping central defensive partnership.  Flynn Downes has mercifully had no reaction to the Birmingham game and is fit to play with David Brooks keeping his place in the side

Saints start in confident fashion, knocking the ball about and Brooks plays a lovely through ball to Stuart Armstrong who is in behind Seelt, who holds him back but lets go which probably meant that he only got a yellow card when it quite possibly have been red because he made no fucking attempt play the ball whatsoever.  Stuart Attwell is the referee, refereeing in the Championship because he’s been shit in the Premier League, even with the help of VAR.  Why is he suddenly going to be competent because he’s now got to make more decisions?  Anyway, a short free kick from Smallbone to Brooks and chipped to the back post and straight off the training ground, Jobe Bellingham heads it across the face of his own goal, Bednarek powers in a header, the keeper parries it away and Stuart Armstrong stuffs the rebound into the net. Great start, 1-0, we want five.

Sunderland respond by being a shambles, trying to pass the ball out from the back and failing, giving it away to Stephens, who does that Beckenbauer thing in the midfield and we eventually work it out to Stuart Armstrong, whose effort is deflected out for a corner.  Come on lads – these are shite.

Another shite clearance from the Sunderland keeper and Stuart Armstrong produces a superb first time pass to put Adam Armstrong clean through but he goes for it first time and it’s high and handsome and shit to be quite honest. The mackems behind the goal enjoyed it though, Arma being a Geordie and all that.

Sunderland have a bit of possession for the first time and work a decent opening on the left, switched to the right and after a couple of crosses are blocked back to him, Burstow tries to hammer it across from virtually the goal-line and it pings off the near post and flies away to safety.

Normal service is resumed as Sunderland right back Hume gives it away and Adam Armstrong plays it to Stuart Armstrong and onto the overlapping Manning, who pulls a Cruyff turn and gets absolutely totalled by a stupid Chris Rigg sliding tackle for the clearest penalty you’ve ever seen in your life.  However, we have a Premier League ref today….

Stuart Attwell: Hi there Stockleigh Park, it’s Stuart Attwell at Southampton. Hello… hello?
Howard Webb: This is Howard Webb at Stockley Park. What do you fucking want Stuart?
SA: Hi … can you check the penalty shout at Southampton?
HW: No Stuart, fuck off, sort it out yourself
SA: But I can’t… I’ve been in the Prem so long, I’ve forgotten how
HW: Yes Stuart, you were shit and now you’re in the Championship, much like Southampton
SA: But I need the backup
HW: Stuart… you’re in a proper league now.  You have to wipe your own arse.  Put your big boy pants on and make a decision.
SA: Can I come back Howard, please?
HW: No, you were shit, you got demoted, that’s the way it works
SA: But… but… Michael Oliver, Paul Tierney ?
HW: They’re next Stuart
[Howard Webb hangs up]

Penalty. Up steps childhood Newcastle fan Adam Armstrong and slips as he crashes it past the keeper and for some reason there’s a few Sunderland players all moaning at the referee Attwell, but he’s given the goal and Arma is off giving it the big one to the Sunderland fans.  I think they’re complaining about the fact that he may have kicked it twice as he slipped but we haven’t got VAR so it’s a fucking goal isn’t it?

Arma Plays a 1-2 With Himself

Half time and 2-0 and this has been pretty routine so far.  Just need to keep it going and not give them a sniff.  No changes for either team and away we go.

The opening twenty minutes of the second half doesn’t see any change of the direction of travel of the game with Saints being a better side and then it’s time for some substitutions. When I say it’s time for some substitutions, I mean we’ve reached the time of the game when substitutions get made by Russell Martin but we didn’t actually need to make any because we are playing pretty well and dominating the game. Change it we do though with Joe Aribo coming on the excellent Will Smallbone and Kamaldeen Sulemana for some reason, coming on for David Brooks meaning that Adam Armstrong switches to the other side. What’s Sam Edozie done to be behind Sulemana in the pecking order?

Sunderland suddenly look like a half decent side and after a cross gets cleared, Sulemana overplays and gets tackled and it gets worked to Mundle who takes a pot shot from the edge of the box and it flicks off of Jack Stephens who’s not closing him down quick enough and flies into the net giving Baz no chance at all. Fuck off.  To be fair, Mundle has deserved that goal as he’s been energetic and their sole threat throughout.

A few minutes later and Saints are still a shambles, giving the ball away and following a rushed clearance from Manning because Bazunu has given him a shit pass, Sunderland recycle it and there’s a couple of headers that THB can’t get away and then Aribo heads are in the wrong direction and Jobe Bellingham picks it up cuts across and curls a ridiculous shot into the top corner. Fuck me. Two substitutions, both given goals away.

Now it’s substitution time to correct the complete bollocks that the first two substitutions have made. James Bree is on for Jack Stephens giving us a balanced back four and Joe Rothwell comes on for the tiring Stuart Armstrong.

Saints break out of defence with THB finding Bree, who sends Adam Armstrong scampering away on the right hand side.  He burrows into the box before firing it across and it deflects out as far as Rothwell on the edge of the box and the substitute almost goes ‘full Huddersfield’ as he absolutely drills it past the keeper into the net. What a strike that is.

Ten minutes plus extras to go and Saints keep piling forward and with Sunderland throwing bodies forward, there’s so much space as Aribo sends Rothwell away at the middle of the pitch and it’s a four and three break.  With 30,000 people shouting ‘fucking hit it’ as he gets to the edge of the box, he doesn’t and plays it to Adam Armstrong, who tries to slide in for Adams but the ball gets half cleared straight out to Rothwell and you know the rest. Drilled into the middle of the net. 4-2, three points baby.

The game is done and the last few minutes have a sense of relief about them.  Sunderland don’t have anything left and Saints are happy just to let it play out.  Stuart Attwell gets something right and blows the final whistle.

It’s amazing how hard we make things for ourselves but at least in games where you finish with the three points, you can look back on it and laugh. We were completely and utterly in control of this game, 2-0 up and cruising until we made a totally unenforced double substitution on the hour mark, removing Smallbone and Brooks and replacing them with your Aribo and Sulemana, which spectacularly destabilised everything and within 10 minutes Sunderland, who had been showing as much life as eleven corpses in a mortuary, scored twice. Luckily, in these days of five substitutions, you can make up for your mistakes, which we did with the arrival of Rothwell for Stuart Armstrong and Bree for Jack Stevens, which of course allowed THB to go back to his proper position.  A balanced team, round pegs in round holes – who’d have thought it?

Now I haven’t been the biggest fan of Joe Rothwell since he started at Saints. I’ve put his goals against Huddersfield down as lightning striking twice within ten minutes but I can see what the issue is now because previously I couldn’t tell what sort of midfielder he was. There were rumours that he was a defensive midfielder, which he most definitely is not. Russell Martin tried to use him as a number eight midfielder alongside Will Smallbone and that wasn’t unmitigated disaster. Today he came on as a direct replacement for Stuart Armstrong as the most advanced of the midfield three and that’s his position, end of discussion.  His carrying of the ball and shooting was first class today and brought him another two goals and rescued us from one of those games where we dominate and I’ll come on the way wondering how the fuck we haven’t won it.

Rothwell playing well in his best position kind of reminded me of one of the unescapable truths of football which is that balance is everything.  If you get the balance right in midfield between attacking and defending then you are sorted and likewise if you get the balance right in defence with everybody playing the correct positions that they are good at, then that is going to serve you well. Don’t overcomplicate it. Having proper full backs on for the last 20 minutes and our two best to central defenders in tandem in the middle of a pitch made us look so much better. It’s not rocket science.

Sulemana Gets Involved

We were treated to half an hour of Kamaldeen Sulemana on the left wing today and he was to be frank, the same as always is. Burns past the fall back on a regular basis and then makes you think that he may as well not a bothered because the final ball or shot is just never there. If I have to watch him cutting off the left and onto his right foot before passing it straight to the keeper one more time, I will scream.  That, combined with another 10 minutes of nothing from Sekou Mara just made me think that we would get more out of Kamaldeen if he played up the middle and bearing in mind we have Fraser, Edozie, Brooks and Adam Armstrong, who all contribute goals and assists from the wing, maybe it’s worth trying Sulomana as a central striker as a back up to Adams. He can’t be worse than Mara and he can’t be less effective than he is on the wing.  He scosred his only goals for us when he played up top, so why not....?

Will Smallbone had a great game in midfield for us today and his partnership with Brooks down the right hand side is really blossoming.  There was a noticeable loss of control when the two of them went off.

The first half saw us deservedly two goals ahead and the second half should’ve been simple and we should’ve equalled the five goals Sunderland football put past us.  Never mind though as three points is what it’s all about.  I can see myself saying that lots between now and the end of the season.

Onwards … and now a bizarrely long break of about three weeks before we play Middlesbrough at home.  We need three points from that one as well, you’ll be surprised to hear.  Up the fucking Saints.

EFL Championship Match 35 - Birmingham City 3 Southampton 4

Ari-BO

What have John Eustace, Wayne Rooney, Tony Mowbray and Mark Venus all got in common? Yes, they’ve all been managers of Birmingham City this season but for various different reasons. John Eustace was the manager because he was doing well even though the owners didn’t really want him because he wasn’t a big name. Wayne Rooney was the manager because the owners wanted a big name that was known to American markets.  Tony Mowbray was the manager because Wayne Rooney was fucking shit and suddenly, having a big name for American markets wasn’t such a high priority. Mark Venus is the manager because Tony Mowbray is ill and get well soon Tony, one of footballs good guys.  It all adds up to a clusterfuck of a season for a club that should be pushing the play-off places and that line below sixth place but instead find themselves being worried about the line near the bottom of the table.

Having got the FA Cup out of the way with the defeat at Liverpool, this game is absolutely crucial for Saints chances of nicking an automatic promotion place at the end of the season. Despite the 22 match unbeaten run in the league, three defeats in the last four have left us with very little margin for error especially given the form of Leeds United who currently reside in second place and looks very capable of chasing down Leicester City. Whether or not Saints can challenge the top two is certainly going to come down to the away games we have left at Ipswich, Leicester and Leeds.  Lose to the likes of Birmingham however and automatic promotion is nothing but a pipe dream.

The season kind of starts here for us now and Russell Martin has to get the team right and that hopefully includes Flynn Downes who has been pictured in training montages from Staplewood but didn’t feature in the Liverpool game, which was predictable and also didn’t feature in the defeat by Millwall.

The main feature of the press conference leading up to this game was the personal abuse that Will Smallbone got online after the Liverpool defeat, which of course crossed the line between criticism of him as a footballer and personal abuse.  I thought it was a good thing for Russell Martin to highlight and also, good of him to make a distinction between what is acceptable and what is not.

To the team news and its pluses and minuses as far as I’m concerned. Flynn Downes is back which is huge but the player who basically replaces KWP in the lineup it’s of course, Jack Shoehorn Stephens, which means that either he or THB is going to be playing it right back. Smallbone is in the side with Joe Aribo the unlucky one to miss out, I presume still blowing out of his arse from Wednesday night.

Any idea that we were going to be more defensively solid today with Downes back in the side, lasted all of a minute as Bacuna fires in a crossfield ball from the left, which is controlled by the hand of Miyoshi, who practically fucking catches it, and then absolutely smashes it and it flicks off Manning, across Baz and into the far top corner. Brilliant finish but it’s easy for it to be a brilliant finish if you’ve patted it down for yourself.  Fucks sake.

Miyoshi Scores a Free Kick After Placing the Ball

It's nearly 2-0 straight after Adams gets dispossessed in midfield and Bacuna strides on and takes aim from the edge of the box and it smacks the post, bounces out onto the back of Baz and squirts wide.

We then begin to play and we are passing through Birmingham’s midfield relatively easily.  Arma crosses from the left and Brooks attempts a volley which is down and into the ground and wide.  Another chance comes and goes as Arma loses the ball to Laird, wins it back and sends Che Adams in on goal from the left but his sidefoot is shit and straight at the keeper. Smallbone drives forward, onto Adams who flicks it round the corner first time to Brooks and he slides a beautifully weighted ball into Adam Armstrong who takes it first time… goal, 1-1, get in!.  Everything about that goal is class.  Very close for the offside but we are owed one for earlier, regardless.

Having equalised, we then go for a variation of the Wee Man West Brom corner routine and it’s swung over by Brooks and met with a decent header by Manning at the back post but it hits Ruddy and deflects away, mainly because the old git can’t get out of the way in time.  Maybe it’s the snow that’s now coming down but Che Adams looks in the mood today against his former club and from 25 yards he has a go out of nowhere and it skids across the turf, past the ageing Ruddy and smacks off the post and wide.  Brooks then feeds Smallbone in what would have been a repeat of the goal, but his shot hits Ruddy on the arse as he sits down and squirts wide for a corner.  Another chance goes begging as we cut through them again and Downes takes aim from the edge of the box and straight at the keeper.

John Ruddy Accidentally Saves One

As we reach 40 minutes with Saints having dominated, there’s a big boot forward by Sanderson and Bednarek makes a total bollocks of it and it slides off his head and goes straight to Stansfield running through and he absolutely lashes it into the top of the net above Baz to give Birmingham a quite frankly ridiculous 2-1 lead. For fuck‘s sake, again.

Saints try and get back into it before half time and we are knocking the ball about on the edge of their box until Downes feeds Adam Armstrong once again he takes it first time and with Ruddy signalling that it’s going over, it dips late and pings off the top of the bar and out.  We win it back and create another chance for Smallbone which he drills narrowly wide of the far post.  Half time and this second half could well be season defining.  No changes and off we go.

An early chance with Adams feeding Arma on the left, goes begging with a scuffed effort at the keeper but next time around, Smallbone gives a short ball to Brooks, who cuts across the pitch as he always does, onto his left foot but with no one closing him down, he almost casually bends it round Ruddy and into the net to level things up again.

From our next attack after the restart we win a corner.  Smallbone takes it and it’s knee-height and cleared to Stansfield who can only clear as far as Smallbone on the right and he gets his head up and crosses it first time to the back post where Adams brings it down, has a little stumble and then manages to poke it into the far corner of the net. 3-2 and this game is mental.  Che is calm though with the respectful lack of celebration.

No Celebrations Required From Che

With Birmingham seeing the game slipping away, captain Dion Sanderson then comes steaming in on Smallbone in midfield and the big clumsy bollocks turns his back and goes in with studs up in a stamp motion and catches him high and the referee stops our four on three attack to go straight over and send him off.  To be fair, he thought it was a red card challenge straight away but if he’d let play go on for even five seconds, Adams puts Brooks in and we score… or maybe not but the point is, let it go for a few seconds when there’s a clear advantage – you can still send him off afterwards.

As the game restarts, Bacuna decides to wipe out Smallbone for no readily apparent reason and the referee does nothing but then Smallbone gets him back and gets a yellow of his own. He is public enemy number one in the blue part of Birmingham.  With Edozie having just come on for Brooks, there’s another change as Aribo comes on for Smallbone.

You would think that our possession-based play and always trying to find the spare man, would be perfect against ten men but we begin to get a bit ragged as the Blues fans get behind their team.  After some sloppy play by Aribo in midfield, Birmingham attack down our right and Laird stops, goes and pisses past Ryan Manning.  The cross is pulled back to Stansfield who shoots and sees it hit the far post and bounce out to Bacuna who can’t miss and doesn’t.  We just can’t defend today.

Substitution time and the face of it there doesn’t seem to be much thought going into this other than throwing on fresh players with the shit-tuplets of Sulemana, Rothwell and Mara coming on for Downes, Adams and Manning.  You would say that with our new 3-3-4 formation, we’re either going to win or lose and drawing is not an option.  Sulemana might make a difference with his pace but the other two won’t and I’m prepared to put that out there and hope to be proved wrong.

Sulemana wins a corner on the left and Rothwell hits the first man with it and then we win one on the left.  Luckily Stuart Armstrong is still on the pitch to take the corner so Rothwell doesn’t get the opportunity to put it nowhere near anyone, and he hangs up a ball towards the 6 yard line, headed down by THB and there is big Joe to take a touch, swivel and smash it into the net. 4–3-pandemonium.  Three points, thank you and goodnight.

Well, we won and it was ridiculously entertaining for the neutral.  Four goals, a late winner, three points – what’s not to like about that?  Quite a lot actually, but first let’s talk about the attacking play which at times was quite breathtaking today.  We could and probably scored more than the four we got as we created so many good chances.  Brooks and Smallbone were having a field day on our right and the creativity was off the scale but we missed chances again.  However, if we had any strikers who were ‘one shot, one goal’ merchants, they wouldn’t be playing in the Championship for us.

It’s another game where we have basically got out of jail despite being a fucking nightmare defensively from start to finish. Three really bad goals conceded which meant that we ended up making incredibly heavy work of it, even after Birmingham big donkey Sanderson got sent off.  I can’t get away from the fact that we are letting in so many goals. Clean sheets get you promoted and get you up the table and we had the magic formula for that during our long unbeaten run.  We were keeping loads of clean sheets with a settled back four and goalkeeper with Downes in front of them.  We can only hope that when KWP is fit that he comes straight back in right back and Jack Stephens returns to the substitutes bench. We had a brilliant centre back pairing who played off each other and knew exactly how to deal with long balls pumped into our half for example, but changing it means uncertainty and the amount of times that our defenders were looking round at each other proves that the uncertainty is now there. Conceding three goals against Birmingham is just not good enough. It was another game similar to Huddersfield and occasionally it will work but more often than not, simply trying to outscore the opposition knowing that they are going to score at least two, will not work and Russell Martin knows that.

Make no mistake, Birmingham‘s first goal should never have stood, it was a fucking blatant handball. Last year I watched JWP put the ball where he wanted to with his hands and then smash it into the net. Thing is, they were free kicks and this wasn’t much different. How the ref and linesman can miss that is totally beyond me but I guess it evens up the THB offside header we had against them at St Mary‘s.

Saints response to going behind was decent and a good flowing team move ended with Brooks putting the ball through for a suspiciously offside looking Adam Armstrong (unproven) to score first time through Ruddy. Adam is much more likely to score if he doesn’t have to take a touch.

As said, we completely controlled from the 20th minute until the 44th, missing a few chances and then conceded a goal that wouldn’t have looked out of place on the Veracity Ground in front of three men and a dog, with a big boot down the middle and Bednarek being unable to make his mind up between letting it run and heading it and basically doing neither. Conjecture of course but I reckon if he was playing centre back with THB, that goal wouldn’t have happened because he would’ve known exactly where Taylor would be.

The two goals in a few minutes at the start of the second half, along with the deserved red card for big donkey Sanderson and it looked like we were going to canter to the finish line. Brooks’ goal was a brilliant finish but shit defending to not put any pressure on him and Adams’ goal is the product of determination to still score after slipping over and before that, an excellent piece of anticipation and a superb pick out by Smallbone.

Everyone of Birmingham persuasion is saying it isn’t a red card but I don’t really know what they’re looking at as he turns his back on Smallbone and then stamps down.  Yes, he doesn’t catch him fully but there’s definitely contact and it’s a dangerous way to go into a tackle so these days, I have absolutely no surprise that the referee sent him off.  As soon as he turned his back on the player he was tackling, it just looked like he was trying to do him and even if that wasn’t the intention, it’s so shit and gives the ref the opportunity.

Ryan Manning is not a great defender. His more obvious gaffes lead to him being scapegoated and then of course there’s a reaction to him being scapegoated and people look past certain things, but the way he allowed Laird to just walk past him and put the cross in that led to the third Birmingham goal was under 11s defending and his drift infield and leaving his man on the first goal wasn’t great either.  Jack Stephens didn’t cover himself in glory on the third goal either, allowing Stansfield to get that shot away.

And then Joe turns up in the 94th minute. Always believe in your soul etc.  I have never seen him turn and move so fast when he realises he’s running the wrong way to celebrate with the fans behind the goal.

The sub-plot of today’s game is the performance of Will Smallbone of course got two assists for the second and third goals. He’s had a tough week with all the social media abuse but showed strength of character to come through it.  He plays well when he’s not deployed as a defensive midfielder.  He’s a good player when played in the correct position with the right people around him and where I disagree with Russell Martin is Russell‘s assertion that Will is flexible and can play number of positions and I just don’t think he is.  Before being switched to cover Downes’ absence, he had been playing well ever since Joe Aribo went to the Afcon and Joe Rothwell was signed.  Put him back in the correct position and he plays well again.

Russell Picks the Man of the Match

Three points and dropped points today for Leeds and Leicester so the gap to the top two closes. We have to back this up now and break our losing streak at home when Preston visit on Wednesday. Let’s hope we have the regular back four in place from the start of the game and up the fucking Saints.

FA Cup 5th Round - Liverpool 3 Southampton 0

 

Here's Our Player Chipping the Keeper : No Goal

Unless you have been living under a rock for the last couple of months, you will know that this is Jürgen Klopp’s last season as Liverpool manager. If you have just emerged from under that rock and you tuned into any sports media anywhere in the world for longer than about 30 seconds, you will know that it’s Jürgen Klopp‘s last season as Liverpool manager. The media coverage is endless.

You will also know that Liverpool have lots of injuries and have a fixture pile up. You will also know as they have been playing a lot of their academy products in recent games, including the Carabao Cup final which they won 1-0 against Chelsea, with a goal by a defender who was average before they paid a world record fee for a defender to sign him from… who was it again?… Oh yes, Celtic. Oh no, hang on, that was Southampton. Southampton signed him from Celtic for a reasonable fee, developed him into one of the worlds best central defenders and then Jürgen tapped him up by inviting him to Blackpool and the rest is history.  As for the fixture pile-up, yes Liverpool have had quite a few games recently but they’ve had less than Saints but I would expect that to be overlooked by anyone in mainstream sports media talking about the game tonight.

Liverpool, as you’d expect from a club of their stature, are still in the running for all four major trophies and having won the smallest one of those, the dream narrative would be for them to win the quadruple in Klopp’s last season. Last year, Pep Guardiola and Manchester City were on for the quadruple until they came across Nathan Jones at St Mary’s. In one of the more ‘strange but true’ episodes from last season, Nathan Jones stopped Pep winning the quadruple. Is it Russell Martin’s turn today?

Russell has done his usual and alluded to the fact that we have so many games coming up in the build-up, which means that there will be a fair few rested today. Liverpool will doubtless do the same and this is a sad indictment of the fixture planning and the decrease in importance of the FA Cup.

Talking of which, the teams are in and Liverpool only have van Dijk and Gakpo from their first team with Gomez and Tsimikas being the other senior players.  Saints have Bednarek and Manning from the first team – Aribo and Edozie from there or there abouts and all the squad players – Lumley, Bree, Stephens, Rothwell, Charles, Mara, Sulemana.  It’s a weird felling as the game kicks off – I of course want us to win but don’t feel that I’ll really give too much of a shit if we don’t.

Saints start really well and show that we want to pop the ball about, easily breaking the Liverpool press.  There are less than 30 seconds on the clock as Aribo puts Mara through and he looks miles offside but strides on and finishes low past Kelleher.  A brief visit to Stockleigh Park because we have VAR tonight..

Craig: Hello from Anfield – Craig Pawson here
SP: What do you want?
Craig: Just checking that offside
SP: Why?  I switched off when I saw who it was – shit!
Craig: What Sekou Mara?
SP: No, Southampton – they haven’t paid their VAR subscription with Sky this year Craig
Craig: Well they’re in the Championship – where the refs are shit but honestly shit
SP: Less scope to get the result we want though Craig, if you know what I mean?
Craig: Offside it is then.
SP: Hail Jurgen
Craig: Hail Jurgen

Liverpool overplay in midfield and Aribo gets a tackle in and tees up Sulemana on the left and he takes his time and his low right-footed effort comes across Kelleher and flicks off the far post and wide. Shit.  A decent effort but has to score really.

Liverpool or not looking any more comfortable as we go on with van Dijk and Gomez combining to play Bradley into trouble and he gets binned by Mara and Mara ends up dead centre, edge of the penalty area with the whole goal to aim at and with a swing of his left foot and visions in his head of the net bulging and being a hero - he puts it straight at the fucking keeper.

We decide to keep attacking until we score and Sulemana wins a corner off of Quansah.  In it comes from Rothwell and Aribo has a header blocked before we recycle it back out to Rothwell and he cuts in onto his right foot and then sharts it wide of the far post.  I am reminded of that Roy Hodgson meme where he gets his hopes up before seeing them smashed to pieces and slumping back into his chair.  Another break and once again it’s Sulemana taking on Quansah and bursts past him before once again shooting straight at the fucking goalkeeper.

Aribo puts Mara away on the right and he’s 1v1 against van Dijk, with Edozie in support.  Mara’s brain is thinking ‘take on best defender in world or pass it to the unmarked team mate?’ and his decision making is predictably terrible and doesn't end well.

One Attack, One Deflection, One Goal

Approaching half-time and Liverpool‘s first real attack sees a corner headed out as far as Elliot and his low shot is well saved by Lumley.  Liverpool come again though with the next attack with Clark (son of Lee) feeding Tsimikas (son of some Greek bloke) out on the left and he finds Koumas (son of Jason) on the edge of the box and he cuts across Jack Stephens (son of Russell Martin) and gets a shot away and it flicks off Bednarek (son of Poland) and gives Lumley (son of Joanna) no fucking chance at all. For fuck‘s sake.

Once everyone calms down, we do our best to kill the game off before half-time when Bree runs into traffic and gives the ball away in our half and eventually it falls to Gakpo who drags his shot wide.

Half time and overall we’ve played well, broken the press, created chances, missed them and paid for it due to a bit of bad fortune.  The bad fortune wouldn’t be so much of an issue if we’d been two goals ahead like we should have been.  Interestingly, because it is a Premier League side after all, we’ve sat a bit deeper and the shape in midfield has been good.

Saints start the second half relatively well with Charles and Aribo combining to send Edozie away on the right and his low cross is touched away from Mara by Konate and then Sulemana can only hit the fucking keeper again. Rothwell’s corner is there met by Aribo, who flicks it narrowly over the bar.

Another attack, another corner on the other side this time.  In it comes from Manning and it drops to Charles at the back post and he takes the touch has all the time to shoot and shits himself and produces an awful effort to shag it into the side netting.  Groan!!!

KWP and Adam Armstrong are on for Bree and Sulemana on the hour mark.  I’d have left Kamaldeen on to be honest as he was still looking dangerous.  Ten minutes go by and Edozie is off for Adams and Rothwell for Smallbone.

Here's Their Player Chipping the Keeper : Goal

Manning brings the ball forward and feeds into Smallbone for his first touch and he passes it directly behind where Manning was and straight to Harvey Elliott, who feeds it into Jayden Danns and the young substitute chips it easily over the onrushing Lumley.  Game over.  In the aftermath of the goal, KWP has worryingly gone off to be replaced by THB.

The tempo of the game has completely changed as well.  Alexis Mac Allister is on for Liverpool and they are now dominating and we can’t get out.  Aribo gives the ball away in blowing out of his arse fashion and the cross comes in from the left, headed out by Bednarek as far as Bradley and his improvised effort with the outside of his boot is pushed out by Lumley and Danns follows it in for a simple second goal.

Please let it end… and eventually it does.

Oh well, lost 3-0, fuck it.

On the positive side, we played pretty well for the first hour and showed a lot of bravery to play out from the back the way that we did and it should have brought reward as we beat the press regularly and created a load of chances.  However, miss them all and you don’t go in ahead at half-time, you go in 1-0 down to a spawny deflected effort from Liverpool’s first attack of note.

We started off the second half reasonably well but in the last half an hour, Liverpool took over and our substitutes just made the team worse.  Liverpool bringing on Mac Allister made their team much more difficult to play through as well.  When we had Edozie and Sulemana on the wings, we always had the prospect of breaking and causing them trouble in wide areas but when we replaced those with Adam Armstrong and pushing Mara out wide, you haven’t got that out ball or anyone carrying the ball forward, especially when you combine that with the slowest midfield three in history with Charles, Aribo (who played pretty well but was blowing out of his arse by this point) and Smallbone, who is the very definition of what you don’t want in an impact substitute.  Minor gripes however from a game where the expected happened.  The only real setback that matters is the injury to KWP and at time of writing there was no news on how serious that is.

I thought the back four and goalkeeper all played relatively well.  Bree did ok in his first game back but in hindsight, 45 minutes would have been enough.  Joe Lumley acquitted himself well in goal and didn’t have much chance with any of the goals. As said, Joe Aribo had a really good first half and Shea Charles did a good job defensively and just makes me wonder even more, why he’s not been in the side of late with Flynn Downes injured.  He did have his usual quota of flaky passing and giving the ball away but he was no worse than Rothwell who gave the ball away just as many times from a lot less possession.

The reason we didn’t have a decent go at winning this was down to the profligacy up front. Out of our misses, the only one that I would call unlucky was the one where Sulemana side footed that effort onto the post. Other than that, further misses by Sulemana and Mara were just shit.  Shea Charles, Aribo, Bednarek and Edozie all missed presentable chances. Mara – bloody hell.  Not only was it funny that he got 95 minutes, he also provided the funniest moment of that game was when he had a choice of playing a simple five yard ball to put Edozie clean through or taking on Virgil van Dijk, probably the best one on one defender in the world.  I mean, full marks for confidence or stupidity, one of the two.  Needless to say, he became a trailing speck of dust as Virgil moved upfield with it.

Our aim this year is of course to get promoted and play against Liverpool and all the others next season.  Even though it was Liverpool kids today in the main, the increase in speed and intensity showed up a few of ours today and is a bit of a reminder of how much work would need to be done on the squad in the event of us going up.  Though he wasn’t alone, Adam Armstrong proved once again that against slightly better opponents then you get in the Championship, not being able to control the football when it is passed to you is a bit of a disadvantage.

We lost again because we didn’t take our chances, end of story. We had so many chances in the first half whilst Liverpool‘s scratch team was growing into the game but didn’t take them and once Liverpool upped their game a little bit, helped admittedly by the slightly fortunate first goal, we didn’t really have an answer.  The five and a half thousand travelling fans were magnificent however.

Personally, I watched it on ITV and the coverage was a Klopp-centric as you’d expect it to be - very ITVomit.  It was all about him and his teeth and hair and the Liverpool youngsters and it was a great opportunity to shut them up but we blew it in that first half.  Sam Matterface can get in the bin as a commentator.  Absolutely shite and he’s bailed out by Ally McCoist, though he was a bit difficult to understand at the start of the game before the beers had worn off and he becomes less ‘Glasgow’.

So, we lost and in the scheme of things, it doesn’t really matter and it would’ve been Manchester United away in the next round anyway.  It would have been interesting as we might have done well against a side not known for pressing particularly well. We’ve gone to Anfield, we've played pretty well in patches, we’ve got knocked out and now we move on.

Being out of the FA Cup doesn’t matter is shit in the context of this season and all we can do is take the positives from this game and take them in to the rest of the league campaign where have very little margin for error, starting with Birmingham City away on Saturday. Win that and I will not give a toss about this game.

Up the Fucking Saints.