FA Cup 4th Round - Southampton 2 Blackpool 1

 

Big Willy Style

FA Cup 4^th Round and a visit of Blackpool who for the afternoon are swapping their seaside town for ours. I wonder if any of their fans will go and check out Weston Shore whilst they’re here?

Most of the talk on social media around Saints this week has not been about this game but has instead been about the transfer window and they seemingly never-ending quest for a player who can actually put the ball in the net with some regularity. Having brought Janny B back from his loan spell at Villa, we recruited another defender this week in the shape of James Bree from Nathan Jones former club, Luton Town.  Bree is primarily a right back who can also operate on the right of a three-man defence, so it seems that this hybrid system that we are failing to master at the moment, is here to stay.  Bree was out of contract at the end of the season, so the signing for £750 grand is pretty low risk.  It does raise a question about the other right backs in our squad. We don’t really need cover for the rest of this season because we have KWP and we also have Ainsley Maitland-Niles, even with Tino Livramento still being injured. It wouldn’t surprise me if this is to cover the fact that KWP will probably be off in the summer, regardless of what division we will be playing in next season.

Like ourselves, Blackpool are struggling in their respective division, which is of course the Championship.  Up until a couple of weeks ago they were managed by ex-Skate manager Michael Appleton but he was sacked and they have appointed managerial stalwart Mick McCarthy who despite having been around forever, remains very likable for the neutral. It’s actually McCarthy‘s first game in charge of Blackpool because last weeks’ league game was off so he will be looking to make an impression today.

With the Newcastle semi-final on the horizon next Tuesday, it will be interesting to see how close to the first team line-up Nathan Jones goes. I cannot imagine that he will not take the opportunity to play the likes of Joe Aribo and others who haven’t played much recently. Maybe there will be an opportunity for one of the B team youngsters like Jimmy Jay Morgan or Dominic Ballard that you could also make arguments for the likes of Sekou Mara and Mislav Orsic to start.

Talking of Jimmy Jay Morgan, he made some headlines during the week by turning down the offer of his first full professional contract. On the one hand, he said that he wanted to play first team football which is understandable but on the other hand, it was said that Arsenal was his preferred choice of club where he will 100% be further down the pecking order that he is here. I can think of Bukayo Saka and Emile Smith-Rowe who have come through the Arsenal Academy to 1st team level and every other youngster like Martinelli or Saliba have been brought in. However, if I was a young striker scoring every week for the B team and I was watching Saints strikers totally failing to hit the net, I’d be pretty frustrated as well. Wait it out kid, you will certainly get a chance.

In the event, Jones spring a surprise leaving out JWP.  There are starts for Perraud, Mara, Orsic and Romeo Lavia.  ABK has returned from injury and the only player on show that is probably guaranteed to start against Newcastle is Lyanco.  Captain for the day is Big Willy.

Away we go in Blackpool are sitting off and inviting Saints to have possession and we’re nt used to that so initially we don’t look like we know what to do.  Eventually we work an opening for Orsic about 25 yards out they clips it with his right foot just wide of the left-hand post. Decent start.

There’s a bit of an incident after 10 minutes when the ball gets rolled to the Blackpool goalkeeper to clear and Mara goes to close him down but for some reason he launches a double footed dropkick in an attempt to block the clearance. The keeper clears the ball and then makes out that Mara has made contact with him. Embarrassingly, Premier League referee Craig Pawson decides to book Mara I assume for leaving the pitch without permission.  Fucking goalkeeper was a disgrace however and thankfully makes a full recovery.

Lavia picks up the ball in midfield and pings it over the full back to where Edozie chests it down and Hamilton barges into the back of him to give us a free kick. With no JWP starting, Orsic and Perraud stand over the ball and with the angle naturally favouring the left footer, it’s no surprise that Orsic dummies taking it and Perraud absolutely lashes it, straight through the wall straight into the bottom corner of the net. Get in.

"I'm Going to Belt the Shit Out of It Mislav"

Having taken the lead, Saints of course can’t do things the easy way and Lavia gets dispossessed on the edge of the Blackpool penalty and Blackpool spring a break on us.  Poveda breaks up the left hand side and knocks the ball into Yates, who just has AMN in front of him and his side footed effort is acrobatically turned away in Big Willy Style.

With the corner survived, the half plays out in similar fashion as before. Lavia and Aribo are bossing the midfield and Saints are looking pretty competent and comfortable.  Most of Saints attacking play is coming through Edozie and he takes on and beats two players as he makes his way to the penalty area before laying the ball back to the edge of the box dead central where Elyounoussi smashes it but it hits a defender.

Half time and no changes in personnel but as we’re winning and playing reasonably, there of course is a tactical change because with the greatest of respect, why not?  Aribo seems to have pushed further forward so now it’s just Lavia as the sole defensive midfielder.  We then switch off big style as Blackpool play a long ball down the line and we are all over the place and for some reason, waiting for a free kick with ABK is on the deck. The ball looks like it’s running out for a throw and everybody fucking stops but there is no flag and Yates puts Poveda clean through and with just Big Willy to beat he tries to chip and no one chips Big Willy.  The ball goes back to Poveda who has the whole goal to aim at and a Big Willy coming straight at him, deliberately and accurately passes it into the Northam End.

Our first real attack of the half starts with Perraud out of the left.  He darts infield, plays a 1-2 with Mara and smashes it past the keeper to make it 2-0.  Nice goal to be fair but I can’t imagine Mick McCarthy will be terribly happy with the defending and lack of pressure on the ball.

With it now 2-0, it’s safe to bring on Theo Walcott who replaces Orsic. Immediately Aribo proves he’s still out there by driving forward from midfield and after a 1-2 with Edozie, his shot is blocked for a corner.  It’s looking comfortable for us out there and then of course, it isn’t as we give the ball away in midfield, Bowler goes past Lavia and a simple ball square by Yates finds Patino who scores with ease which is what tends to happen when you leave a player completely unmarked on the penalty spot.  Now this is a lot more difficult than it should’ve been.

Saints and into panic mode with the odd break forward out of the shambles and from one of these Walcott runs at the defence with all the conviction of a 34-year-old with cheese for hamstrings and his eventual shot hits a defender and a flicks up in the air and comes down on top of the goal. Surprisingly, he hasn’t injured himself.

We have totally lost control of the game in midfield with Elyounoussi and Aribo now not helping helping out Lavia at all so to correct this, Jones makes three like for like subs which don’t, with the greatest of respect, actually correct anything at all on the face of it.  Diallo is on for Lavia and there’s two charges upfront with Edozie and Mara being replaced by Adam Armstrong and Che Adams.

Diallo immediately gives away free kick 35 yards out because we are so good at defending them and for some reason there is a load of handbags.  In comes the free kick, ABK heads out for a corner and up comes the goalkeeper. Over it comes and another corner… and another one which is headed goalwards and caught and claimed by Big Willy who lays on the ground and like any 41 year old, he’s gonna take a while to get up.  Final whistle.

With the Greatest of Respect Nathan, The Half Time Change was Mental

Jesus that was hard work. I’m not necessarily talking about Saints finding Blackpool hard work but it was a tough game to watch.  The first half was quite slow paced with Saints pretty much in control throughout and leading through Perraud’s free-kick but not really creating any other chances.  The second half we made more difficult for ourselves when we lost control of the midfield but having gone 2-0 up, we really should’ve coasted through the rest of the game. Instead of that, we contrived to give away a shit goal and then resorted basically to booting it anywhere and let a very limited Blackpool side have a decent shout of getting a replay.

It was a difficult game for Nathan Jones because his focus was very much on Tuesdays game at Newcastle, but the bottom line is that we got through. tThe tactical change in midfield  at half-time didn’t help us and we were worse in the second half as a result. Also feel that the substitutions weren’t really geared to regaining control when Blackpool got the goal back. We were still too light in midfield as two of the substitutions were just like for like subs up front. 

With the greatest of respect, Jones also did his usual and made a twat at himself in the press conference afterwards, saying that the fans wanted us to push forward against Newcastle even when we only had 10 men and we’d probably be out of the tie.  For some reason he felt it necessary to come up with this straw man argument to prove a point that didn’t need proving.  So, you know more about football than the average fan Nathan? Well, with the greatest of respect, it would be slightly fucking worrying if you didn’t.

Today was a game for fringe players to either show why they should be in the team or to prove that the manager is right to not have them in the team. Romain Perraud certainly came into the first category, scoring both goals and making a mockery of the recent decisions by Nathan Jones to leave him out in favour of a hybrid left winger/left wing back which has never really worked. Maybe if we play a proper left back and a proper right back, we might stop so many crosses coming in from the wings. It was also promising performance in midfield by Romeo Lavia who played for a good 85 minutes before coming off. The manager needs confidence that Romeo can get through 90 minutes and I suspect Romeo needs that himself. Lyanco had a decent game at centre back next to the unsurprisingly rusty ABK and we of course had a bit of Big Willy in goal and it was nice for him to be captain for the day and finish on the winning side.

Joe Aribo had a strange match. I thought he was very good in the first half dropping deep to pick up the ball and constantly wanting to be involved but in the second half he seemed to get moved further forward and struggled to get on the ball and he kind of just existed with the game going on around him. Elyounoussi, who was stationed next to him for most of the game was his usual mix of tidy play to keep the ball and moving it sideways or backwards but was the same as he always is when it came to trying to pass the ball forwards. His passes simply never connect and just get intercepted because they are usually so telegraphed and under hit.

With the signing of James Bree, I kind of feel that Ainsley Maitland-Niles should really be packed off back to Arsenal if we can do so. The guy played like he was on something again and really doesn’t look interested.  He does good things at times nut most of the time, it looks like it's all just too much effort for him.  It’s one of the Premier League‘s great mysteries why AMN is still on the books of Arsenal.

Up front saw a slightly disappointing performance by Mislav Orsic who really struggled to get into the game and was wayward with his passing throughout.  Patience is needed thought because he’s having to get used to a different style of football at the age of 30.  Many have failed before and we just have to hope he can adapt though I had hoped to see better today though, against Championship opposition.  Sekou Mara had obviously been told that he should’ve put a tackle in on Emi Martínez when we played Villa the other week and this saw his ridiculous two footed lunge in front of the goalkeeper that got him a yellow card. Other than that, he did his usual and buzzed around but barely got a touch of the ball, always seeming to get there just a little bit too late.  His main contribution was of course though, the short pass back to Perraud for the second goal.

Blackpool and Mick McCarthy have more important fish to fry this season for their fans were excellent and his team worked very hard in his first game so I hope they stay up.  I imagine that Mick will be having a word about bravery in the wall and trying to chip the keeper when clean through.

Through to the 5th round we go, where having played Crystal Palace and Blackpool, we hope to be drawn against another one of the teams that we beat on the route to winning the cup in 1976, so that leaves either Aston Villa or West Brom or Bradford City…. All of whom are out, so I guess that just leaves Manchester United and to be honest, we don’t wanna play those wankers just yet. (UPDATE: We have the winners of Luton and Grimsby at home in what of course, with the greatest of respect to Grimsby, might be the Nathan Jones Welsh Mining Village Derby)

Next up of course is the Carabao Cup Semi-Final second leg against Newcastle. I repeat the words of Kevin Keegan once more “I would love it if we could beat them, love it”.

6 days to go - Nothing to Worry About!

Aaaargh!  We got no wingers !!!

Pre season is traditionally an exciting time for supporters regarding players coming to or going from their club.  As supporters we’re living in hope of signing a player who is going to be a game changer or signing a player who is going to strengthen a rather obvious weakness in your team.  It’s also a time where you have to be patient, especially this year as pre-season is longer than usual due to Euro 2012 and the Olympics.

The glaring deficiencies in the Saints squad are at centre half and on the wings where we have no back-up for the recognized first choices and no standout candidates respectively.  There are two weeks to go until the season starts and a further two until the window shuts but I’m beginning to get a bit concerned that an injury to Jos or Jose will see Dan All-at-Seaborne in the side to play against Aguero, Balotelli and Tevez when we kick off on the 19^th.

Let’s face it, he didn’t prove he was good enough to play against all those Total Football exponents in League 1, especially against the few sides that attacked us and played on the floor.  It’s obviously been decided that Aaron Martin is not ready and so he’s been loaned out to Palace and that Dan Harding is not good enough so he’s been sold to Forest (more on that later).  Elsewhere in the squad, Dicko, Barney and Johnno Pace have been told they’re free to move on as well so why is Seaborne still here when he’s arguably the most ill equipped for the Prem out of all of them?  Is it because that his long term injury means that Nigel and Crozzer haven’t made their mind up about him yet or is it that we can’t get anyone else in?  Why is it that Aaron Martin has been loaned out and replaced in the squad with the even younger Jack Stephens?  The answer is, in pure Adkinspeak, that “lots of work is going on behind the scenes”.  We know that but it doesn’t stop me worrying at our apparent lack of activity.

In the meantime we’ve been playing friendlies including one which bizarrely, was televised on Channel 5.  I thought our centre half problems had been sorted when I saw Ken Monkou pitch side at the Ajax game but sadly, the 48 year old colossus can’t hack it anymore even though I’d be less worried about him playing than Dan Seaborne.

A brief run through of the friendlies – we lost 1-0 to Ajax with the goal coming from Jose Fonte keeping to fine footballing principles and passing the ball out of defence which was OK until his pass went straight to an Ajax player who smashed it in the net.   There were decent performances with Adam Lallana and James Ward-Prowse being picked out by Ajax manager Frank de Boer who didn’t mention the fine debut from Paolo Gazzaniga’s hair which features a little ponytail to make him look hard.  Seriously – forget getting him to sing a song as part of his initiation – shave his head.

Wolves at home saw a decent performance and a 2-0 with goals from Billy Sharp and Punch.  Billy’s goal in particular was very well worked and Punch seems to be putting in a decent shift in pre-season despite being on most people’s list of players who won’t be here at the start of the season so fair play to him. 

A trip to Ashton Gate to play against last seasons double-defeat-inflicting Bristol City saw us dominate the opening of the game before going 1-0 down to a decent goal from the usually very average Jon Stead.  We created loads of chances playing decent football and missed them all before a good old fashioned cross into he mixer was headed down by Sir Rickie and Billy Sharp was there again to nick the equalizer at the back post and so the game ended 1-1 which proves that we have moved on massively from last season when we got beaten twice by this lot.  Bring on Manchester City….erm.

Before we can start dreaming of starting the season with a win at Eastlands, we had our final friendly against Udinese at home and I made a late decision that I was going to go.  I took to the new look Saints website and after 4 hours of trying to navigate my way round it and find the cost of tickets, I’d missed the match - part of that story may be true.  Actually, what happened was that I found of the prices and got hit with a large dose of ‘fuck that’ and so neatly dodged our 4-0 defeat, courtesy of some stunning goals including two from Di Natale who was last seen playing in the Euro 2012 final.  Reality check – oh yes.

As a general point though, the prices for the friendlies have been ridiculous.  By definition the games are just extended training sessions and we’re being asked to pay £20 for it.  I’ve seen it mentioned that Season Ticket Holders should be given free seats for friendlies ... why not try it and see how the money works out with a gate of 15000 instead of 5000.  Failing that, make the top price a tenner.

I never take friendly results as an indicator of an impending good / bad / indifferent season  but I have to say that I’ve been a wee bit concerned by our new formation which as I write, 6 days before our first game, we don’t have the players to carry off.  Nigel’s thinking appears to be that we need 3 players in the middle of the park and one of those should be Adam Lallana as he doesn’t have the requisite pace out wide.  OK – I buy that but it causes problems elsewhere.   If Adam is not on the left, we need someone else and at present, that someone is J-Rod who is no more a left winger than Jos Hooiveld.  Paying £6million-ish for a centre forward and playing him on the left wing seems odd and it illustrated perfectly against Udinese when we didn’t have the ball much and J-Rod spend most of his time running towards our own goal about 3 miles from the place centre forwards would usually be. Punch seems to be the man in favour on the right wing but as we know, he’s totally left footed and when was his last good competitive game in a Saints shirt?  Other candidates like Guly and Chappers do not have pace and the one who does, Steeeeeeeve isn’t anywhere the starting XI I would have thought.  Also of course, this formation leaves room for just one of Sir Rickie and Billy Sharp and both of them are the kind of players that need other players near to them. They both have many attributes but pace isn’t one of them.  Sir Rickie would be picked out of the two of them which would be harsh on Billy who has 5 pre-season goals so far.

The wingers issue has obviously not gone unnoticed elsewhere as in the last few days we’ve been linked with left winger Matt Jarvis from Wolves who has handed in a transfer request.  Wolves are playing hardball with Sunderland over the fee for their centre forward Steven Fletcher so I imagine they’ll be doing the same over Jarvis and I can’t see us playing £10million for him.  The other player linked is Matt Phillips from Blackpool and the great thing about this one is that we’ve got up Ian Holloway’s nose to the extent that he’s reported us for making an illegal approach, implying that we’ve gone behind his back.  It’s odd that Nigel’s said that he’s had a conversation with Holloway about it.  It’s also odd that Nicola Cortese has had discussions with the Blackpool Chief Exec about it.  Holloway seem to think we’ve not been stand up gentlemen about the whole thing but it’s ok for him to have a rant in a press conference.   I know he’s only looking out for his best interests but he is a cock but watch your back Ian,  it looks to me like people in the upper echelons of your club are trying to sell the player from under you.

The last actual activity that occurred regarding player movement was Dan Harding leaving to join Nottingham Forest.  I was never his biggest fan but he put in some decent performances for us, especially in his first season and knocked in a couple of decent goals when he found himself in the box.  I always found his defending to be poor especially when up against a physical player when he was always found wanting, especially in the air.  He would be buried alive in the Premier League so I’m glad he’s gone but good luck to him as in the main, he did a decent job.

So, 6 days to the start of the season.

Mood - Apprehensive

NPC Match 40 - Blackpool 3 Southampton 0

"I am Premier League and I'm above this Championship Shit you know !"

Oh I do like to be beside the seaside... yeah, whatever.  Think of Blackpool and I think of donkeys but Jason Euell has left.  They’ve got Brett Ormerod (as the song goes) but he never gets a game now, unlike Kevin Phillips who isn’t on the Vodafone network.  On the subject of Kevin Phillips – good player, great goalscorer and a major threat today.  They have other attacking flair in the shape of Matt Phillips and Thomas Ince so if should be interesting.   Ian Holloway is of course, the man in charge and is a very good reason for wanting to win.  A much better reason for wanting to win is that the Fat Sam Total Football Academy are at home to Reading today and we have a great chance to gain some more points on one or both of them.

Firstly, a correction - at the end of the last game I said we needed 15 point to be promoted but that was wrong due the aforementioned FSTFA v Reading game today.  In fact, 13 points will be enough to finish above Fat Sam with our superior goal difference, which, in case you’re wondering Sam, we have because we don’t try to shut up shop at 1-0. 

The main SFC news this week has been the start of the new training complex and the release of the accounts up until June 2011.  The new training complex will be the dogs bollx and costs about as much as we got for Alex Chamberlain, a sale which incidentally, came after those accounts that were published.  I love all this about the training ground, infrastructure and long term thinking as it gives me a warm glow.  Why would you bother with all that if you were just in it for a quick buck?

 I’m sure the trolls will see the headline from the Accounts, that the Liebherr estate loaned us £33m and then converted it to shares, as a negative but (I think) this means that it’s not a liability to the club any more – they have shares in a company that they own.  More troll bait is that wages were 93% of turnover in June 2011 but since then, turnover has gone up 70% whilst wages won’t have increased as much.  In 7 games time we’ll have a fair idea of turnover for next year and I’m led to believe that we’ll get a few quid if we go up.   This is probably one of the most boring couple of paragraphs I’ve ever written but we’re all a bit more interested in football finances these days given our own administration and the stench permanently wafting down the M27 from the East.

So, to the game and we’re on the bloody telly again so it’s a 5.20 kick off.  I made the schoolboy error of assuming it was on Sky so made arrangements to go to the pub and all that that entails before finding out it was on the BBC and I was rumbled and given children to look after.  Of course, with it being a 5.20 kick off, we know the other scores and Fat Sam will be choking on his post match meal of chips, lard and Mars Bars as Reading went to the Boleyn Ground and won 4-2.  Another interesting one is that the Skates played at home to mid-table Burnley and got dicked 5-1.  So, the team failed but even more predictable was that the self proclaimed Best fans in the World ™ failed to Pack the Park.

Back to Blackpool and the TV coverage is the usual cliché ridden pile of shite.  You can imagine the brains trust at the pre-production meeting.  “Listen, it’s at Blackpool, seaside town, famous for the tower so let’s get a shot of the tower in the opening titles along with a shot of a wacky Blackpool fan in a novelty hat as they’re very popular here”.  So, after a shot of the tower and some ugly bint in a stupid fucking hat and glasses (the O’s in pool are the eyes – oh yes), we find out the teams and where’s Sir Rickie? Apparently he’s still in Southampton nursing a groin strain so we have Billy Sharp up front with the returning Guly.  Chappers comes in on the right in place of Steeeeeve and Butters is again at right back in place of Frazer.  Holloway has gone mad with his players and made 7 changes from their last game.  After all the worry about Kevin Phillips, he’s out injured as well so up front they have the lumbering Gary Taylor-Fletcher, supported by the fleet footed Matt Phillips and Tom Ince who is unlike his father in that you don’t immediately want to punch him in the face.

On the sofa as pundits you have Mark Lawrenson and Steve Claridge.  Lawro looks and talks like a man who believes he is above all this Championship lark talking in condescending terms of how he wants to see what all the fuss is about with Lallana and Southampton in general.  Claridge is synonymous with Championship coverage and as such, looks more natural and talks more sense.   He gets a lot of stick from our fans, purely for being a Pompey fan but I think he’s alright.  Put it this way, he’s more objective when talking about Saints than I would be talking about them Skate Bastards.

Away we go and we make a decent start as Blackpool get to grips with all of their team changes and we really should take the lead on 5 minutes as Adam Lallana slides Guly in and he reaches the ball first to chip it over the onrushing Gilks and just wide.  Having got to the ball first he really should have scored with the whole goal to aim at.

We’re on top and controlling things and then in the blink of an eye it all changes as a long ball from the left back catches Butters out and Phillips is away on the left, feeding the lumbering Taylor-Fletcher whose clipped effort is well tipped over by Superkelv.  We clear the corner but another long ball dissects the defence again and Ince is away down the right and he feeds Taylor-Fletcher who lumbers in and sees his prodded effort well saved by a Superkelv boot before he lumbers the rebound wide.  Ince scoots past Foxy straight afterwards and goes himself this time with Superkelv holding his effort at the near post.  So – we’ve gone from in control to in the shit and it’s looking like our last televised appearance against Leeds where Superkelv stopped everything.

In that game of course, we had Sir Rickie to bang in a goal but in this game we don’t and that was illustrated next as after a decent move, Lallana played in Guly who was trashed by the sliding Harris for a penalty.  It was a foul but Guly went down a bit easily it has to be said and the linesman gave it instead of the ref.  I had a quick think about who would take it with Sir Rickie not being present.  I believe that Dean Hammond is the reserve penalty taker but he’s not on the pitch so I’m expecting Danny Fox or Guly to take it.  The punters who have Jack Cork at 750-1 to score the first goal are momentarily excited thinking he may be on the penalties before reality strikes that it’s Billy Sharp to take responsibility.  He does not look confident as he waits for the ref and then he seems to look at the ref again as he starts his run up, bang, keepers right, comfortable save. Bugger.  It’s one of those where if the keeper goes the right way, he saves it.

Four minutes later and we’re back up the other end and Taylor-Fletcher is lumbering up the left wing.  He cuts in and lumbers past Butters and Chappers who knocks him off balance before he lumbers into the penalty area before a lumbering belly flop into Morgan which the ref deems worthy of another penalty.  Maybe he thought that it needed evening up as he didn’t give the one up the other end but it’s a shite decision.  Dobbie, who bears a resemblance to the ugly Harry Potter goblin thing of the same name, places it perfectly into the corner and though Superkelv goes the right way, he has no chance.

Blackpool are now looking the much better side but we’re creating a few things when we go forward and never more so than on the half hour when from a Foxy corner and a Chappers flick on, Big Jos steams in and puts a free header wide of a gaping goal from about 6 yards.  Having watched it a few times, I can’t make up my mind if he should have scored or was it travelling too fast.  My gut feeling though is that from there and with a forehead that wide, he should have scored.

Thirty seconds later and the ball in our net again as Gilks wellies the goal kick, the lumbering Taylor-Fletcher beats Jos in the air and heads it on and Dobbie holds of Jose before firing across Superkelv and into the far corner.  Great finish but absolutely shithouse amateur hour defending from us.  The rest of the first half consisted of lots of sideways and backwards from us and every time we went forward, incorrect offside calls against Billy Sharp.  It isn’t going well or looking good.

Half time and a chance for Lawro to be condescending before we start the second half with Steeeeve coming on for Chappers to add some pace to our efforts to get back into it.  Funnily enough, I feel that this game is completely gone already and as such, I feel kind of immune to what happens next.

The first major action of the second half is Blackpool winning a corner and the kick being headed over the bar by Baptiste as Jose challenged him.  Not a corner in my book but we completely switch off as Big Jos loses his man to present Evatt with a free header from about 4 yards which he isn’t going to miss, 3-0, game over even more.

We’re never going to score but we have a go as a Fox corner ends up at the feet of Guly near the byline.  He takes his time and picks the best option which is to tee up Lallana who balloons his effort over the bar, no doubt causing Lawro to write down another condescending point to bring up at the end of the game.

Adam does get an effort on target later but it’s cleared off the line and it wouldn’t have counted anyway as Billy Sharp had pulled off that trick whereby he makes the defender who is playing him onside disappear, causing the lino to get it wrong again.  Steeeeve attempts to put the impact into impact sub by flying down the right wing before firing over a decent cross right onto the head of Lallana who manages to not make contact somehow.

By the look of it, Danny Fox is peed off and he has a go at missing the next 3 games with a wild challenge on Ince which I would have applauded if it’s had been his dad on the receiving end.  Luckily it’s only deemed worthy of a yellow and he’s still on the pitch to take a free kick awarded when Jose bursts onto a ball and is taken out on the edge of the box.  Danny’s free kick is round the wall and heading in until Gilks gets across to push it away.

All that’s left is a spate of substitutions as Brett Ormerod comes on for the ugly goblin fucker from Harry Potter and Lee Barnard comes on for Guly.  Nothing changes and my interest is not engaged and you can tell that we know the game is up and we’re not going to mount a storming comeback.  You can also tell that we can’t be arsed any more as Lua Lua comes on for the last few minutes and doesn’t even get much stick, despite being the main protagonist in the ‘Sha la la’ match at Fratton Park in 2005.  The ref can’t be bothered either and ends the game, spot on the 90 minutes + 3 minutes of injury time mark.

Well, how do you sum up that one?  Quite frankly, we were crap and deserved to lose.  You can point at a couple of things that went against us which could have made things turn out differently – Guly should have scored after 5 mins and of course there was the penalty miss. The shite decision to give Blackpool a penalty for a dive was a bit of a turning point but at the end of the day, we got battered and let in two of the worst goals you’re ever likely to see to kill the game off.  We missed a decent chance to put some serious distance between us and Fat Sam but it’s not a disaster as long as we move on.  It reminded me of a game last season at Rochdale where we were on a long undefeated run and then just simply didn’t show up.  Last year of course we kicked on and won every match from there on in and hopefully we can do that again.  Blackpool were decent though and deserved any luck they did get for basically playing with four forwards.  I hate to admit it but Holloway did well as he wasn’t afraid to freshen his side up and they reaped the rewards.

When you come off a long unbeaten run and get thumped – the key of course is how you react.  We have the Skates at home next and in terms of that game, today’s reverse might not be a bad thing.  I was a bit worried about the Skates being more up for it than us but not anymore – there is no danger of any complacency at all having just got stuffed.  We will obviously be hoping that Sir Rickie is fit and Frazer would be a welcome addition as well.  I also feel at this stage that Deano, Lee Barnard, Punch and Steeeve will be in with a shout of starting. There were a number of bad individual performances today and you’d really struggle to pick a SFC man of the match so I’m not going to.

As Nigel is prone to saying, draw a blue line under it and move on - 6 games left, 12 points needed.

Bring on the Skates and at 3pm after we’ve beaten them, I want to hear 30,000 people singing ‘who the fuck is laughing now’.

NPC Match 21 - Southampton 2 Blackpool 2

Buy this twat a stopwatch for Christmas

Blackpool came to SMS trying to banish the memory of the FA Cup match last season when there were two divisions between the sides and our reserves stuffed their reserves while we were ‘avin’ a laugh.  Ian Holloway didn’t like that.  Good.

I was expecting today to be a severe test of the winning home run in view of Blackpool being a half decent side and us being a bit ropey of late.  There would of course be issues if Sir Rickie wasn’t fit but thankfully he was.   On the bench we have no keeper so lets hope nothing happens to the keeper... but we do have Ben Reeves, joining Holmes, de Ridder, Martin and Harding.   Maybe Ben Reeves can go in goal, all 5 foot 3 of him.

I was hearing the Blackpool side being read out and was pleased that two players who I knew would score against us, Rat Boy Phillips and that ex-Skate git Lua Lua were on the bench.  No Brett Ormerod though which was a shame.  I’d missed the Saints team announcement and old Bill who sits next to me said “you’re quite happy with Bart in goal aren’t you?”.   Oh.... hadn’t noticed the absence of Superkelv but I’ve always been happy that Bart is a decent enough keeper and had voiced that opinion on any occasion that Superkelv hadn’t been quite so super.

Saints lined up once more with Morgan on the right of midfield and made a decent start, settling well and zipping the ball about nicely.  The first time Blackpool showed was when Matt Phillips got down the right and crossed from deep straight to Bart who juggled what should have been an easy take, wide of the near post for a corner whilst three quarters of the crowd momentarily shat themselves.

Encouraged by the nervous looking keeper, Blackpool tested him out again when Sylvestre fired in a shot from 30 yards plus and Bart saw it all the way and decided not to use his hands.  The ball smashed into his chest and bounced out to where Deano hacked it clear as Gary Taylor-Fletcher lumbered in.  If ever you are writing anything about Blackpool, try putting ‘Taylor-Fletcher’ in a sentence and not putting the word ‘lumbering’ – it’s impossible.  A bit like ‘Morgan’ and ‘goal-machine’.

Saints miss a decent chance next as Sir Rickie heads down a Lallana cross to the goal-machine that is Morgan whose snapshot flies narrowly over the bar.   Next came another decent chance as Deano came flying in to meet a Frazer cross but again, hit the crowd instead of the net.  On the half hour though, the next chance falls to the real goal-machine as Lallana nicks the ball off of the dozy full back Eardley and feeds Cork who pushes it to Sir Rickie who cuts inside one defender before having a left footed lash which Cathcart obligingly deflects past Gilks and into the net.  We’re ‘avin’ a laugh Ian.... 1-0.

If we were ‘avin’ a laugh then, we were nearly pissing ourselves a minute later as the Gulyman played a great through ball to put Sir Rickie one on one against Gilks but this time, his left footed blast hit the keeper and the chance was gone.  Before you could say “I wonder if we’ll regret that”, Blackpool got down the left and the cross was met by Basham from barely 6 yards out to make it 1-1, giving Bart no chance.  This goal served as a lesson, the lesson being “it’s better to mark the player than stand there with your arm up hoping they’re offside”.... which, as TV replays later proved, he clearly wasn’t.

A foul on Cork meant we got a free kick about 30 yards out, just left of centre.  It looks like a surefire Sir Rickie blast but we over complicate things by chipping it up and making a mess of it.   JUST FUCKING HIT IT!!!  Corky and Morgan both find themselves with shooting chances as the half draws to a close but we’re trying to do an Arsenal and walk it into the net and in both cases, we mess it up.  JUST FUCKING HIT IT!!!!  Matt Phillips shows us the way in the last minute of the half and lashes one in which pings to safety off of the base of the post as Bart watches.

An interesting half of football and during half time I reflect on how we are playing much more direct compared to the start of the season.  Is that down to a lack of confidence or the opposition having sussed us out?  No such pondering for the Chuckle Brothers who have decided that we’re rubbish.  I tune in for a moment and the Moronic one says he was late today so sat on the end of the row and talked to someone else.  I bet they were delighted.

Nigel’s team talk obviously had an element of JUST HIT IT  BUT KEEP IT IN THE BUILDING AND ON THE BUS about it as Morgan shoots and it deflects for a corner which comes to nothing except a break up the pitch by Blackpool and the ball is with McManaman on the left wing.  He cuts in and from 25 yards, hits a right footed rocket which flies into the top corner.  Sorry – thought I was writing for the Official Saints website for a moment.  What actually happened was that he scuffed it and Bart let it go through both his hands and his legs and trickle over the line.  Bart then compounded the ridiculousness of the situation by crawling into the goal like an 18 month old baby to get the ball.  It’s a nightmare – right up there with the worst you’ve ever seen on one of those Football Nightmare DVD’s, one of which I noticed on the shelves in HMV, presented by Olly Murs, who is nothing to do with football and is a wanker.

There are still 40 minutes to go and Gilks in goal decides that it’s time to start wasting some of it, taking an age over a goal kick…. here we go.  The referee really wasn’t doing us any favour at this point with seemingly every 50/50 going Blackpool’s way and no cards being handed out for persistent time wasting.  Joining the ref in being a twat were of course the Chuckle Brothers with the whiny one giving it the full “Why deee dooo daaaahhht?” and  the moronic one checking out any funny anagrams he could make out of Bialkowski.

Back to the serious business of trying to equalize and most of our decent play is coming through the Gulyman who looks dangerous every time he gets the ball, firing in a decent effort which Gilks didn’t take cleanly but unlike Bart, got enough behind it to grab it at the second attempt..  We also go very close on the hour mark as Deano gets into the box and curls one just wide of the far post.  Tensions are rising thanks to the time wasting and the ref and Sir Rickie gets in a shoving match with Barry Ferguson who was, you guessed it, wasting time over getting the ball back to his own keeper.  Both end up getting booked, Sir Rickie for pushing and Ferguson for being a whiny faced little git.

Saints defence are playing a game of ‘Thou shalt not pass.... back to our own keeper” as Jose Fonte embarks on a risky 40 yard dribble from our own goal line, rather than pass it to Bart.   When a back pass does go to Bart it is met with entirely predictable ironic cheers from some of our fans.  That helps doesn’t it lads? Well done.   It’s substitution time with de Ridder and Harding coming on for Deano and Danny Fox and I for one am struggling to see the sense in swapping left backs but Harding quickly adds more energy down the wing.  Soon after, Holloway brings on Rat Boy and Lua Lua in quick succession which at least gives our fans a couple of genuine hate figures instead of having a go at Bart.  This is more like it though I do hope Rat Boy’s wife didn’t have the telly turned up too loud.

The Gulyman heads a Cork cross just over after a long and deliberate build up and we have a double penalty shout as Morgan gets barged over twice in quick succession – the second of which looked pretty blatant from where I was.   The ref wasn’t interest and he also missed a blatant trip on Nigel Adkins by the water bottles, strategically placed behind him on the touchline.

Usually at home, we’re in front and we want the fourth official to put up 1 or 2 minutes but of course they never do.  Today we were hoping for about 10 minutes but 5 would have to do.  Blackpool backed off inviting pressure and in the 93^rd minute, Frazer swung over and inviting cross to the back stick and in steamed Sir Rickie to bury the header for 2-2.  We even had a chance to win it when de Ridder did brilliantly to win the ball and steak towards goal but with both Lallana and Cork in support, he failed to get his head up and totally butchered it.  2-2 in the end and probably a fair result.

Fair that is, unless you’re Ian Holloway who didn’t say much after the game, aside from moaning at the ref for adding 5 minutes and wondering where he got it from.  Let me spell it out for you Ian... concentrate.   For starters, we scored within 3 minutes anyway but as you’re asking... 5 second half substitutions = 2.5 minutes, probably 3.5 with the amount of time your three took to get off the sodding pitch.  The ref just added an additional 1.5 for all the Blackpool time wasting from the 50^th minute onwards... pissing about at every free kick and goal kick, turning your back on ball boy after they’d thrown it back etc.. I’d say there should have been 7 minutes, not 5.  Muppet.  Why not moan about the fact that you didn’t have a shot for the last 40 minutes of the game when it was obvious our keepers’ confidence was shot to shit.

So, the run of home wins came to an end as it was always going to eventually.  Bizarrely, we moved a point further clear of West Ham as they had a shocker at Reading and got beat 3-0.  I haven’t looked at the stats but I feel that we missed a lot of chances today, the main one being at 1-0 when Sir Rickie was through.  That goes in and it’s 2-0 and probably a comfortable win.  Five minutes later and it was 1-1.  Of course, Bart’s performance and the second goal in particular, were horrific but we dug in and though the record has gone, we achieved the next best thing and got a draw... and we pssed the Bumpkin off again.

All things being even, we should still be top of the league when we go to the Beirut’s twin town, Portsmouth to play in the Mecca of Football Grounds, Fratton Park.  They won for the second time in a row today so they’re on a bit of a roll and you never know, they may get more than 13,000 in the ground next week.

Nigel’s post match interview was mainly spent fielding questions on Bart and talking of next week’s match.  He left me in no doubt that the players know the significance of the fixture.  As for Bart, well he had a shocker of course but I felt a bit for him as it must be tough to be a reserve keeper.  You don’t get a game aside from the Carling Cup and there aren’t enough Reserve or U21 matches to rotate all the keepers in the squad.  Having said that – he shouldn’t have been that bad and one suspects that Jack Dovey or Stephen Mowthorpe would have performed batter.   Maybe even Dismal Forecast.  Hopefully Kelvin and maybe even Chappers will be back and we won’t freeze on the day and despite our iffy away form, we have to look forward to this ...

Bring it on.

PS – My son is 7 and plays in goal on a Sunday morning.  This Sunday, at 0-0 and straight after half time, he took a drop kick and somehow managed to kick it vertically upwards.  When it came down, with my lad not knowing where it had gone, a forward just stabbed it into the net.  Meanwhile, another lad missed an open goal at the other end and it’s ‘unlucky’.  Such is the lot of a keeper.  Put Bart and Sir Rickie into this little story and you get roughly the same picture as what happened on Saturday at SMS.  Luckily, my son didn’t have a collection of morons jeering him from the side, just me crapping it every time it went near him.

FA Cup 3rd Round - Southampton 2 Blackpool 0

Yes, we're having a laugh, you bell-end.

FA Cup 3rd Round day and we’re up against Blackpool from the Barclays Cash Cow League. Blackpoool manager and part-time comedian, Ian Holloway told us in advance that he was sending a combination of reserve / youth team players down to play us. One hopes that he thought his team could at least get a draw from the game but who knows. With both teams prioritising elsewhere, it would be interesting to see how keenly each team contested this game and what would happen should it be level going into the last few minutes.

The day started off in fine fashion with Adam Lallana signing a new contract to keep him (relatively speaking) at SMS for the next 4 and a half years. You never know what clauses are in these contracts (so don’t believe what anyone might print on a web forum) but on the face of it, it’s as good a news as we could get. Fair play to you Adam and I hope the club can reward you suitably by getting promoted this season. Now of course, we need to tie up Tommy Forecast on a new five year deal and the squad is complete.

Talking of Dismal Forecast, he’s on the bench as Superkelv is given the day off and Bart is in goal. Centre backs are Aaron Martin and Dan Seaborne, the former of which is making his first appearance for Nigel Adkins. Midfield sees the biggest shock with Jason Puncheon in the side having returned from his loan spell at Millwall. It’s a strange one as he scored 5 goals in 7 matches for them, having been shite for us in a league lower down this season. He also had a dig at Nigel in the papers and any hope of a permanent move for him collapsed when we (allegedly) asked for nearly a million. So, an interesting one. Barney was back up front as the Gulyman was rested. Blackpool’s team contained Brett Ormerod and Jason Euell up front – one player we liked and one we didn’t. Regardless of how I felt about them, I wasn’t worried about the attacking threat posed by either.

Due to my own incompetence, I had got tickets late for this and so the FA Cup tour of SMS has landed me in the Kingsland, up near the Northam End so that’s Northam, Itchen, Kingland for the three rounds so far. The online ticketing system really should tell you when the person sitting in front of you weighs upwards of 25 stone and when they stand up to let someone in, it’s like the sun has gone out. Still – no moaning twat Chuckle Brothers behind me today so can’t complain.

The game starts and what a cracking game it is with both sides trying to play open attractive football. We are in the main managing this and Blackpool have Ormerod and Euell – they also have Matt Phillips who looks a cracking player who is going to give Harding a tough afternoon.

The ball is in the net on 20 minutes when Rachubka is standing with the ball in one hand which Barney heads it out of before rolling it into the net. For a fleeting moment I wondered if this was allowed but according to today’s ref it isn’t which is probably correct. I bet you can find a League 1 ref who would have given it – Andy D’Urso perhaps.

Talking of the ref – he then decides that there is far too much flowing football going on and he has to make himself the centre of attention, first booking Richardson for looking the wrong way and then Martin for pulling out of a tackle. We then have a golden chance to take the lead when Rachubka is flapping around like a budgie and the ball falls to Sir Rickie who manages to smash it against the bar from close range, the ball rebounding and hitting him before dribbling off for a goal kick. The Blockpool keeper is the busiest player on the park though as he has to save from Barney after Lallana teed him up and then has to save from Lallana himself who should have done better when the surprisingly excellent Puncheon teed him up.

Just before half time we had a show of Premiership quality from the visitors as Phillips delivered an excellent cross but fortunately for us, it was onto the head of Euell who didn’t make any contact because he’s crap. Nil-Nil at half time and fatty in front of me begins the long and painful ascent out of his seat and heads towards a half time burger I guess.

The second half starts and it’s exhibition stuff from Schneiderlin which ends in him firing narrowly over the bar. Ten minutes in and we take a deserved lead as Hammond binned someone in the tackle to win the ball high up the pitch and puts Sir Rickie clean through on the left edge of the box. And Sir Rickie must score but he doesn’t and his shot is saved by the foot of Rachubka before rebounding to Barney who takes as long as it takes me to shout ‘ fucking hit it’, before burying it past the two defenders on the line.

Matt Phillips, the one Blackpool player to stand out, created their best effort but his excellent strike from the left was well tipped over by Bart who to be fair, would have been disappointed if he hadn’t saved it. Bart has a difficult moment when he flapped at another Phillips cross but was bailed out by Aaron Martin who produced one of those 100 metre clearances he’s so good at.

In a substitution frenzy – Deano goes down and is replaced by Dickson and then Brett Ormerod is subbed to a standing ovation in recognition for his services to Saints and also for playing another game at SMS without scoring. Blackpool bring on a couple more kids and it’s now all Saints with Barney again testing the keeper and then Sir Rickie teeing up Dicko to go close. We need a 2nd goal and so we need Chamberlain and The Gulyman with Lallana and Barney making way.

On 83 minutes came the clincher as Sir Rickie, running like a man carrying Radhi Jaidi on his back, kept the ball in over on the left wing and fed it inside to Dickson who cleverly stepped over it, allowing it to run to The Gulyman who turned away from goal before smashing a right footed effort around the keeper and into the net. A quite stunning goal and the place went nuts.

There was still time for another chance as Chamberlain went through but instead of squaring to where the unmarked Punch would have had a tap-in, he lashed it past the keeper but unfortunately, it pinged off the angle of post and bar before rebounding away.

A superb performance by us and a thoroughly deserved win. I have never seen a Saints midfield so fluid in formation and so committed. The ball retention was excellent and the closing down and covering was different class. Though I occasionally slate him, the best player on the pitch was Schneiderlin who was simply brilliant, never wasting a ball, never shirking a tackle and being involved for the whole 90 minutes, more so than in any other game I’ve seen him play. Jason Puncheon had his best game of the season for us (not hard) and though I didn’t particularly want him back, on that form he’s going to give teams problems. Over to Nigel to use his degree in psychology (or whatever, to get Punch to want to stay. Lalllana, Chamberlain and Dickson also gave Blackpool massive problems and with a bit more care, all three could have had goals. Defensively we were sound with both Martin and Seaborne having good games and stifling the prolific and savagely dangerous Euell/Ormerod dream team up front. Up front for us, Sir Rickie worked his ass off but really should have scored, both in the first half when he hit the bar and in the second, just before Barney scored…. and then there’s the Gulyman. What. A. Goal – brilliant strike.

Holloway’s post match interview consisted of a dig at the harmless chant of “Premier League, you’re having a laugh”, which was directed at his team. His little comedy rant was no doubt designed to neatly deflect the attention away from the fact that his team were shite and got spanked by a League 1 team who made nearly as many changes. Lets face it, we left out our regular keeper, best centre half, most experienced centre-half, most in-form midfielder (Chaplow) and striker (Guly) – not to mention our hot prospect (shhhhh, don’t tell anyone)….. and we still beat you easily. The funny thing is of course that we’ve been drawn against Man Utd at home in the 4th Round which would have been a nice little money spinner for Blackpool. Anyway, normally I’d have wanted Blackpool to beat Liverpool in their league match on Tuesday but I hope they get battered. To be fair, I’ll go back to liking Holloway again next week but for now he can jog on. Having a pop at us for that is bollocks, especially when he failed to mention the standing ovation for Brett Ormerod. So, yes Ian, we are having a laugh… because we dicked you.

So – Southampton versus Manchester United. As mentioned above, I couldn’t believe it when we got drawn against those twats again. As I’ve said before, the 3rd Round defeat a couple of years back ranks as one of my very worst experiences as a Saints fan because after about a hour, I just didn’t care any more. Then there was relegation in 2005 when they beat us 2-1 and some year in the 90’s when they won the League at The Dell and the Milton End was crawling with Man U fans with Hampshire accents. Still, we play like today and we have a chance….

Lets talk local rivals for a second and it was nice to see Brighton knock Pompey out. It was annoying that Pompey were referred to in the media as ‘last years beaten finalists’ instead of ‘Dirty Skate bastards who cheated and lied their way to the final last year’.

On to more important stuff and Bournemouth’s convincing win over Plymouth in League 1 has moved them above us and so we’re 3rd, so a win v Oldham on Tuesday night is required to get us back into the automatic spot. Bring on the Dickov.

As an aside…. I was listening to Radio Merrington on the way home and I heard the interview with Eddie Howe. He’s been offered either or both of the Charlton and Crystal palace jobs and has to make his mind up. I can only speak for myself but if I was him, I’d stay at Bournemouth. He’s achieving great things there with the restrictions he’s under (a proper transfer embargo, not a Pompey ‘do as you fucking like’ one) and he’d be mad to throw that away to join clubs where he will be under big pressure to deliver or else he will get fired within 18 months. If he was being offered a Premiership job then fair enough but he’s only 33 and he has years of management ahead of him. In my opinion he should stay and learn at a club where he’s not under too much pressure. It’s the same argument as why Alex Chamberlain should stay with Saints at this early stage of his career - there is no need to move when you are that young. The silver lining is that if Howe does go, you can’t see Bournemouth maintaining their challenge but then…. I’ve been saying that for a while and the Moaning Dorset Bastards are still above us.