League 1 Match 43 - Southampton 2 Hartlepool 0

Standard Kingslander Moaning Old Bastard

Due to the lunacy of the Easter fixture schedule, we are playing again, two days after the Lord Mayor’s Show at Brighton. The fixture computer really is a joke with Hartlepool having to travel to the South Coast from the Arctic Circle on Easter Monday. This is the same fixture computer which always has us visiting Hartlepool on a Tuesday night. Auto promotion rivals Huddersfield are at home to Dagenham and Redbridge so neither us nor them would be expecting the other to drop points.

In the car on the way to the ground, I hear on the radio that we are making SIX changes which causes a bit of an intake of breath until your realise that Connolly and Lallana coming in makes the team stronger and Richardson, Harding, Stephens and Seaborne don’t make it weaker. Personally I would have preferred to see Dickson and Chaplow starting but after Saturday in particular, in Nigel we Trust. The point is that the squad is very strong.

There was another change I need to report in that the Chuckle Brothers were not sat together – for some reason they were sat apart as the whiny stupid one was right behind me and the unfunny moronic one was four seats away.... still in earshot though. My theory is that they hate eachother and their bi-weekly “Who is the biggest twat” competition had turned nasty.

The game started and Hartlepool quickly had Richey Hunphreys (Age 38) up front and ten players behind the ball. However, they didn’t have anyone in the proximity of Dan Harding who flew down the wing and fired over a superb low cross which no one had read. A shame as an early goal would have made this an immediately more comfortable afternoon.

We thought the early(ish) goal had come just after the quarter of an hour when Lallana was worked into space by Connolly before a bit of trickery gave him enough space to stand up a lovely cross, right onto the head of the Gulyman on the back post who thumped his header into the net. The keeper thought it was a goal (judging by the way he wellied the ball back to the halfway line) and so did most of SMS the flag was up – very, very tight but probably the correct call.

I’m not saying for a second that I know everything about the game but I’ve been watching Saints for 36 of my 42 years so I’d like to think I know a bit. I find it both incredible and exasperating that some of those around me in the Kingsland Central have probably been watching football since Ted Bates was a player but all they do its moan and don’t seem to have a clue. It’s quite incredible when as soon as a pass goes sideways they start kicking off – “gerrit fooorwerd”. For their information, Saints were passing it about nicely, looking for the right opening and trying to draw out the massed ranks of Hartlepool defenders. Some of the balls into the forwards feet from all the midfielders, showed really good technique and Lambert and Connolly were looking after the ball well and making it stick.

Dean Hammond turned up in the left wing position following a bout of passing and chipped in a cross with the outside of his right foot, to a cacophony of moaning from the people around me. The cross dropped perfectly over the left back to where Sir Rickie controlled on his chest and smashed goalwards, nearly knocking Flinders off his feet as it hit him.

Dan Seaborne is having a bit of a mixed bag a usual but in the main, he’s defending well and keeping Humphreys (Age 42) at arms length. The ball gets played up to Humphreys on the half way line and for some reason, Desperate Dan goes straight through the back of him to pick up the most obvious yellow card you’ve ever seen. He would have got booked even if Mother Theresa was refereeing. She’d have yellow carded him and told him to stop being an arse.

The Gulyman is in magic mode a minute later as he takes on three Hartlepool defenders in a space the size of a telephone box. He got a poked shot away too but the increasingly overworked Flinders came out and blocked with his feet.

Half time comes and goes without the Chuckle Brothers talking to eachother. Also – the big fat bloke who has no awareness of his personal space, decides to go for his lunchtime burger, hot dog, pie and 3 pints, via the gangway at the other end of the row and not via the one at my end. He had a bit of a delay getting to the food at the last match as there was a standard Kingslander in the way with a walking stick and a telegram from the Queen. His years of getting up quickly were long gone and I don’t think fatty wanted to chance being late for the food again. In more important news, Huddersfield were beating Dagenham and Redbridge (who play like us without Lambert) 2-1.

Thankfully, it only took 5 minutes of the second half for the breakthrough to come as The Gulyman expertly backheeled the ball through the defence into the path of Sir Rickie who was barged down by Collins as he was about to shoot. Penalty and a harsh red card but in the referees defence: it was a foul and he was the last man. Flinders goes one way, ball flies into the opposite top corner so 1-0 up against 10 men.

We should really have steamrollered them from this point on but it didn’t really happen as we seemed to get a bit tentative and all cramped up in the middle of the park. Hartlepool had nothing to lose and started committing a few more bodies forward and nearly equalized just before the hour when Richardson and Davis left it to eachother, allowing some little bloke a free shot which he tried to left over Davis who mercifully, clawed it away.

David Connolly was having a good game and worked a chance for himself before firing just wide but Saints were suddenly not really at the races so Nigel sent Chappers on for the Gulyman. This meant tactical weirdness as Hammond was moved out onto the right of the diamond with Chaplow on the left and Stephens sitting deep. Needless to say, this didn’t make the play any smoother so two days after praising Nigel’s substitutions and tinkering to the heights, I’m wondering what exactly he’s up to. That’s football I guess.

May I digress a little - I had a perception of the Chuckle Brothers that they were relatively new to watching football, hence how little they knew about the game or anything remotely to do with it. That was until the Unfunny one shouted out that Richardson was playing like Jim Magilton. Hang on a minute, Jim was in our midfield in the mid-90s, meaning that the Unfunny one has been watching Saints for 15 years or so at least. One questions is... How can that be when he knows so little ? Another question is.... How come it doesn;t look like anyone has punched him yet?

Though looking slightly disjointed, the midfield carved open the Hartlepool defence as Stephens fed Sir Rickie is flicked a great pass through to the one player you would want in a 1v1 situation against the keeper. Connolly took aim and it was a real shock when the net didn’t bulge and Flinders blocked it low down.
We were into the last 10 and the Connolly miss had at least sparked saints back to life when Lallana went on a mazy and was dumped to the ground in Sir Rickie territory, just right of centre. Everyone knew he was going to shoot, especially the Hartlepool defence who were no where when the ball was chipped in onto Fonte’s head and he made no mistake just guiding the ball into the far corner. 2-0 and game over.

There was enough time left for Fonte and Lallana to get a rest and on came Aaron Martin and Johnno Pace. Johnno pulled out his classic signature move of “push it past the full back and run like fuck” but the full back couldn’t be arsed to chase him so he dumped him on the ground. Full time and 2-0 to us, 2-1 to Huddersfield – as you were but one game less to go.

OK, that’s that one out the way and onto Brentford which is the one I was worried about but when you look all all three games now, they suddenly look more difficult than they looked a month ago. Brentford have nothing to play for but it’s always a tough place to go, Plymouth looked dead and buried with their -10 and all that but they have given themselves a chance now and Walsall are one place above the relegation zone when a month ago they looked like they’d already be relegated by now. Huddersfield have to go to Brighton – come on Gus, you know you want to get the 100 points (which I said you couldn’t get now cos my maths was terrible). In my dreams, we win at Brentford on Saturday and Brighton beat Huddersfield which mean that we’re 3 points ahead with a big goal difference advantage and they only have 1 game left… bet that doesn’t happen though.

24,000 fans in SMS today along with about 14 from Hartlepool and Nigel acknowledged the level of support. He tried to keep a roof on the bus and make sure no one gets carried away and we’re still only chipping away. His perception is obviously that the crowd stuck with the team and didn’t get apprehensive and stayed patient. I can categorically say that many in the central Kingsland did nothing of the sort and just moaned constantly throughout. If we do manage to go up, I think some of these people might explode when we’re not dominating every single match.

I’m back at work and as you may or may not know, I work in Brighton. I formed a one man guard of honour this morning and clapped a couple of Brighton fans into the office and I got told to go forth and multiply. All’s fair in football banter and my chorus of “It’s just like watching ..... Dagenham and Redbridge” went down a bit better.

3 games left, 6 points needed

League 1 Match 29 - Hartlepool 0 Southampton 0

The game, this blog entry... everything really !!!

Well, we were supposed to be playing Rochdale away on Saturday but there were two games called off in the whole of England and ours was one of them which was to say the least, annoying. I’ve seen it suggested that there should be a ‘cricket style’ grading system of pitches whereby a substandard / waterlogged pitch is punishable by a points deduction. There is some merit in this idea as the threat would make teams sort out their drainage before they buy another player etc. Some would say that this is unfair but who gives a toss about fairness when fans have to turn round and go home having travelled – spending out lots of cash and not even seeing a game. The reason a system such as this won’t ever be implemented is because no independent assessor or referee is going to call off a game at Old Trafford or Stamford Bridge when it’ll mean a points deduction. The decision to call the game off has caused problems for Southampton FC who, through no fault of their own, have to fit yet another game into an already packed schedule and it's caused problems for the aforementioned fans who have spent money and travelled and are now in possession of a ticket for and April Tuesday night in Rochdale. Yet another fans ‘issue’ that won’t ever be sorted out. Anyone for a debate on safe standing areas ? Peoples game my arse.

I appear to be ranting. So, the team stayed in the North and moved on to Hartlepool for a difficult looking game against a team with a decent home record and a history of hanging monkeys allegedly. In our squad we had James Shea, a teenage goalkeeper from Arsenal who was covering for the injured Bart. It’s shame that Tommy didn’t Forecast that one when he went on loan for a month at Eastbourne to play in West Sussex Division 7, where in his first game, they lost 6-0. Everyone was available and so we had our strongest side out with Lallana returning to the left wing, Chambo on the right with Deano and Chappers in the middle. As well as Shea, the list of subs included Barnard, N’Guessan, Martin, Schneiderlin and Richardson – players that Hartlepool would probably kill for and Oscar Gobern who they probably wouldn't kill for.

I’ll say this now – the match report isn’t going to be very long because in order to have a match report you have to have some incidents to talk about. Unless you are going to make a big incident out of long balls forward, bad first touches and keepers kicking it to eachother then you are going to struggle to write much about this game.... and Jaidi heads it away... again!

There were no more than half chances in a diabolical first half with the majority of them falling to us. We tried to recreate the ‘Peterborough’ corner routine but instead of Chambo’s corner rolling to Hammond who smashes it in the net, Chambo’s corner went to Hammond via Butterfield’s shin and Deano kicked the ground and the ball rolled to Flinders in the Hartlepool goal. The Gulyman gave Flinders some more practice at picking up the ball when after a mazy run, he hit a daisy cutter which, due to the lack of daisies and the presence of lots of boggy turf, just rolled through to the keeper. The best chance fell to the returning Lallana who was put through by Sir Rickie’s pass on the left but then angle was against him and Flinders beat away his effort.

It as one of those halves of football where rather than getting excited, you end up just taking the piss at the ineptitude of it all. You know it’s bad when even the radio commentators (Temple and Merrington) were really struggling to inject any enthusiasm into the commentary. Unlike previous weeks, when it’s been a decent game, the Saints Player feed was playing cruel games witht he listener and working fine.

Half arsed penalty shouts at the start of the second half when a Pools player fell in a heap under challenge from Fonte who then went up the other end and had a shot which was blocked somewhere near the guys arm. If we were Darren Ferguson (thank Christ we’re not) then ours was a definite pen and theirs was complete miserable bastard nonsense. The action was at least stepping up a notch with Chaplow going close (relative to this match) when he arrived and tried to dink a lob over Flinders, failing by about four feet. Lallana topped that by working himself a position and lashing one miles over.

The best chance of the game fell to Hartlepool when a cross from the right cleared everyone and fell to McSweeney who thankfully slipped as he tried to volley it. Good job he did as any sort of contact from there would have given Superkelv no chance. There were a couple of speculative long range strikes from Hartlepool, one of which brought the obligatory ‘one for the cameras’ save from Davis but the introduction of Barnard for Chamberlain failed to give Saints any spark and so it petered out into a pretty crappy 0-0 draw.

It’s been interesting reading the Hartlepool view on the game which was that it was a great game and they deserved to win, according to Mick Wadsworth, their manager who is well known at Saints, for being an arse. If that’s a great game then no wonder they get less than 3000 home fans to a game. It sounded complete shite to me but I guess they were expecting to get nothing from the game so it’s a decent point for them. Is it a decent point for us?.... well, Brighton won tonight but everyone else at the top drew, so if you look at it logically and calmly, then a point away at Hartlepool is probably a decent result but... we really should be winning games like this. I’m now fretting a bit about what we did in the transfer window. Yes – we secured Lallana, the Gulyman and Chaplow and in addition, Chamberlain didn’t leave – all excellent players but they were already in the squad which needed to be strengthened to maintain the push. Our two incoming players were N’Guessan and Forte, neither of whom will be nailing down a regular starting place any time soon. Still, we are where we are and the squad we have should be plenty good enough to win the race for 2nd place as Brighton disappear off into the sunset.

Nigel was interviewed at Cliche o’clock after the game and spoke of his frustration that we created chances and didn’t win what was always going to be a difficult game. We didn't create many mate!!! When he went on about us ‘respecting the point’, I thought he sounded like something out of a Monty Python film… Life of Brian ‘respect his shoe’…. ‘respect his gourd’ etc. Unsurprisingly, the players were taking care of business but it’s shame they didn’t take care of Hartlepool as a win would have made our position much stronger. Central midfield is still an issue for me and when you look at the individual players in question, it’s hard to see a solution. There are deficiencies with whatever pair you decide to play as we have a forward runner in Chaplow, a strong tackler in Deano and a ball player in Morgan. Play Deano and Chappers and we don’t keep the ball well enough to dominate games, play Morgan and Deano and we sit too deep, play Morgan and Chappers and we’re too lightweight. What’s the answer... maybe play all three but then you have to leave out one of Guly or Chamberlain. Perhaps Nigel needs to take care of business himself and sort this one out.

Roll on the weekend, Swindon at home and time to avenge the four losses in a row we’ve suffered against them.

League 1 Match 37 - Southampton 3 Hartlepool 2

"Diabolical defending Monkey Hangers"

When we played Hartlepool in the away fixture, I had a good old moan that the fixture computer had arranged a 3000 mile trip for us for a midweek game. At least the sense of fair play, so often lacking in football, had deemed that Hartlepool make the return trip in midweek as well. This observation is in fact a load of rubbish as the only reason that this game is on a Tuesday is because we had an FA Cup run and the original Saturday date was occupied. The move from Saturday to Tuesday of course meant that I wasn’t there but was listening to Radio Merrington.

Twas of course, the last game before Wembley so it would be interesting to see what sort of team Pards would put out bearing in mind that we have to win this game as well. Some managers – Rafa Benitez springs to mind – lose many games because they’re worrying about the next one rather than the one in front of them. As it happens, Radhi Jaidi is predictably left on the bench with Dan Seaborne keeping his place, Adam Lallana is rested with Papa Waigo given a start and Dan Harding continues at right back. Worryingly, we line up in a 4-3-1-2 formation with Papa ‘in the hole’ as Tiger Woods would say.

Saints usual fast start was stolen by Hartlepool who pinned us back, finding masses of space down the wings where we had no one. We persevered with being very very poor and continued with the tactic of doing nothing except live dangerously. This lasted until the 15th minute when Hartlepool took a deserved lead when Bob Monkhouse scored from close range.

Pards and Dean Wilkins were in technical area meltdown and following some frantic waving and pointing, they finally managed to wave and point in a language Papa Waigo could understand and Papa was pulled to the right wing. Punch went out to the left and we went to a traditional 4-4-2 and lo and behold, a Waigo cross and a header from Puncheon was kept out by a combination of bar and goalkeeper before sitting up for Lee Barnard to nod into an empty net. Miraculously it wasn’t ruled out for offside and so we were level.

Now playing in a formation that the players understood, we pressed forward and the next twenty minutes was all Saints with Flinders in the Monkey Hangers goal being called on to keep Hatlepool in it. He was helpless on 35 minutes though when a Puncheon cross came in. The centre back had a decision to make and he either had to head it, control it or hoof it. Fail. He decided to take the option of leaving it and giving a striker who has already scored 30 goals this season, a free shot from 12 yards. Bang, 2-1, Sir Rickie does not miss those.

Following the 2nd goal, Hartlepool came back into it again and were unlucky not to be awarded a penalty as Fonte and Seaborne both had a good go at giving one away with shirt holding and handball respectively. The name ‘Richey Humphreys’ came over the radio waves. I remember when he played for Sheffield Wednesday about 15 years ago and he was a fat bastard then. I expect he’s slimmed down a lot by now.

Half time and 2-1. I’m reliably informed by my Dad that that the bloke I had a go at last week was not present today but the guy who makes animal noises through a rolled up programme was there, trying to make puns out of Jason Puncheon’s name about a hundred times. Not funny the first time and unsurprisingly, not funny the hundredth time either. If he is sat near me at Wembley….

The opening ten minutes of the second half is quite even but following a bit of Hartlepool pressure, Puncheon broke away and ran at the defence. He eventually got into a scoring position, only to have his effort cleared off the line before another piece of joke defending when a defender tried to head it back to the keeper who was on his backside at the time. Papa Waigo nipped in scored to make it 3-1.

When you listen to the radio you accept that the commentators are going to miss some stuff, particularly the commentators on Solent but it plumbed new depths when, during the eulogising over the goal, we (the listening public) were informed that Paul Wotton had come on for Schneiderlin, ten minutes previously at half time.

The thought that the game would now be a formality lasted all of a minute until the ball broke to Hartlepool full-back Austin who smashed a brilliant shot in from 25 yards which Kelvin didn’t get anywhere near. Usually you can point the finger and pull out the ‘a team is never more vulnerable than when it has just scored’ cliché. However, this is just a brilliant strike, end of story. So, 3-2 and we still have half an hour to go.

It’s another 15 minutes before Saints manage another shot with Sir Rickie firing one in from 35 yards and forcing a good save from Flinders. The rest of the time is spent chasing Hartlepool around in midfield where we have totally lost the grip. It’s interesting that you would expect Wotton coming on for Morgan to close the game down but the opposite happened because we didn’t retain possession. Morgan is clearly missed and it shows that he’s improving, especially with his tackling and awareness of the defensive side of the game in particular.

Connolly comes on for Sir Rickie and the pattern of play remains mostly the same with Saints mounting the odd break in between giving the ball away lots and inviting Hartlepool onto us. It sounds like Fonte is a one man defensive unit at times with the term ‘Fonte heads it away’ being used repeatedly. Big Dave Merrington only gets animated when Mills is the subject of a very poor tackle and the referee (Andy D’Urso – another Prem ref) does absolutely nothing about it. It’s all Hartlepool and in the last minute they get the obligatory free kick from the edge of the box which gets all fans on the edge of seats and saying prayers. Austin is obviously put off by me shouting ‘fuck off’ at the computer and shoots wide.

The added three minutes produce nothing of note and the final whistle goes to signal an amazing thing – Lee Barnard completes 90 minutes for Saints. The game had finished and we had won, which is all that matters. Yes, we only really played for about 30 minutes of the 90 and yes, Hartlepool maybe deserved a draw as they had a good go considering where they are in the league but as you know, you don’t always get what you deserve in football. For example, do Pompey deserve to be in the FA Cup Semi-Final bearing in mind they’ve cheated? No they don’t. That said, I hope Hartlepool stay up as they won’t be able to afford Richey Humphreys Big Burger Boy Bonus if they go down. Three points for SFC and the gap to the playoffs is now 11 points but nothing changes in reality as we still have to win every game.

Pards post-match interview was class. I particularly like the fact that he admits that he messed up with the formation at the start of the game and he also gave very good insight into why younger players would find it hard not to be thinking of the Wembley date on Sunday. I’ve said this before but I never read a Pards interview and think he’s hiding something or talking rubbish. I must hook out some Burley and Poortvliet interviews for a comparison.

Next up is the JPT Final versus Carlisle at Wembley, in case you didn’t know. I repeat the message to remember that the clocks go forward an hour on Sunday night. Bring it on.

League 1 Match 18 - Hartlepool 1 Southampton 3

The fixture computer operator has been drinking again ! Hang the Monkey !

Hartlepool away …. Where’s that ?... Must be close because the fixture computer would never give you an away match on a Tuesday night that was too far away… Sat Nav says ‘Drive towards Newcastle and stop 30 miles short’. Not too far then. I have to admit that I didn’t really know where it was, other than that it was ‘Oop North’ and the reason I’m starting with reference to the trip is to pay tribute to the 635 who made the trip on a Tuesday night in the pissing rain. You are quite mad but I salute you…

I am fully ‘Saints Player’ enabled for this match so have the delights of Dave Merrington and Kris Temple to listen to. I have the TV on silent and am watching Debrecen v Liverpool. The games kick off and after watching two minutes of Liverpool I am worried that I may fall asleep. Once I find Barcelona v Inter Milan, I’m happier.

Pards had spoken after the Norwich game for the need to ‘go ugly’ and he took that literally with his one change of the night with Murty replacing Antonio in a like for like swap. Murts will be adding extreme pace to the right flank and Michail will be sat on the bench eating a pie. This change gets Lloyd James away from right back (which is a great move) and into the anchor role of the midfield diamond with Lallana at the front and Hammond and Schneiderlin to the sides.

There is a force 9 blowing straight down the pitch in Saints favour which means that we can send it 80 yards up the pitch and Lambo and Connolly can get neck ache. It sounds like football is impossible and Dave Merrington tells us stories of the journey up with Trotman not fancying the flight in the wind and rain and Lambert forgetting his passport which shows you how far away Hartlepool is. Actually, he needed it for photo id… I wonder if he could have shown them one of those t-shirts from the Saints Shop. Meanwhile, on the pitch, Trotman and Jaidi sound like they’re trying to knock planes out of the sky with their version of the long through ball.

Hartlepool are playing most of the little football that is on offer and take the lead after working it down our left and getting in a cross which is headed in by Monkhouse, no relation to Bob, I assume. Over the past few seasons, 1-0 down, up north, in the rain would have meant a 5-0 defeat but I have confidence and this is rewarded 15 minutes later when Lambert put Lallana through on the keeper to make it 1-1. More hoof and hope for the rest of the first half with Lallana being the only player on the Saints side who is prepared to get it down and pass it. Honourable mention goes to Schneiderlin who is being praised for his graft so it appears he can do it if he wants to.

The second half starts and it’s evident that the wind is now favouring the Monkey Hangers (WTF is that all about ?... look it up here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monkey_hanger) but they are having problems locating their front men as well. Ten minutes in and Lallana picks it up on the left and like Connolly on Saturday, comes infield and curls one into the far corner for 2-1. Even the Hartlepool fans applaud as it’s that good.

Hartlepool on the attack again and Davis pulls off a blinding save from a point blank header but appears to injure himself in the process and has to be replaced by the Pole in Goal. I like Bart and think he’ll be a really good keeper if given a decent run in the side but Stu and Dave are reacting like it’s the death knell of Saints season. To be fair, the comments are based on how good Davis is rather than anything negative about Bart but over the top or what. They go on about how many point Davis saves us a season which is fine but no one mentions that he cost us two on Saturday – he’s good but he’s not fantastic guys…

For all the world it sounds like it’s going to peter out and we’ll win 2-1 and no one is looking like scoring until the Monkey Hangers goalkeeper, makes the kind of mistake that would make you want to re-nickname the team ‘The Goalie Hangers’ and passes it straight to Lambert, 5 yards out, 3-1. It’s amazing how many times this year that Lambert has profited from the opposition keeper having a shocker but I suppose that if you keep shooting, you get lucky.

Inspired by their keeper, Hartlepool get annoyed and a bad tackle on Lallana sparks a 19 man melee, the net result of which was Hartlepool were down to 10 men after a 2nd booking and 3 Saints saw yellow, all 3 of which were not in involved in the tackle. Trotman showed great intelligence to run 50 yards to pick up his 5th booking of the season and a one match ban.

Kris (who can't spell his own name) then explained that Trotters would miss the FA Cup tie on Saturday but pondered whether this was the case as Preston had already said he couldn’t play in it. For good measure and great comic effect, Dave then repeated the exact same thing. Genius on the radio.

Anyway, game over, 3-1 win, back on track. Still in the relegation zone but with our next 3 matches looking very winnable, we should be looking to climb out and hopefully stay out. It was a gutsy win tonight in bad conditions, an ugly win if you like. The bad news from the night is of course the injury to Kelvin Davis but I have every confidence Bart will step up. I always felt he had a raw deal from Whisky George and he’ll hopefully get a chance to play a few games starting with the FA Cup tie on Saturday at Northampton. A win there and we’re in Round 3 with all the big boys and the Skates.

Well done the 635.