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 8 - Middlesbrough 2 Southampton 1

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Mason's Loan Spell Is Not Going Well

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Yes Russ, You Lost to Michael Carrick

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Up the Fucking Saints.

Premier League Match 36 - Middlesbrough 1 Southampton 2

What a Surprise - The Boy Can Play

After the tedium of the past couple of games, there won’t have been many Saints fans looking forward to today’s trip to Middlesbrough..  Boro prove that no matter how much your own team annoys you, you never have to look too far to not feel too sorry for yourselves.  Boro have not been having the best of times of it either, having had their relegation confirmed last week when they failed to win a 3 point banker away at Chelsea.  The football they’ve produced has been horrendous and they don’t score any goals.  The tedious brand of football that they employ was set in stone by Aitor Karanka who finally got sacked and Boro gave notice that they had given up on staying up by approaching Steve Agnew as manager for the rest of the season.  I don’t really know anything about him but one three minute interview is enough to know that they weren’t going anywhere other than the Championship.

The Boro squad looks ready for the Championship already.  Brad Guzan in goal after that season he had in goal for Villa last season where he let in about 100 goals with 98 of them going through his legs.  Patrick Bamford is up front and they paid £7 million for a striker who never scores.  He looked good in youth football when he was the biggest 14 year old you’ve ever seen. 

The defence features Calum Chambers – no doubt in his reflective moments he thinks about the decisions he’s made in his career and feel a bit sad but then his bank statement drops through the door and he feels ok about it all.  To recap, he was with Saints from 8 years old through to 20 when he made the first team, played about 20 games and then fucked off to Arsenal as soon as he could.  I’m sure he envisaged Champions League Football and England Caps and whilst he played very occasionally (as 4^th choice right backs, 5^th choice centre backs do) he mostly ended up playing in front of 3 men and a dog in age group games before this season being loan to Middlesbrough where he’s played about two-thirds of the games and been relegated.  Maybe if he’d stayed with shitty old Southampton he’d have been a Premier League regular and possibly been in the England squad.  Never mind though – just check the bank balance whilst you’re pondering next season’s loan move or better still, ask for a transfer and move to a club where you might actually play, rather than becoming the next Luke Shaw.  Would I take him back? Yes – potentially a very good player.

The press have latched onto the ‘Puel out’ bandwagon and have linked a few managers with us, the most prominent of which being Marco Silva who is about to get relegated with Hull.  Hmmm.  I’m not a huge fan of Claude right now but I think we can do better than that come the revolution though Silva’s record in Portuguese football before Hull was very good.  My main criticism of Claude is his predictability but he must have had several ‘fuck it’ pills before picking the side as he made 7 changes.  Amazingly, one of them was Martin Caceres coming in for his long overdue debut and almost as surprising was Jeremy Pied starting at right back.  I’m going to go with Cedric and Gabbiadini being rested but going to say that Stephens, Davis, Redmond, Tadic and JWP were all dropped to see if others could do better.  In addition to the two debuts, in came Hojbjerg, Clasie, Boufal, Long and Rodriguez.

It's predictably dull for the first fifteen or so.  Saints looks solid enough at the back with Caceres showing touches of class in amongst touches of rust which after 18 months out is not surprising.  Shane Long is playing down the right and wins our first corner.  No one seems to know who’s going to take it with none of JWP, Tadic or Davis on the pitch so it falls to Boufal and it’s a decent kick but an under pressure Caceres heads over.

Jeremy Pied is making up for lost time on the right and is finding loads of space to attack, feeding Long whose cross is missed by J-Rod and finds its way across to Ryan Bertrand’s right foot and he shanks it wide.  Caceres starts Middlesbrough’s first attack with a poor ball out of defence and J-Rod shows great work ethic to get back and foul de Roon and just to make sure, Romeu trashes Bamford as well which is pointless because he’s complete shit.  Negredo takes the free kick but can’t clear the wall.

I have been a pretty loud critic of Shane Long this season but he does bring something to the team that is needed in that he plays quickly – there’s no fucking about and not too much thought about going sideways or backwards.  J-Rod finds him out on the right and his first time cross is heading towards Hojbjerg for a tap in but Guzan gets a hand to it and the danger passes.

Gibson, the Middlesbrough centre back is highly rated but every time I’ve seen him on TV he’s been shite and there’s an “Under 11s football klaxon” going off as he lets a clearance bounce, Long challenges him and so Gibson just hauls him down and handballs it.  How this is not a yellow card I will never know and similarly to the corner earlier on, no one knows who’s on free kicks and so Hojbjerg has a smash from miles out but again it hits the wall, goes up in the air and Maya tries to score with a header from 20 yards which even Guzan saves.

A goal is not looking particularly likely but then what do you know?  Clasie picks it up and plays a superbly times ball into the right channel for Shane to run onto.  He crosses first time to where Chambers has lost J-Rod and with an almost casual swing of the right boot, Jay dispatches the ball past Guzan and into the net on the half volley.  Great technique and a really good goal.

Boooooo! go the Boro fans as the teams go in for half time.  Bizarrely they’re chanting the name of Aitor Karanka who is at least 90% responsible for the way they’ve played this season.

Boufal is gone at half time, replaced with Redmond and away we go.  Obviously fired up by the words of inspirational Agnew, Boro attack a bit at the start of the second half but this mainly involves lumping it forward which Caceres and Yoshida are dealing with quite comfortably.  They’re also sticking the boot in whenever possible with Clayton seemingly on a one man mission to kick as many players as possible.  There’s another Bamford classic as Chambers launches it in there, Negredo wins the header and it falls to Bamford who shuts his eyes and slices it over the bar.

Saints show them how to do it a few minutes later as Romeu and Hojbjerg combine to give the ball to J-Rod and he superbly picks out Redmond on the left wing in acres.  Fabio has come so far infield that when he tries to get to Redmond he just skips round him and bends a right footed shot into the far top corner.  Superb goal and 2-0.

Saints keep attacking as the boos ring round and Bertrand on the left slides a well weighted ball to meet the diagonal run of Long and he gets there before Guzan who brings him down as clear as you like.  Penalty.  Oh fuck off, Shane’s going to take it.  J-Rod, Bertrand, Caceres – actually any fucker rather than him.  Up he steps, leathers it, off the bar and over.  Bloody hell.

We have another great chance to put it ot bed as Redmond again finds himself in acres on the left with Fabio nowhere but this time he gets under it and puts it over.  Boro show signs of life with De Roon firing over and then they are very lucky to win a corner as Friend and Pied go up for a header and he ref adjudges that Friend’s header has flicked off the top of Pied’s head.  Looks like bollocks to me.  Anyhow, Fischer whips in the corner, a header and it’s in the back of the net.  No, not fucking Bamford.  Then I see the replay and it’s actually quite funny.  Bertrand is marking Bamford and is shoving him around a bit and I swear that Bamford is looking the wrong way and it just hits him on the back of the head and goes in.

There’s a little over 5 to go and we’re still a threat and Gibson shows how average he is by taking a shite touch, losing the ball to Shane and then unceremoniously carting him over.  It’s his first yellow card but it should be his second.  Shane isn’t getting up and on comes Charlie Austin for the last few minutes.  As the free kick comes in I’m expecting an Austin goal but J-Rod puts a header over the bar.

There is one scare as there always is as a bouncing ball falls to Chambers who leathers it but Fraser gets down well to save quite comfortably and the last chance of the game is ours as Redmond on the right plays in Davis (on for Hojbjerg) who gets to the ball through some dreadful half arsed defending and pulls it bacj to J-Rod on the edge of the box who fires just wide.  Should have scored really but never mind.  It’s the final whistle and we’ve got that winning feeling again.

Ultimately it was a win against a desperately bad Middlesbrough side who are relegated for a reason and they showed it today. It was good to see the fringe players show what they can do and hopefully, Claude can continue his upward trajectory and the ones that played well will be rewarded with a place for the Manchester United match. From what I saw today, Clasie should keep his place ahead of Steve Davis, Redmond ahead of Boufal and J-Rod ahead of Tadic... Oh yes, Martin Caceres. Who could have predicted that the 60-odd cap Uruguay International with five Scudetto's and a Spanish league title would be decent? Barcelona and Juventus on his list of former clubs... played with and against some of the best players in the world... Who could have predicted that possible? Two months too late. You know, maybe Claude wouldn't have any pressure on him if Caceres had played for the last two months and he has to stay in the team. I know that Bamford and Negredo aren't the toughest opponents to deal with but I'm sure he'd be OK to deal with better – after all, he’s done it before.

Having said all that about the changes in the team, the first half was incredibly stodgy and we only really played ok from J-Rod's goal to Shane's penalty miss.  Jesus... Who is the last Saints player you'd ever want to take a penalty?  Out of the 11 out there at the time, I'd have had Shane in a play off for last place with Fraser.  Anyone who has watched Shane over the last few years knows that the ball only goes in the right direction when it's instinctive and he has no time to think.  He never scores in the warm up shooting drill and there is no way that he practised penalties ever.  I reckon he knew that he was going to miss.  My mind goes back to when Austin started a fight with Tadic so he could take a penalty and the theory I have about J-Rod just being too nice and almost timid..  We really could have done with J-Rod doing an Austin today…”I’m the centre forward, give me the fucking ball, I’m taking it”.  Jay has been on the pitch for the last two penalties we’ve been awarded and watched Tadic and Long fuck them up.  Jay scored a great goal today and there were flashes of his best but he needs to be nastier all round.

Typically, after the farcical penalty, we let a goal in and Fraser had to pull off an admittedly routine save to stop us gifting them 2 points.  We are now 9^th in the league and just one goal behind West Brom in 8^th.  I reckon that one win out of our last two will be enough to get 8^th place but it makes you think – Top 10 and a Cup Final – is that a bad season really?  If you forget the Cup Final and just think about the League – in the Premier League era (the last 25 years), only Koeman (twice – 6^th and 7th), Pochettino (once – 8th), Alan Ball (once – 10^th), Glenn Hoddle (once – 10^th) and Gordon Strachan (once – 8^th) managed to finish in the top 10.  None of those had Europa League Group games to deal with and only Strachan got us to a Cup Final.  On results alone it’s not so bad but the style of play at home and the lack of goals is appalling and that’s what we need to change in the last two games, starting with Manchester United on Wednesday.  So be brave Claude – go for it…

Forster / Cedric – Caceres – Yoshida – Bertrand / Romeu – Clasie / JWP – J-Rod – Redmond / Gabbiadini

Premier League Match 15 - Southampton 1 Middlesbrough 0

Bouf!!! - Pick That Out!

After Thursday’s appalling shithouse of a display, we really need a visit from Middlesbrough who are officially the least entertaining side in the division having scored less than everyone and not conceded very many.  Nailed on 0-0 draw then given our troubles in the final third and the lack of Charlie Austin today, following his injury from the Thursday abortion.

Some teams come up to the Premier League and try and play football to survive, like Bournemouth did last year in the main.  Some come up and try and bore the shit out of it and that’s the approach of Aitor Karanka and his Middlesbrough team.  They were in the final few weeks of their promotion season when he walked out and was persuaded to return.  All very odd and I don’t really know what happened there.  They have a couple of ex-Saints in Gaston Ramirez and Calum Chambers.  Gaston’s 4 years at St Mary’s were ultimately not very rewarding for anyone but there was the odd moment.  I do wonder how he would have done under Claude in the Number 10 position but there was no way he was going to get the opportunity and it was for the best that he moved on.  My thoughts on Calum Chambers and his career trajectory are well known.  I saw one write up this week which was raving about him.  The point is that he’s had to go to a bottom end Premier League Club to get a game and Arsenal now have at a rough guess, 5 centre backs ahead of him in the queue - Koscielny, Gabriel, Mustafi, Mertesacker and Holding.  Would have been better off staying at Saints of course but there you go – enjoy that beautiful pure Middlesbrough air.

The media are still trying to stoke the fires of Fonte to United and Virgil to everyone.  The Virgil one was all about Liverpool and then others were linked, then Liverpool dropped out allegedly so it went quiet and miraculously, a release clause was invented to get the story moving again and every Big Club was linked and Celtic were mentioned as having a sell on clause (which is probably true).  The release clause thing is of course horse shit but linking all the Big Clubs (and Everton) and Celtic made for clickbait overload on both sides of the border.  We’ve also been linked with incoming strikers due to Charlie Austin’s injury.  Sunderland are really not going to let us have Jermain Defoe when he is their one chance of staying up… the stories are beyond funny.

So, we need a win – any sort of win.  An entertaining feel good win would be nice but anything will do.  Any thought that going out of the Europa League would mean a change in the rotation policy was shot down with the selection of the second choice full backs in McQueen and Martina.  JWP partnered Clasie in midfield and Rusty Rodriguez was given another chance up front ahead of Shane.  The Phantom of the Opera was back, as was Sofiane Boufal.  Gaston Ramirez was always injured when he was due to play for us so maybe it’s something about St.Mary’s he doesn’t like as he’s out again and so is Negredo, their main striker.  Jordan Rhodes is up front – he’s a player who scored loads in the Championship  no one took a punt on him until Boro did in January of last year nd he rewarded them with not a lot and even less this season.  I’m fully expecting Karanka to play for a 0-0.  Should be a great game.

The first half does not start like it’s going to be a good game as Clasie gives the ball away in the first action of note and a chip forward down our right finds a lack of Fonte and Martina and just Fischer for Boro.  The two Saints wanderers get back and Fischer does for both of them in a tight space before finding Rhodes but his snapshot is blocked at source by the sprawling Fraser.  Our first effort is from Clasie who plays a 1-2 with Rusty before shooting wide as some though he was going to replicate the Arsenal away goal.

It all gets a bit tetchy as Rusty caught Adam Clayton, the U2 bass player and we then didn’t put the ball out and built down the left and McQueen fired in a cross which Clasie decided to put out of play, or maybe it was actually supposed to be a shot but it was that bad.  Roughly 10 seconds after he’d crossed it, McQueen was taken out by the Boro right back  who got a very deserved booking.  U2’s next album will not be delayed by the injury.

Boro like to try and play out from the back and they’re not very good at it and cough it up to Clasie who feeds a good ball into Rusty who hits it first time and Valdez saves easily.  Shoots of recovery from Rusty though who is really putting a shift in.  More shite finishing though as Tadic (who has been dreadful) puts over his one decent cross which finds JWP all on his own but his header (if you can call it that) is dog shit and well wide.

Young JWP is not having a good few minutes as he tries to find a player in red and white which a pass back to the defenders and he succeeds in dissecting the defence superbly and Fischer is away.  Some greag scrambling defence by Virgil stops him getting a shot away, the Fonte blocks from Stuani before the same player smashes it over the bar in piss poor fashion.  The half is over and it’s been as piss poor as expected.

Redmond is on for Tadic at half time which is not welcomed by some (Tadic has been dreadful as said earlier) and the change means that Boufal is more infield rather than wide left.  He immediately looks better there and sees a shot blocked after a decent run and cross by Martina and a nod down from Redmond.  On 55 minutes we get a moment totally out of keeping with the rest of the game as the ball moves forward between Romeu, Clasie and JWP before moving on to Boufal who takes a touch and belts a left footed effort which starts straight before curling away from the rooted keeper and into the top left corner.  What a fucking goal that is. Brilliant.

What have Boro got?  Not a lot aside from a ridiculous optimistic shout for handball when the ball pings about and hits José square in the chest.  You should almost be booked for appealing for utter shite like that and luckily the ref wanted nothing to do with it. Davis is on for Boufal and he’s on the end of a superb curling Martina cross straight away and have you ever seen Davo score a header for Saints?  No, nor have I.

We look like the only team who might score again and on 81, a JWP corner is well met by J-Rod and U2’s bass player nods it off the line.   It’s not J-Rod’s day so far and it certainly isn’t as the game ticks down as Redmond burgles the hopeless right back and puts over a perfect cross which takes out he keeper altogether and J-Rod slides…. And connects… a yard out… and over… by miles.  Fucking hell.

Final whistle and we got there and we deserved it.  The better side as we had the one true moment of quality and the vast majority of the chances in the second half.  The less said about the turgid first half the better, as it was absolute gash.  There were some good performances from some players who don’t usually put in good performances with Clasie showing up well, along with J-Rod who more or less did everything but score.  I have to say that even Martina put over a couple of decent crosses.  No one was bad but it was never going to be a game full of exciting football.  The other positive was the performance of Boufal in the second half before he was subbed.  We are beginning to see just what we've got in him and today we saw that it would be better utilized in the middle of the pitch.  

Claude’s post match interview revealed that Charlie Austin would be out for 3-4 months which is a bit of a disaster.  Looking at it positively, the timing of it gives J-Rod and Shane an opportunity to prove that they have what it takes and if they don’t take their chance then we have options in January, namely getting someone else in or recalling Sam Gallagher or whatever.  

Next up we have the horrible trip to Stoke City where I guess the rotation will carry on so expect Cedric and Bertrand to come back in.  Whatever he picks, I hope he finds a way to play Boufal at No.10 and I suspect he will.

It wasn’t a day for pretty football but who cares and Wednesday at The Brittania won’t be either but if we manage to pull off a win there like we did last year, I won’t care how we do it and neither will Claude.

NPC Match 45 - Middlesbrough 2 Southampton 1

Boro pose for their Pre-Match Photo

A trip to Middlesbrough and now we can actually taste it.... not the Premier League but the pure air quality of the smog.  Hang on, we can actually say it now... win this and we’re in the Premier League.  Not wishing to entertain negative thoughts but today is a free hit.  Even if we don’t win then we have another go next Saturday with Coventry at home but I and I suspect everyone else, wants this done today so we can all have a party next week. I would certainly like it done on Saturday so I can concentrate on other areas of my life that I have been neglecting for the past few months.

Middlesbrough have had an average kind of season when compared with their expectations at the start of the season and currently sit 4 points off the playoffs with 2 games left.  By the time our game kicks off (yes, we’re on TV again) then they may well know that they have nothing to play for as opposed to next to nothing.  Whatever the other results today then this will be a difficult game against a side who will try to play football as that is Tony Mowbray’s way.  Mowbray is a manager who falls squarely in the ‘decent bloke’ category of manager and not in the Fat Sam-Warnock-Poyet category.  I expect that Boro were expecting to do better and indeed at Christmas they were briefly in second place but poor home form and recently, poor form everywhere has almost certainly done for them as far as going up this year is concerned.

It has surprised me this week that the Saints players have obviously been talking about the alleged TV curse in that there is a generally held opinion that Saints + TV = Shite and if our results in televised games were replicated over a season, I expect we’d be in League 2.   No negative thoughts here as Nigel would say... the fact that it’s on TV is completely irrelevant.  Other Saints news this week is that Lee Barnard has finally been cleared of any wrongdoing in the infamous White House incident of 18 months ago.  The court case had a longer lifespan that the pub which has now closed down and maybe Barney will wrestle one of the three substitute berths off of the defenders.

The 3pm games that were interesting saw Reading have Jason Roberts sent off and eventually draw 2-2 at home to Crystal Palace which tantalisingly opened up the possibility of winning the league again.  Personally, I can’t believe that Reading didn’t somehow score a winning goal as that’s the way they roll.  The way the Skates roll is to follow a decent performance with a pathetic one and they lost 2-1 at home to a Derby team with nothing to play for which relegated them, regardless of the fact that Bristol City got the result they needed to condemn the fish fiddlers anyway.  Cue moaning about the 10 points, the Fit and Proper Test and blah blah fucking blah.  Bye……

More relevant was that fact that Blackpool and Birmingham both won to confirm their playoff places but Cardiff only drew which means that Middlesbrough still had a shout of taking the last playoff place despite a run of one win in their last 10 which is quite frankly, shit.

So, sat in the pub and the team is announced and it’s the same as last week but the bench has thankfully changed.  On the face of it, it’s better as Bart is on there along with the returning Morgan and Guly.  There are still two defenders with Martin and Harding – surely de Ridder, Puncheon, Falque or Barnard would have been a better bet.  Hang on, so in fact it’s even more defensive than the last game with de Ridder being replaced with a defensive midfielder and Richardson with a keeper.

Middlesbrough’s side looks decent on paper with two forwards with Saints connections in ex-Saints-trainee-Billy-Big-Bollocks-good-in-Scotland-but-shit-everywhere-else Scott McDonald and the player who caused a Daily Echo meltdown earlier in the season, Southampton born Lukas Jutkiewicz.  Also they have a couple of decent midfielders in Barry Robson and Nicky Bailey.

The cameras pan around the fans and there are many Saints fans in celebration mode, wigs and hats and the like.  There’s a part of me saying “ok it’s the last away game of the season so fair enough” and there’s another part saying “you look like a prick and let’s win the fucking game first”.  Away we go and immediately we have a throw on right wing where Chappers feeds it back to Jose who swings the cross over in time honoured fashion.  Two Boro defenders run into eachother and it drops to Lallana who heads it through to Sir Rickie.  He looks like his first touch has taken it too far but he squares it and Billy Sharp does what he does.  46 seconds and 1-0, get the fuck in there and we all go nuts.  Billy runs straight to the camera pointing to his ‘LV’ tattoo.  I happen to know due to a Soccer AM interview with Billy and James Beattie, that this stands for ‘Las Vegas’ which I’m guessing is on the agenda for the players if we get promoted.  Before Billy got fitter it could have stood for ‘Luncheon Voucher’.

Boro tear back into us and in no way are going to lie down.  Firstly, Bailey fires one over the bar before Haroun gets played in behind Fox and feeds in a decent low cross which Jose expertly deals with.  It’s mainly Boro for the next 20 minutes really but without any shots on target as Robson fires narrowly over twice.

Then a curious incident as we play the ball up the left and Sir Rickie is away and the ball is rolling along the line.  It doesn’t go out and he cuts in and smashes it past Steele.  In fairness, Steele has seen that the lino is flagging and hasn’t tried to save it but it definitely has not gone out so it’s abysmal officiating.  How difficult is it to look along a line and stick your flag up if the whole of the ball is over the whole of the line?

Saints need to get hold of the ball and pass it about which they then do and there is a lovely passage of play where we keep it for about 40 passes and it’s unfortunate that the player ultimately on the end of it was Chappers who was off balance as he lashed a left footed effort over the bar.  Chappers is nearly in again a few minutes later but is denied by a desperate tackle which sees us win one of an ever increasing number of corners.

Boro are being overrun and resort to hacking players down to get a foothold which results in a booking for Bailey for cynically hacking down Lallana as he sped away from him in midfield.  We come close from the resulting free kick as Foxy curls it left footed, just over the angle of post and bar.  As an aside, Bailey has the kind of face you would never tire of punching.

As half time approached we were comfortable enough without really dominating but out of nowhere Boro equalized when a hopeful lob into the box was headed away by Big Jos but Bailey met it on the volley and a deflection off of Chappers took it past Superkelv and right into the corner.  He’s hit it well enough to be fair but the deflection turns it into a goal.  So, 1-1 from Boro’s first shot on target.  Having seen it again, Jos’s header wasn’t good enough and should have been headed out to the wing, rather than the middle.

We’re rattled by the goal and immediately, Robson plays in Jutkiewicz who finishes well as the Daily Echo wanks itself into a frenzy but he’s flagged offside when basically, he wasn’t or at least, it didn’t look like it to me.

Half time is a time for refilling your glasses, emptying your bladder and wondering if the pundits on Sky have been watching the same game as I have.  Boro have scored and had one disallowed in the last minute so naturally, they’ve been the better side all game which of course they have, if you have the memory span of a goldfish.  No matter though as whatever has been said by Nigel at half time has clearly worked and we are on fire at the start of the second half and Boro are still taking advantage of the ridiculously lenient referee by fouling at every opportunity.  We’re getting free kicks though and Sir Rickie flashes a 30 yarder just wide of the post.

Another passage of passing play sees us over on the left and sees Corky, Deano and Adam playing triangles.  Corky plays the ball, I went for a round of drinks, got served, counted my change, handed the beers out and then Hines arrived and wellied Corky up in the air.  I have seen many referees send a player off for a tackle like this on it’s own but we got the predictable yellow card brandished.

We’re nearly back in front on 52 minutes as the dominance continues and Sir Rickie tees up Sharp on the edge of the box but his blast just fades away over the bar.  Then, three minutes later came the talking point of all talking points.  Boro are playing a high defensive line, I assume because we haven’t got much pace up top but Lallana provides a burst and gets through and in behind, running at goal.  He gets to the edge of the box and Hines trashes him from behind.  The ref gives the foul and all the Boro players surround the ref cos they know Hines is going off.  There is a slight question mark on a straight red because the left back is coming across but he’s not there yet.  Either way it shouldn’t matter as it’s a definite yellow card at least.   But it does.  Inexplicably, the wanker in the black doesn’t card him.  Absolutely fucking unreal.  So, we go from having a clear goalscoring opportunity to having a free kick with 11 players in front of it, not to mention the 35 minutes we would have had against 10 men.  To further add to the sense on injustice, Sir Rickie smashes the free kick wide.

The next 20 minutes are relatively quiet.  The incident and the non-sending off has quietened us down a bit and disrupted our flow and then comes a flurry of substitutions.  I remember that Scott McDonald was playing as he trudges off and Robson also goes.  For us, Chappers has picked up a hamstring injury whilst trying to reach a ball before it ran out and is replaced by Guly.  The camera pans to Andy Crosby giving instructions to the incoming sub.  Hopefully it as something like “it’s actually really warm out there and it’s still 2011, when you were decent, before your form went to shit”.

Fifteen minutes to go and a ball is floated in Jutkiewicz who shoves Fonte who responds by briefly grabbing his arm before letting go which was pointless as the ball was going over them both and through to Butters.  Free kick to Boro 25 yards out and a booking for Jose, proving that holding someones arm for a second warrants the same punishment as hoofing someone up in the air with the latest of late tackles and then bringing someone down from behind when they are clean through on goal.  Once the ref has missed the initial shove by Jutkiewicz, fair enough Fonte has pulled him and so it is a free kick.  As in the first incident, to add insult to injury, Zemmama clips a lovely shot over the wall and in for 2-1.  To be fair, it a lovely strike and the only way we could have prevented it was to have a player on the line.  Superkelv was covering the other side so once Zemmama got it up and down it was always going in.

We look shellshocked top be honest though Guly does manage a rasping drive from 25 yards which Steele tips over the bar which of course, is a goal kick.  A quick look at what remains on the bench sees a defensive midfielder and two defenders and so Morgan comes on for Butters, thus replacing our best crosser of the ball from the right wing and we predictably do sod all for the rest of the game which Boro manage to play out in relative comfort.

As the game ends and we get a shot of Hines celebrating on the pitch that he should have vacated 35 minutes earlier, we then get another shot of some middle-aged prick in a clown outfit, crying – I know you’re a fellow Saints fan mate but how embarrassing is that, not least because it’s still in our own hands no matter what happens.

I thought that tactically we got it a bit wrong today.  Boro set up with a midfield diamond and maybe we should have done the same as we had the players on the pitch to do this.  Adam Lallana said in his post match interview that Bailey was giving us problem from the base of the diamond so maybe we should have pushed a man onto him.  Having said that though, we did create chances for all but for the last half hour when we were poor.  Again I repeat my moan about the bench as we had one attacking player on there and we had to use him in midfield when Chappers went off.  I can’t help but feel that Steeeeeve would have been useful today with Boro playing such a high defensive line.

Like the Skates game and the Reading game, it seem that every on-target shot has ended up in our net.  I’d say a draw would have been a fair result today with 11v 11 but it shouldn’t have been 11v11 and I hope the ref gets called to account for what was basically a huge case of bottling it.  Having said that, we could have controlled the game a bit better than we did and I felt our problems were really amplified when Chappers went off.  In hindsight (again) maybe we’d have been better bringing on Morgan and moving Corky to the right, rather than using Guly and could have kept him back for later.

As Nigel correctly pointed out though, it’s all in our hands still and a win against already relegated Coventry at home next Saturday, will put us into the Premier League.  He also mentioned the ref and the turning point and fair enough.  Hines would have been sent off for both his offences by some referees but only got one yellow today, complete madness.  Another point is that they had one free kick and scored whereas we had about 5 and missed them all with none being on target.  We get given a lot of free kicks around the box and maybe we need to be a bit more clinical with them.  Whisper it quietly but I don’t think Sir Rickie has scored from one this season.

Moving on….Fat Sam has a game on Monday away at Leicester who have nothing to play for but will still provide stern opposition.  Leicester avoiding defeat will also put us up and if they do, Nigel Pearson will write another chapter in his SFC history.  If he fails then we’re in for a nerve shredding afternoon next Saturday.  As for the people who say we'd rather clinch it ourselves.... words fail me.

I can see it now…. Leicester 1 West Ham 2, 93rd minute, penalty to Leicester, David Ex-Skate total wanker Nugent to take it…


1 game left, 3 points needed, maybe 1 or maybe none.

C'mon Leicester.....

PS - Reading have won the Championship, well done.  Right now I don't care.

The Great Lukas Jutkiewicz Bullshit Edition

Local Boy, Local Interest, Lovely!

WARNING: Some of this may be factually inaccurate, possibly, allegedly.


There has been no Saints news since the weekend victory over Brighton, there has however been bullshit. Picture the scene at the Daily Echo.

MONDAY

The ‘Brains Trust’ meet on the top floor.

Editor: OK lads, Today’s edition had the Brighton match report so we’ll flog a few copies. We need a Saints story to boost circulation for the rest of the week. Any ideas?

Hack1: Cortese leaving for Milan? That would destabilise things nicely.

Editor: No, not taking him on again, I’ve got a family

Hack2: It’s the end of the emergency loan transfer window on Thursday

Editor: Excellent, what can we do with that?

Hack2: How about re-hashing our made up bullshit from the last transfer window... you know about the local lad from Poland.

Editor: Oh yeah, that Jutkie..Jerko...Junkki...thingy. Polish lad from Southampton. Excellent, it’s got local interest with him being a local boy. The punters will love it.

Hack2: Connolly’s injured again so we’ll say that it’s an emergency loan with a view to a permanent move in January. How much shall we say for ? Coventry are skint so £1million ?

Editor: Naaaa, the readers like big numbers and it provokes discussion so let’s go £3 million

Office Junior: Are we allowed to run a story that has no factual basis whatsoever and is based on a four month story which was proved to be completely false.

Editor: Stupid boy... and anyway, what do you mean by false. He was born in Southampton and his sister teaches at Bitterne. Go and make me a cup of tea... two lumps.

TUESDAY

Story gets run in the early edition. Online edition tags ‘Coventry’ which sparks a chain of events which begins with the story getting reported on Coventry unofficial websites. Then, the Coventry local paper, The Sky Blue Bore gets hold of it and re-hashes it for the paper edition which causes....

Coventry fans go mad as he’s their best player, only goalscorer and they’re in the bottom 3

Coventry fans then finish the article and think £3m is a good deal.

Coventry fans then get angry again as they hate their owners and know the money won’t be spent on the team. ‘Sack the board’ they cry.

Coventry fans accept that it’s the players’ local club and at the top of the league etc and wish him well.

Saints unofficial websites report the story, adding a player exchange angle for no readily apparent reason, other than that Coventry needs some players. This exchange involves our ‘out of favour’ players... Dickson, Harding, Butterfield, Holmes... as well as Connolly who is out of favour due to being injured and Mick Channon who is out of favour due to being 60.

Coventry fans debate merits of said players – he’s good, he’s shite, I’d take him, why do we want their cast-offs etc.

Meanwhile, back in Daily Echo Towers...

Editor: This Juko, Juttervick...Jank... story is dieing on its arse, circulation only went up by 1 and that was some bloke in Netley who had dogshit on his shoe and needed something to wipe it off with. What can we do?

Hack 2: He was linked with Middlesbrough in the summer....

Editor: Who... Jurkovitch or the dogshit guy ? OK, good... re-hash the re-hash from before from the angle of Middlesbrough preparing a rival bid. Mention “bidding war” as that’s always good. Also, push the player exchange angle as we’ve been given that one on a plate.

WEDNESDAY

Story gets run with the web version tagging Middlebrough.

The Middlesbrough local paper, The Daily Smog gets hold of it.

Boro fans think he’s not worth £3million, doesn’t score enough goals, Everton fans thought he was shite etc, Saints are welcome to him, hometown club etc, why do they want him as they’ve got Lambert?.

Tony Mowbray quoted as ‘not interested in loan players’. Probably something he said in the summer.

Meanwhile, back in Coventry...

Andy Thorn is interviewed and the story comes up. He says he knows nothing and it’s out of his hands if his players get sold.

Lukas Jutkiewicz (who probably wants the move to be fair to him) is asked about the move and vows to remain professional and give 100% to Coventry.

Back in Echo Towers...

Editor: OK, I need more conflict, more interest, more bullshit. What have you got...

Hack 1: How about a late bid from a Polish Club or Pompey?

Hack 2: I’d go with Jakovich getting kidnapped by the Coventry Massive and being forced at gunpoint to have an affair with Sienna Miller, Steve Coogan and JK Rowling. It’s topical and more plausible than Pompey affording £3 million.

Editor: I like the way you’re thinking but ‘battle’ and ‘war’ always sells so we’ll have “Saints in Fight for Djokovic”.

THURSDAY

The story runs, Novak Djokovic ignores it and gets on with playing tennis, the day goes on and nothing happens.

Thursday at 5pm rolls round and then emergency loan window slams shut. If it was a door it would slam shut... if you slam a window it usually breaks.

Nigel Adkins gives an interview saying what he always says... we have a squad of players we trust and then adding..... I’ve heard about the story but I don’t read the Daily Echo.

Back in Echo Towers...

Editor: OK lads, damage limitation... lets go with Saints were looking for a striker and enquired but decided against it. Put a paragraph about maybe going back in January and if they do, we can say we were right all along, if they go for someone else we can say he’s second choice because the Jakkovitch deal fell through. Local angle, local boy etc. Lovely. Where’s my tea? What do you mean “he’s quit on principle”.

FRIDAY

The story runs – no one cares.

The bullshit has managed to get thousands of people interested and involved when there was never anything there. Three managers have made comment and three sets of supporters have got angry or excited or disappointed or shrugged their shoulders in indifference. In addition, lots of website editors have got busy and given the non-story legs and made it run. Ultimately it doesn’t matter – the only person who may be slightly pissed at it is Lukas Jutkiewicz... and me.

This chain reaction was brought to you by The Daily Echo. Call me naive but I thought the press were supposed to report the news and not create the news especially when it’s not in the public interest. It’s a good job that these day that you never hear about the Power of the Press being abused and Steve Coogan and Sienna Miller are signing for us in the summer. It’s probably just as likely as Lukas Jutkiewicz joining us.

NPC Match 14 - Southampton 3 Middlesbrough 0

I Wanna Look Like Chappers

Middlesbrough at home in another tough home game and another severe test to our 18 games winning run or whatever it is.  They've only lost one game all season and the only reason they're not higher than their current 3^rd place is because of the number of draws, specifically 0-0 draws that they've had.  They don’t score many and they don't let in many either.  Boro legend Tony Mowbray is a manager who seems like a really decent bloke who wants his teams to get it down and pass it so we should see some decent football today, unlike the West Ham hoof-fest.

 As I said in the start of season preview, think of Boro and I think of Gareth Southgate who is so dull, he makes Alan Shearer seem interesting.  Pre-Gareth I think of Schteve McLaren of course who got the England job based on a couple of freak results in Europe and before that, Bryan Robson and the time they legendarily decided not to play a game as they had a few injuries... three points docked and relegated.   I also remember a game at The Dell when we were 3-1 up with a minute to go and they had 9 men... and we managed to get a draw.

We had a right to moan that day and unbelievably, moaning has been back on the agenda this week.  I’ve read moans about the Carling Cup exit with a weakened team and moaning about how we haven’t won an away game for a while.  Best of all, I heard some bloke on talkSHITE moaning about everything to the incredulity of the presenters who quite reasonably, expected Saints fans to be happy right now.  Personally, I’m delighted with where we are and anyone who expects it to all be perfect is at best deluded.  Yeah, we all have the right to moan but if you do, don’t be surprised if not many people are listening to you right now.  Can’t wait for the first time we drop a point at home...  Mick McCarthy has had a go at some Wolves supporters with short memories this week and he is spot on.... every club has them.  Every SFC moaner should be forced to watch the Season review of the Poortvliet / Woote season, which they can’t do because we didn’t produce one as we were that shit.

We have a few changes from our last league match with Danny Butterfield replacing Frazer Golac at right back and Adam Lallana returning to the left wing, meaning Chappers moved to the right and the Gulyman went up front meaning David Connolly dropping to the bench.  Jose Fonte had recovered from the ‘about to get sent off’ injury that he had last week.  There was no place on the bench yet for Lee Barnard and so Connolly was joined by Steve de Ridder and Morgan along with the bench ever-presents, Aaron Martin and Bart. 

Middlesbrough had ex-Saint Scott MacDonald up front who I remember mainly from a program about our youth players from that era and he came across as a complete Billy Big Bollocks.  He’s done alright for himself though and would be a threat today, as would their top scorer, Marvin Emnes.  Boro lined up n a 3-5-2 formation which I expected to cause us a few issues in midfield.

First to show was Jack Cork who embarked on a twisting run past a couple of players before he was unceremoniously halted on the edge of the box.  Sir Rickie looked like he was going to thrash it goalwards but instead, stood up a chip to the totally unmarked Fonte who was apparently offside.  The fact that he was unmarked was the interesting thing.  Attack followed attack and we won a corner which Lallana floated in, Big Jos headed down and Jose span and smashed it narrowly over the bar.  There were encouraging signs that the much vaunted Boro defence really weren’t all that good at all.

Final proof of that fact was delivered on 15 minutes when Deano swept a ball out to Butters on the right wing and he pinged in a cross from miles out, over Sir Rickie but straight onto the head of the unmarked Gulyman who planted his header into the top corner as the keeper watched for 1-0.

Boro looked a little shellshocked to be fair and weren’t winning the midfield battle at all despite having an extra player in there.  On 25, Sir Rickie tried to slide in Chappers who’d made a superb run forwards but he got tackled and the ball came out to Lallana on the left.  His cross to the back stick was met by the unmarked Sir Rickie who headed across for the Gulyman to head his second goal from about 3 yards out and about a foot off the ground.  2-0 up and we’re having a laugh.

Marvin Emnes is a tricky little player and he warned us against complacency with a neat little run and was denied by a well timed rush from his line by Superkelv who took the ball cleanly.  There is always a player on the opposition who gets a special award and so today’s Opposition Bell-End of the Week is Barry Robson who got tackled by Danny Fox and then spent a bit of time moaning at the linesman and pointing to his heel.  When he got nothing he carried on moaning at the lino and a few team mates and then, having being told to wait for the whistle, took a free kick too quickly and got himself booked.

It was all Saints though and Butters fired in another deep cross which Sir Rickie met well and headed it just the wrong side of the post.  The Gulyman should really have claimed the match ball a minute later as Lallana slipped him in and his scuffed, bobbly effort beat the keeper, hit the inside of the post and stayed out.

Boro had a couple of chances before half time as McMahon hammered a free kick just wide after Big Jos had fouled McDonald who had a chance himself, right on the whistle as he rounded Superkelv but ran out of pitch and angle before hitting the side netting. ‘Do, do-da-do, fucking useless’ sang the Northam which was a bit harsh but funny nonetheless.

We had reached half time and looked in no bother at all, Deano and Corky were ruling the midfield and Sir Rickie and the Gulyman were terrifying them up front.  At the back we looked in no trouble at all and the wide players were all doing sterling jobs in both defence and attack.  In short, we were fucking great.  The half time piss always feels better when you are half way through it and you find out that the Skates are 3-0 down.  There’s a certain symmetry with the Skates getting stuffed and watching piss flow down the drain.

We’re straight back at it after half time with Sir Rickie heading a ball on and Chappers heading down and in from an offside position though there is a slight concern that the Gulyman is limping a bit and after 10 minutes he makes way for David Connolly.  Connolly’s first real action is to catch one of their defenders daydreaming before he clears it and feed Corky who advances and hits a screamer towards the top corner which Steele does well to tip wide for a corner.

Middlesbrough finally get a bit of possession around our box and win a couple of corners but all this does is leave them open to the counter attack and we have a one man counter attacking machine in Bald Psycho who runs fully 80 yards with the ball, loses it in the Boro penalty area, before winning it back again and crossing.  Jose Fonte has somehow made it up from the back and thrown himself in front of a defender to knock it goalwards with his knee but the keeper is becoming increasingly irritating and saves it again.  Sub time and Chappers looks absolutely knackered but it’s not him coming off as Adam Lallana is replaced with Morgan Schneiderlin.

The game drifted on with Saints being the better side by a mile and Middlesbrough not really threatening.  Mowbray made a couple of subs to little effect and Morgan broke up a Boro attack on the edge of our box.  Virtually all the outfield players got a touch over the next 23 passes before Chappers put Sir Rickie away on the left with pass 24 and he beat the defender, got to the goal line and waited for someone to make themselves available.  Predictably, that player was Connolly, pass 25, bang, 3-0, game over, fantastic goal.

Boro had a couple of half chances in the last 10 minutes and Superkelv had to be alert to keep out a header from one of their subs but his best bit of play was to come out to the edge of his box and head a through ball straight to Fox on the left, whilst all the Saints fans in the crowd, shut their eyes and prayed.

There was still time for Steve de Ridder to come on in place of Deano and fire in a cross which Sir Rickie met superbly on the volley.  It flew like a missile, heading for the top corner until the bastard goalkeeper Steele took off and tipped it round the post again.  Annoying fucker – he was complete crap in the first half and looked completely lost and in the second half he’s Gordon Banks (the pre-car crash Gordon Banks).   Full time.

A stunningly good performance really and I really hope that moaning bastard is on talkSHITE again this week.  Maybe he can moan about his pie being too hot or the dispensers in the toilets running out of paper towels.  You sure can’t moan about the football as it was superb.   We played more long balls today than usual but this was clearly tactical as a weakness in the air at the back had clearly been identified, hence playing the tall Brazilian instead of the small Leprechaun up front.  Having said that, the long balls weren’t aimless hoofs upfield a la Allardyce and there was still a lot of play through midfield.  A 26 pass goal kind of illustrates that this team can do both.   I laughed when I saw that some Boro fans were complaining that the tackle that won the ball before the 26 passes, should have been their free kick.  Fuck me lads, you only had about 5 minutes to win the ball back before we scored.  How about blaming the defender who let Sir Rickie waltz round him.

Nigel was buzzing afterwards, especially over the performance of Chappers.  Aside from the Barnsley game where he got sent off in an act of Bald Psycho red mist, Chappers has been quality this season either when starting or coming on from the bench.  He’s played all the midfield positions as well and has set a really high standard.  The midfield was superb today with the return of Adam Lallana a major plus.  OK, he tackled himself a few times and looked a bit rusty but the panic in the opposition when he’s on the ball is what it’s all about and despite it being his first game for a while, he provided an assist for the 2^nd goal and played the pass for the Gulyman to hit the post. … and he makes Messi look shite, oh yes!.  The first time I heard that chant I thought it was about him messing with shite and I wondered how the Northam all knew about it.  Mention must go to Jose Fonte as well who I thought had his best game of the season.

As Chappers was man of the match, he got interviewed afterwards and all the internet articles have taken his quotes… and twisted them horribly.  He didn’t say anything controversial about Darren Ferguson, didn’t say anything about him being a knob or a twat or a man who is impossible to like or anything like that… but Tuesday’s match v Peterborough has meant that some quotes, probably from 2 years ago have been stuck into some articles.  Regardless of this, Fergie Lite will hopefully get a complete battering on Tuesday night.

I expect there will be a few changes with Tuesday with probably Frazer and Morgan getting in somewhere.  Go on you moaning bastard, get yourself back on the radio.