Nordic Saint

Officially, the most onesided derby in the country. It's got even more onesided since the Guardian published this table: Which two rivals have the world’s closest derby record? | Football | The Guardian

This afternoon's diving competition should be interesting but Grealish is going to have to work very hard to preserve his title as he will only be appearing as a second half sub and by then Zaha will have built up a big lead. Grealish will of course get more points for style.

If we're looking for a replacement for McCarthy as backup goalkeeper to Forster and eventual first choice, David Raya would be a better buy.

To be fair, we are solidly mid table with 43 points from 36 games. About as many points separate us from a European place as separate us from the relegation zone. We finished with only 39 points in 2019, 36 in 2018, and in 2017 we finished 8th with 46 points. We'll finish above Burnley and we'll also be the top south coast team again. The Premier League is the toughest league in the world and it's no surprise that 2 Premier League teams are in the Champions League final. It is very difficult for newly promoted Championship teams to compete in it unless they are a very big club like Leeds with a lot of financial muscle.

With all the injuries we've had this season, there have been plenty of big changes already. I'd prefer to see Salisu partnered with Bednarek, especially as it sounds like Vestergaard is going to be sold in the summer.

Wolves' remaining fixtures look tough so they may not pick up another point, which means if we win 2 of our remaining games, we could finish as high as 12th. Spurs A Everton A Man United H

When it was announced that Ings was in the starting lineup again, we knew we were going to score. The question was whether our defence could hold up and thanks to Forster it did. His penalty save was the turning point. We are 14th but we should now aim to finish 12th, which would seem like a reasonable end to the season. My favourite May home game v Palace is still the 6-0 in 1971 (1970-71 being one of my all-time favourite Saints' seasons) but tonight's win is up there as a cause for optimism for next season.

Three ex-Saints battling it out at the top: !st Jose Fonte's Lille 2nd Pochettino's PSG 3rd Paul Mitchell's Monaco With only 2 games left to play, it looks likely that Fonte will lead his team to the title with the best defensive record in Europe and pick up his third major trophy. French Ligue 1 Table - Football - BBC Spor

The accident has already happened when he played Mane onside for their goal. He just plods around in his own ego-driven world totally disinterested in what the rest of the team are trying to do. The sooner he goes to Spurs, the better.

With Mr Plod Vestergaard playing in our defence? Really ?

The big dummy, Vestergaard, played Mane onside. He has no team awareness. He just plods around in his own world.

Is our defence better with or without Vestergaard? In the 11 Premier League & FA Cup games he has missed this season, we have kept 6 clean sheets. Looking back, most of our best defensive performances, like the 1-0 wins v Man City and Spurs and the 2-0 win v Chelsea last season and the 1-0 wins v Liverpool and Arsenal this season, have been when he hasn't played. The players seem to cover each other better and show more team spirit when he's not there.

Just spend the money on bringing in some of the best referees from abroad, the same as we do with players.

The same referees, with their established prejudices, are on VAR too. To be fair, it's difficult to find anyone in this country with an interest in football who doesn't have favourite teams as well as teams they don't like. The old referees like Dean and Moss, who have been there for decades, have built up their prejudices over many years. If it's a decision that might favour a big team, they will take several minutes examining it on VAR but when it comes to us, they barely give it a second glance. and that was what happened when Moss was required to consider Vestergaard's red card. We have foreign players so why not foreign referees? That might help solve the problem.

Remarkable statistic: Palace remain unbeaten in their last 24 Premier League games when leading at half-time. Are Leicester good enough to end that run?

He has been about our only defender who can actually defend, which is why teams now concentrate their attacks on our right flank.

It's not going to happen.

If it even gets off the ground, it will go the same way as Kerry Packer's cricket circus. The only question would be whether it would last 1 year or 2. The teams stupid enough to enter it would be heading for a big fall.

I went to watch Saints at Anfield 50 years ago and they were lobbing bricks at us even then. There was a narrow alleyway with high walls on the walk from the station and the local youths hid behind it and lobbed house bricks over the walls as you walked through.

Our defensive midfielders always are underappreciated by many of our fans. Wanyama, Reed and Hojbjerg were too. The transitional midfielders like Schneiderlin and Diallo tend to get more praise.

The bottom line is we only have one effective defensive midfielder in our squad, Romeu, and he's out injured. Both Diallo and Ward-Prowse would be fine if they had him alongside them. Could we buy another one? Defensive midfield is not the most glamorous of positions and they don't command big transfer fees as Spurs discovered when they bought Hojbjerg. Right now we could do with someone like Harrison Reed.

It looks like Hampshire will be top of the table after the opening matches, as they should go on and win this and they'll be the only team with maximum batting bonus points.

That's impressive. He hits the ball hard, usually gets it on target and some of his goals are quite spectacular. He's certainly a better finisher than Shane Long.

He's been brilliant so far tonight. That run to set up the 3rd goal, where he had 5 Wolves players all trying to stop him, reminded me of Channon at his absolute best about 50 years ago. Lingard's goals and assists could well clinch West Ham a Champions League place.

We could have scored 2 or 3 more goals in the last ten minutes. 4-2 or 5-2 would have been a fairer reflection of the game. Pope and the woodwork kept the scoreline down.