Giordano

He has not played enough games in a row to be written off aged 22. I know that is unpopular with those that have decided he is rubbish lazy unfit and had enough time now to impose himself in training to show he should start etc but unlike our other young players he has not had the benefit of attending saints academy, playing this kind of football and so on. Hes been playing in Italy. Slow slow quick quick slow. With us its fast fast faster faster fast. Clearly Guly was preferred to him as a substitute versus Fulham. We can all guess at the reason why - for me Guly has got more of the diligent worker about him than Ramirez, he is bigger stronger and faster. Not more skilful though, and in the latter stages of matches maybe what MOPO wants from his subs is workrate first and foremost in that situation. If we were losing i think he would have come on though. If we released GR then we need to replace him immediately with higher quality and some. So its not a money saving exercise. I would hope we would persevere this season. Fingers crossed he plays well versus Sunderland.

Its a good question given our style of play. I agree fully. Our last 6-8 games showed all the hallmarks of players fatigued after working in new ways under Mopo and after the initial high has gone and the season had left its toll. I reckon the old hand managers with bigger squads will think we will fade and most objective people would agree -but it all really depends upon how good our sports science is and how good our squad depth is. At present I can see only four adequate replacement players in our squad who are physically up to the job who did not start v Fulham - Cork, Davis, Chambers and Osvaldo. Beyond those the rest are going to show a noticeable drop in fitness quality when and if they play. That might be harsh on Yoshida because he hasn't played all season but he plainly cannot be at the same level as fonte and lovren, but its a fact for Ramirez who has obviously continued to struggle physically, Guly for all his critics does have physical strength and speed so he is a maybe and can do a job but in midfield in particular we are probably still one player short - in particular for if and when MS or VW are not there. Hence i don't see them starting cup games and why for us the cup is absolutely time to put out the entire second eleven. Im not sure many people are aware that its become increasingly common practice to blood spin and re-inject your own (previously withdrawn and saved) blood into injured body parts as the healing components of that spun blood are about 5 times more concentrated and this promotes faster healing of injuries. I wonder if Southampton players are having blood withdrawn and used for that purpose - or saved for later in the season in a similar way? Its a somewhat dubious practice ( and anyone who has read Tyler Hamiltons book will know why - ) but apparently blood spinning is not illegal for this use according to uefa, and i reckon its possibly the big unspoken factor in some of the apparent super fit teams we see like Bayern Munich and Dortmund ( did you know that the dortmund team ran nearly 12km MORE than Arsenal in their recent CL game at Highbury? Thats 1km more per man....it seems an obscene difference in physical capacity) Totti has had it done to an injury recently, Defoe had it done last January.... when i see the large leap in fitness we show compared to other premiership teams and even compared to twelve months ago and i hear its down to "double sessions" i think - yes, up to a point, but is there any other reason? Do we tire out the opposition so that they make us look fitter than them towards the end because of our high ball possession? Is it just double training? ( hint- if that's so why don't all the other teams do it as well?), is it they eat better? (really? - all the EPL teams hire dieticians)...do we have a ground breaking match recovery programme ( not last year we did'nt)... I know Solent Sports science are leaders in the field so maybe that's the hidden X factor we have in refining and improving our player vo2 max....but is that everything? Its an interesting question. I will try to remember to look at the physical opta stats for the last 10matches and compare them with last years equivalent i think...our points for those games is so much better- but have we run more to get it?

So what did they identify as the trigger and how to execute this tactic? I'm not a footie coach but trying to think logically id guess it might be: (1) We lose possession ( assuming in oppositions half - if we lose possession in our own half i think there is a variation i have not worked through yet). (2).Our player who lost possession must immediately be the first player to attempt to regain (if possible) possession or restrict or stop dangerous onward ball distribution by the guy who dispossessed him. ~ He must do this automatically without hesitation as every millisecond is crucial. No rolling around feeling sorry for himself or referee shouting or anything - just on autopilot go straight into ball retrieval mode. (3). If that is not possible (he may be on the floor/tackled/injured/wrong-footed/out of position/ tired/decided to roll around and berate referee instead because he has lost concentration or for whatever other reason), then it must be our next player closest to the opposition player in possession. (4).The player nearest to the back-up presser, OR the back-up presser must intelligently decide whether to attack the ball/press the opposition player or to close down the opponents teammates who are the most immediate short passing options. This is based upon the theory that by forcing a long ball pass we will have a good chance to get the ball back straight away - so we don't mind if they hoof it under pressure from us as its unlikely to be a killer pass and more likely to be picked up by our players somehow. (5) The 3rd,4th and 5th nearest saints players immediately (instantaneously or near as dammit- milliseconds are vital again here) conduct a spatial awareness exercise calculating key distances and angles, likely opposition player movements, likely ball pass trajectory, time of release and speeds - and then travel and position themselves between ball and likely target pass accordingly. (6) In the event of this not recovering the ball through tackle, interception or recovery of a hoof ball then these 5 players must conduct an orderly retreat into defensive positions, again taking all angles and likely pass destinations forwards primarily at this secondary juncture, into account. In phase 1-5 forward sideways and backward passes by the opposition must be anticipated, but if this fails then a more clearly defensive / damage limitation approach kicks in and they adjust to defend against direct forward passes primarily until we are into our (agreed in advance) preferred out-of-possession-in-our-own-half defensive formation. Does that sound like what Mopo tells them to do?

Brett is a good shout. And Guly plays when he does probably for EXACTLY that reason. I wondered if Damiao fancied running around lots. Floridamartin is totally correct- its about group doggies of course so its the whole team harrying, but Mopo still DID say Rickie was his first defender and being that he is the most centrally orientated of our fluid attacking line up he is likely to be doing the most doggies... Someone remarked to me yesterday for instance that they rarely had seen an England number 9 do as much running/harrying work as SRL did away to Ukraine.

Let me rephrase the question actually to make it more saints relevant. Which Saints striker from the past would be able to play in the current team/squad in this MoPo style? I think: Keegan and Steve Moran off top of my head. Least likely to ever get a game : Frank Worthington.

MP said in his post match interviews that our first defender was Rickie Lambert. So, Nicola is talking with a potential brazilian wonder player and he says oh by the way, i know you can dribble around trafalgar square eight times and shoot from the half way line but the key thing is that i need you to be our first defender". Hmmm....i cannot see too many strikers going "yes please, i know im the main goal-scorer where i am right now and that is why you like me but you also want me now to be the best striker for doing doggies in the league, AS WELL" I love our style of play. But players like MLT would never get near this squad. In fact there is a long list of strikers that just cannot ever being considered as being either willing or able to play to our system. And even if they are able then it would also take a bucketful of cash to encourage them to be willing to run their tush off for little Southampton. So when i see that Osvaldo or Jrod or even Rickie are criticized for profligate finishing, I wonder if people realise that they actually run much more than the average striker and do more defending than the average striker so will be that much more fatigued than the average striker when they do get a sniff of goal? Any NEW striker we pick up in January is going to have to be one hell of a special player, with frighteningly high fitness levels, high football intelligence, great technical ability, superhuman mental strength and ridiculously high work-rate as his number one talents. And hopefully he can score as well. Ignoring young up and coming forwards for just a moment , which current strikers in World Football do you think could play as our lead striker in MoPo's team? Im struggling but two obvious ones are Rooney and Tevez.

In 2014-15, after the World Cup, a 22 man England squad will have 5 Southampton players in it. We WILL be the England team of the future, and it will play like we play today. Most likely are Adam, Clyne, Shaw, Jrod, JWP. For this World Cup SRL is our best hope - and for me should get in because he has already delivered in the WC and has got goals plus is the best assist man in that forward line up- rooney welbeck and sturridge are largely goal scorers rather than makers - he is both and is ideal to put the ball in the right place for any of those to score - and from penalties too... Adam offers something different as so many have said and i think he has got the next best chance. Clyne, and JWP are next but id say they would be injury choices if the incumbents got crocked ditto Jrod should sturridge/welbeck/walcott get injured.

Exactly.- succinct and totally spot on. If you want a stick to beat GR with then its better to use his performances. A non appearance is clutching at straws though. Guly got on NOT because GR is hated and is rubbish. It's because our manager is shrewd. No EPL is ever a given three points so in that situation it was the best tactical substitution to make. If we were losing the subs might have been different. Second half was mostly about professionally controlling the game.

I can understand the interest in Lennon and Oxo but it seems pretty clear cut to me that the essential qualities that MP looks for in a player is ball possession and work rate. He does not want profligate players who will undo the pressing and disciplined work done to get the ball every time we lose it by someone who is going to put head down and lose it in cheaply. Our game or rather mopes game depends upon retaining possession ever higher up the pitch. Then bringing force of numbers into play with technically gifted players who can eventually find the pass so that we can get a good strike on goal. Multiply over and over and statistically we will score more and concede less. If we lose poses soon when we have committed men high up because a sloppy head down winger has gone for s trick too many we will be at greater risk of counterattack in the breakdown phase. So i reckon technically gifted midfielder with some pace but primarily pace of thinking and ability to score might be on the list. That's supposed to be GR. Some have mentioned Banega but I've not heard anything if him this season so far - but there are quite a few around, immobile is another, Coutinho was another, iwould not be surprised to see a Spanish / Italuan player fitting the bill / arrive in January - perhaps on a swop.

Excellent point. Everyone bought under Poch was brought in to be a first team starter. Not all will make it ~ but that is the basic premise. No "back up" purchase players. The back up players are the ones that get replaced by the new players. And the previous back up players get sold, loaned or released. But what about the "squad" players we currently have who are not quite up to 1st team starters and have age /limited upward growth potential against them? The likes of Fox, KD, Jos, Guly etc? The difficulty in situations like these is summed up best by the left back dilemma. To be honest can anyone see a new full back displacing Luke Shaw? Not really. Yes maybe a free signing experienced mega star like Ashely Cole on the remotest of chances in a year or two because he is unlikely to be dropped for anyone else # nor would we spend £15m+ on another young LB whilst he is still around..so i do not see a LB being bought who would replace Luke Shaw and relegate him to "back-up" . And that means in turn our back up player Fox could be released. So in this instance does Poch sell / release Fox and take a risk with an even younger understudy? Doubt that strongly. We already got CC for that. Or does he work out that the Fox you know is better than the Fox you don't? For now - yes that is what he is doing - maybe not in January though. I think he is being pragmatic on that.If an experienced (ie who will accept being on the bench if he is paid well enough) top (probably foreign) left back becomes available then we may pick one up a player from a mid to upper Primera league or Seria A ;-). These will have tactical awareness and professional understanding. If Luke is ill then there will not be such a noticeable drop in quality on the left flank accordingly when the new player plays. And the pressure on Luke to perform is stronger. And yes, Fox could be sold. By the same token I also don't think you can just dump KD because he might not be quite good enough either. He is club captain and our spirit is down to the likes of him being around.He delivers points by virtue of his presence and pressure of Boruc. His experience is already there as his understanding that he is understudy. Very very unlikely to get better than KD happy to be on the bench every week.

Nice read Gemmel. Thank you. Summed up everything and made sense of a lot of conflicting reports - especially regarding the two players. Thought the player celebrations were top notch in the corner as well. Not sure hi many and who was on the bottom but it was a pyramid of at least 5 or 6 i think , maybe more!

I think Rickie will be sacrificed to let someone else younger in. UNLESS - one or more of the current key three strikers (Rooney, Welbeck, Sturridge) has a serious injury. If so, and SRL stays fit and scoring, he's got as much chance as anyone else and probably slightly more because of his contribution and impact in the matches he has played in already recently for Roy, who will value that as much as league form. He never let his manager down and he both scored and made goals. I'd say Roy is old school in that regard. I also think he will make a judgement on his squad morale and the squad PR out there. Having a Rickie Lambert in your team is very good for that - especially the PR side of things. We don't want any of that "I'm bored" rubbish coming out of the World Cup camp like last time which just made them look like a bunch of prima donnas.

Get in!!!! Southampton 1 Denmark 0. Osvaldo scores for saints!!!!

http://www.corrieredellosport.it/calcio/italia/2013/10/09-337096/Italia%2C+Balotelli+out%2C+Osvaldo+sar%C3%A0+l%27unica+punta Balotelli has got an injury and Rossi probably wont be risked. They talking about a 4-3-2-1 formation with Osvaldo as the most likely lead striker. If SRL does not start I will be watching the Italia game live away to Denmark and keeping only a a secondary eye on England... PS if Lloyd Isgrove gets picked to start for Wales I'm watching that too..

Thanks for that. Just as i thought. typical journo second hand turning around innocent answers to questions ****e. Hes sitting there happy on the sofa with his missus and saying straightforward stuff noone would say was out of order but somehow they manage to get a sensationalist story out of it. that's it. I'm not buying the mirror anymore. ( i never ever did of course but this settles it!) oops tell a lie i read the sports pages in the barbers few weeks back,. wont do that again.

Agree with Turkish. And you wonder why pro players sometimes privately consider supporters with contempt. One minute you are working your nuts off in L1 and CCC and are the bees knee's, the next you trying to play against World Cup +International players and are a hopeless tosser who should be made unemployed. Fox and Guly - the slagging off just shows, sadly, how contemptible some of our "supporters" actually are. Mind you, all supporters are fickle so its not just Saints fans. I think in response to what he also said about what would these guys have done in the 90's when we only started playing in March - well i think that we were so rubbish everyone thought it was quite a laugh ( i think it took until about March for most the squad to sober up enough to play a bit - christmas celebrations kind of lasted from late october to mid february and then we would wake up and go- oh, better win a few games or we are doomed...Nowadays we got people who believe we are big time now so we can act like complete planks towards some squad members who occasionally get picked. Shameful really, but i put it down to ignorance and the generally low levels of self-esteem in the barracking supporters.

Given our next seven fixtures "look" considerably harder my gut feel is to average anything above a point a game from those would be fairly good. Man Utd, Chelsea and Arsenal away are as difficult as it gets in the EPL and most if not all teams would be happy with a point there, in any season. If we lose 2 but win 1 hey fantastic...more likely we will lose all three or grab a draw somewhere anmd lose two. Hull and Fulham though, for most teams in the EPl this season, you are thinking they are very winnable games at home.That leaves Stoke away and Villa at Home. Any normal season I would take three points, possibly even two from those two games but Villa are unpredictable and Stoke are..Stoke who will play in a way we wont like...so we in theory should have a really decent chance of getting 8 points ~ even if we lose the 3 tough away matches. But the start we have had this season is so rare and difficult to understand that 7 points would be a disappointment to many on the forum. My guess is we will get 8-9 points from the 7 games, not great, but given the calibre of who we are playing, not bottom three form either.

So, there is some kind of interest in a post match show solely focused on the Saints match. It would not replace the Solent phone on radio efforts but would be a TV broadcast you could easily find on the search engine of your computer. It would have a simple structure of a limited number of features ( maybe including phone or phoned in comments, a live interview with someone, anyone, who either watched live, watched on tv, listened on solent radio/saintsplayer or was glued to Sky sports news or that BT one or just read the sfc texts and this is there opinion ~(good bad or ugly) ...plus maybe a pass of the day feature, foul of the day etc), not all the features would be conventional features especially if contributed by posters like Bearsy, probably no more than 30-45 minutes total to keep it punchy, and there is interest in my gf getting her baps out at some point to up ratings. I think i got all that. Will put some thought into format and put together some trial episodes. I would record it so it could be accessed at any time by anyone but the initial viewing would be "live". So if i advertised a text number competition, remember kids, all entries after the closing date will NOT count, but you may be charged.:-). I will not discriminate (except against pfc peoples) hence I WILL accept product placement from anyone as long as i get freebies out of it like free drink and free stuff in general.Anything else i forgot? Is anyone kind of professional or semi-pro at this already might give me some heads up? My first goes were pretty nonsensical drink fuelled diatribes but they had "something" about them which you cannot get from saintsplayer or gary lineker..

Yep agree again 70-30 sounds about right. I tried 90%+ plus and it's real tough to keep it going . I was helped by the wine but still it wasn't as fun as it could have been .

That's a good idea bearsy. A post match analysis show/ maybe with interactive content would be easier to organise easier to ensure high quality content. Could easily insert key highlights . Re: My gf. Yes of course glamour = viewing figures- been doing it in Italy for years. But a live show is better. Plus I have to try to work things out after couple bottles of wine post match so possibly won't be as brilliant as I am normally - but you've given me food for thought, thank you. Would you like to be an occasional contributor ? You could tell people stuff about the match but not in the usual way - highlighting complete nonsenses for instance, ****e ball control, crotch scratching instead of heading ball into the back of the net, all the minutiae which is more interesting than Fred scored 65 mins from a corner type stuff. I want to know what the exact abuse aimed at the corner taker was for instance by the loyal supporters by corner flag.

I "produced" "directed" and was the on-screen "presenter" for three matches myself live about 5 or 6 years ago and peaked at a pathetically small number of viewers during one match - no more than 12 I think but wondered if there is any interest nowadays in watching/ participating seeing as we are oh so good and popular now compared to then? I simply set up a Justin tv account that you could log into and watch me talking live about a Saints match in progress over my shoulder or me doing voice over commentary or via radio commentary with my added extra good bits and my giving my incredibly interesting and not at all bias commentary on what was going on. I used to have mates/colleagues at SMS or wherever phoning and texting me "interesting" info about the matches live as well which i then relayed live... Stuff like what colour boots Adam was wearing, if the bloke sat next to you in Northam had farted, was the beer better at SMS this week, as well as the conventional but boring stuff about what's the score and how we playing (which you can get anywhere) . I used to do at least a bottle of Sauvignon Blanc as well during the match so my diction noticeably deteriorated/ improved during the match - which was an added fun factor I thought that proper supporters could ID with. I had a few live "phone-ins" and online banter situations with oppo supporters interacting too - but its great if you run the tv show because you can basically say what you like to the opponents such as yeah you might be winning but your shirts are a terrible design and i wouldn't be seen dead in that shade of blue and actually Saints are better than you whatever etc.:-) If there is some interest i might give it a go again. Its a bit hard work doing it all yerself tbh - just having even one other person helps massively. This time around my gf supports saints so i might be able to convince her but she often works saturdays..hmm ok still working on that! Its not as good as Gillette soccer saturday but you could have both on at same time and in my case im totally biased none of this praising the others bs.

That's a very good point. IMO The current Saints starting 11 probably ( Boruc and Lambert apart) don't get valued or salaried at under what a £10m player is worth or gets - and with those two its only age related - im sure they get £10m player packages/salaries. A £12m player bought from outside is NOT an automatic starter like we would all have assumed barely 18 months ago.....he is on a par with the rest of the first team squad. Osvaldo at whatever he was starts to push the outside of the envelope that was already widened when we didn't automatically start a £7m Jrod previously......the "must play" minimum fee is rising....right now only a £20m player would probably get a guaranteed start at Saints...and which of our players on current form is that? None really but by end of season I hope Osvaldo, Lovren, MS, Shaw and Bigvic have reached those heady heights.

I don't think the plan is to play Gaston when fit. I think he is fit already. I think "the plan" is to use him when needed, but our default starting line up, until and unless we get injuries suspensions or loss of form, does not currently include him. We are doing "alright" as we are. IF (or rather i should say WHEN) we start losing or the Inj/susp/loss of form kicks in then he may well start more games. Until then, I don't think he will. For me, nine out of the eleven positions in the team are now automatic: Boruc, LS, Lovren, Fonte, NC, VW, MS, SRL and Osvaldo. The two I consider most interchangeable currently - Adam and SD - are the most likely to be substituted according to match situations. MP has already shown his hand with this if you observe his teams and subs this season to date. JWP, JC, GR and JRod can play those positions. If we need to attack and win then Jrod and GR are the options, if we need to defend or hold then JWP and JC are the options. GR is the least defensive of those left on the bench who could replace either of AL/SD but he is also the most likely to do something special. Its a trade-off. FWIW, its not the teams that do well in September that win the league, avoid relegation, win cups get European football. Its the teams that have got the squad quality and depth to cope with the inevitable injuries suspensions and loss of form that the grind of the season creates in the run-in period. Spring 2014 will show which squad has the most depth. We have the strongest deepest squad that i can remember, and relative to other mid and lower table teams I see no others markedly superior - in fact I regard see our squad as clearly superior to all but the top ten of last year and "as good as" or near as dammit to the 10th to 6th placed teams.

It would make me, my son, my daughter and my girlfriend very sad. We love Rickie. He is a good bloke, family man, great footballer, role model and club icon. We need Rickie more than we need £3-5m plus his wages. He has more than paid his wages plus in the positive publicity that our club has received as a consequence of him being our player in the last few years alone. The value of brand "Southampton" is massively enhanced internationally by him being picked and playing Centre-forward for England. I hope that NC recognizes that and that it will trump "tactical" reasons, especially when he scores versus Palace! As he gets older it will be tougher for him to keep his place that's true but there's a lot of mileage and goals in his legs yet imo. Keep Rickie Saintly!

I did'nt see anyone else scoring a volley into the top left hand corner last night to put us 1-0 up and pretty much settle us down into a predictable victory albeit with scares. That is what a fuori-classe player can do. That is what he is meant to do more of. It is not, for me anyway, a question of ability, it is, for me again, a question of his application of that ability in our team to date. Its an oxymoronic thing to say but if he could get more consistency with his occasional moments of magic that is what we want. His gestation period is longer than I expected but I am still patient. He is young. His job is not just to bulldozer someone and then pass it to someone else. He is the "someone else" and so far when he's been given the ball he has not delivered enough of what we expected to see from his Seria A days. I think that the large increase in both speed and physicality in the EPL has really caught him out. If he can play like he played in Italy he is worth every penny and more. But so far i'd say that he has not justified his £12m price tag, BUT that is true of the majority of the young high (over?) priced players i reckon...for every Coutihno there is a Carroll....