TWar

Impressive trolls don't get banned. That's the real litmus test of troll quality. Gotta be annoying, but not quite annoying enough for a mod to step in.

The american one or the UK one, as it greatly effects how much sympathy this elicits?

Completely agree with all of this, some great points. Especially the bit about Broja as a great option off the bench. Having Armstrong and Adams as our first choice and Redmond and Broja to back them up is probably the best forward line we've had in overall quality since Mane/Tadic/Pelle

He knows Che's strengths, better to put it in space where Che can use his pace and strength to get there before the defenders than put it closer to the keeper and leave a harder finish under pressure. Or it was just a slightly weak through ball and I'm overthinking it! Whos to say?

Pretty sure SKDMan does, then again he also thinks Pompey are better run than us and that Ralph is a worse manager than the guy who was in charge of San Marino....

Yeah Vestergaard has been dreadful since leaving us. It's incredible that for all the signings we made our biggest upgrade was just a sale which allowed a benched player to step up. Salisu is so much better than Vest it's amazing.

I think Watkins is vastly overrated. I honestly believe near enough anyone in the league would get a bunch of goals playing up top in a team with Jack Grealish.

Maybe if he's near the end of his career. Che is already too good for Celtic imo. He starts for us and we are well established to be higher in the pecking order than them when it comes to player signings, it's why we dumped our struggling bench choices (Elyounoussi/Forster) to start for them, and they sell their best (VvD/Wanyama/Forster) to play for us.

He plays for Scotland as he is eligible to do so and realises he won't get past Kane, DCL, Rashford and in the future Abraham. That doesn't make him worse than Bamford or Watkins who themselves don't make the squad beyond a couple of token cameos for friendlies. They finish better than Che, but they don't create nearly as much or has as much ability to link and stretch play. There is more to a strikers role than putting the ball in the net, especially in a pair. If you'd put him in the same bracket as Barnes I'd put you in the same bracket as a nutter, or a troll. Barnes doesn't even start for a relegation threatened Burnley. Maybe in the same bracket as Wood would be fairer but even then is a fair undersell. Che is easily better than Broja, he creates an absolute tonne more. Broja is a decent finisher but there isn't any other aspect of his game where he comes close to Adams. He does have less potential than Adams and Armstrong, he's a good finisher but that's about it. He has a bit of overhype from a couple of good games and scoring a couple of goals but he hasn't at all proven to be better long term than Armstrong or Adams yet. You keep saying he's amazing as if it is fact.

Yeah we don't need an injury prone crocked striker. We have so much promise in our front line, we need to develop Adam Armstrong for that Ings role, with his raw pace and two footedness he's going to be a star.

Che is better than Eduoard for me. He's stronger, dribbles better, is smarter and passes better. Edouard has better finishing but thats about it. To be honest I'd put Che on par with the likes of Watkins and Bamford. He's absolutely quality at what he does. He also is much better at getting a tune out of Ings than any Villa player atm. Regarding our strikeforce. Che is a better player and better partner for Armstrong and will be starting up there for the foreseeable I should imagine.

It would suck if those four were out but our depth is as of a sufficient quality that their replacements are actually really good. Macca KWP Bednarek Salisu Perraud Diallo Romeu Stu Elyounoussi Adams Armstrong In fact, we have members of our fanbase who have believed at various times this season than Diallo is good enough to displace JWP, KWP should be back in at RB, Redmond should be dropped for Stu, and Armstrong/Adams should be our first choice pairing (I believe this now). That's a massive mark of our quality in depth imo.

Disagree personally. Gilmour is raw but has promise and a tonne of skill. Mcginn is bang average. Hope Gilmore stays benched, he, Rashica and Pukki could all pose a little threat. Still rate us to win comfortably though.

He had one touch in this game which was sensational. All game though his hold up play, strength, and aerial ability were causing Denmark problems.

Che is terrific. With him and Armstrong we have a legitimately good strike partnership forming, just needs a little more time to gel. Broja off the bench for when they are blowing due to the intense press, he can score a hatful too.

I think if it had hit his ankle it might have been fairer. Looked to my like his toe collided with the lower calf, didn't seem that dangerous to me. Also it wasn't at massive pace, like JWP dived in but I don't this there was much force. Thats what the slomo kind of misconstrues, there wasn't much force in the challenge imo. A yellow would have been fairer imo. Studs up yeah, but not much force, not much contact, and no real malice imo.

I guess you could say he has proven himself to be someone who can get a team promoted, maybe Norwich pitched it as "we know you are going down, get to know the team, do your best to raise value for those we intend to sell, and next season we will back you financially take the championship by storm".

Or alternatively it was between the two of them and Frank pulled out so now they are offering it to Smith. It makes sense as Frank turned down palace in the summer and that is a much more appealing proposition imo.

If Mane was so in demand then why didn't the other clubs interested just outbid Liverpool? Either he had his heart set on Liverpool and hence we couldn't sell to anyone else as he wouldn't go, or we got the max value anyone would pay for him. To suggest we made some sort of error is silly, we couldn't hold as his value was about to drop, what else were we supposed to do? Acting like we snapped up Liverpools offer when there were better available seems silly.

Not in the squad for Albania tonight, apparently has a muscle injury.

I thought it was a harsh red personally, looked worse in slo-mo

I have to say, I personally remember him for rallying one of the most incredible comebacks I've ever seen against AC Milan in the CL final.

Fbref, data available here - https://fbref.com/en/squads/33c895d4/Southampton-Stats There is an absolute tonne of stats on there, can be a real rabbithole

Internal promotions like Pep and Zidane are kind of different stories for me, they have the big advantage of knowing the squad. Tuchel as you say had the middle step to Mainz who are not a massive team. The next step for Gerrard for me would be to move in the summer to a newly promoted side or championship side, it feels like a massive step up and being midseason I think it is a very steep learning curve to come in immediately and turn that team around.

How do you know what I would say? If we had brought in the Salzburg manager when in desperate need of points midseason I would definitely have been concerned. And if you think I'd be happy with Ralph being replaced you don't read my posts very carefully. As for lack of quality, did you not watch Friday? Or any of their proceeding four losses, they are not a good side. Also, regarding Ings, he will probably be out for like a month more if it is his hamstring and then will be poor for a little while after that judging by how he recovered from the last one.