Fabrice Fernandes no.1 fan

I hate to admit it but they do seem to make a cracking atmosphere, imagine if st Mary’s was a tough or intimidating place to come and play rather than a lovely warm environment for the away fans and players

Strikes me as an odd one really, doesn't stop us from still starting either Adams or Mara really, and we've only recently signed Orsic. Does look like a quality player, but is it what we need

We've made a lot of money from left backs over the years (Bridge, Bale, Shaw) so it is a great plan, fill the youth team with left backs and sell for big sums. We don't have the same history for many other positions so why bother! What is more odd is that even with that hoarding, we seem to be starting a right back or centre back there most of the time for the first team

And the women are full-time pros now too, so another full squad training

I think Antonio may be a difficult one now Ings is injured again, as they are back to square one. If he was fit, Antonio is a peg down the ladder, but they may still see him as being needed

Not sure we have two u-21 centre backs worth playing that aren’t on loan or olly Lancashire

Would expect to see Morgan in the squad tomorrow then and maybe Luke Pearce too as he isn't involved. Shame if Payne and Ballard aren't near the squad.

Heard that Armstrong's surgery was with a specialist in Spain and went very well. Hopefully we see him back to his old self before the end of the season.

Beattie was interviewed at half time, couldn't we have got him to stick a pair of boots on for the second half and just tell him to hit anything that comes near him.

Also saw on LinkedIn (the height of all football gossip on there) that one of the staff for the women was asked to help with the process of him signing and settling because she has a degree in Spanish. Seems to me that we don't have many Spanish speakers knocking about. The boy was great yesterday in my opinion. Passed well, moved well and seemed to be genuinely positive with his play. The thought of a three man midfield of him, JWP and Lavia could end up saving us this season, if we can just start scoring.

Overall I didn't come away too disappointed. Newcastle have won a lot of games this season by doing exactly what they did to us, so we can't take it too hard. I did think we genuinely looked like an improved side. Alcaraz looked very good, took the ball nicely on the turn a few times and seemed to be progressive with his passing and movement. Not sure he gave Diallo the most support at times but Diallo actually had one of his better games for us I thought, just didn't quite have the composure needed for some more intricate passes. We did lack on the left side at times. Salisu seemed limited at left back, did an alright job tracking Almiron but was getting no help from Orsic who had a poor game. I'd like us to start a more attacking left back with him soon to see how they pair up (e.g. Perraud on the overlap). They had multiple chances from cut backs so their goal did look inevitable, we never seemed to be tracking Joelinton and Willock. Adams had the best chance by far and did exactly what we all expect of him by hitting it hard and hoping. I did think, would I rather that chance fell to Mara but I suspect he would have been offside... There seemed to be some discontent towards the end that we weren't going all guns blazing for a goal (especially bringing on Janny B when DCC was sent off) but I think going into the away leg only 1-0 down isn't the end of the world. We so obviously need a striker who can actually put the ball away. A more accomplished finisher than Adams or Armstrong and we're 2-1 up going into the second leg. Final thing to note, Aribo seems to have fallen out of the squad entirely now.

There is a very very small part of me that hopes Bednarek comes in and plays on the left of the partnership and actually plays a bit like he does for Poland. He won't, it is just another player to score some own goals

For me the blame for the actual goal we conceded falls with Lyanco. He plays Watkins onside, by being a foot or two behind the rest of the line, and then misjudges the ball and jumps under it. That being said, overall Bazunu isn't good enough right now to help stop us from being relegated

We don't have a keeper like him because of our choice, and our coaching. Martinez only cost Villa £8m more than Bazunu cost us (or just over one Larios), (20 vs 12) and his wages wouldn't have been that much more as an Arsenal squad player compared to Bazunu as a City player. We needed a keeper with experience to lead a young defence, and we have the draw of coming to England and the biggest league in the world as a draw, so reasonably we could have signed a better keeper. I really don't know why we aren't banging down Juventus' door for Mattia Perin, they really need wages gone right now and he's their number 2

I think part of their issue is not actually buying very good players with all that money. Their squad is the level they are, bottom of the top 6, enough for European football but not enough to really win anything. Hojbjerg plays every minute for them, and we all know he is good but he isn't going to lead a team to a title. The same with the likes of Davies, Emerson, Sessegnon, Bissouma etc. They'd all walk into most PL teams, but are they consistently good enough to get Spurs to the very top, probably not

I think this speaks more of how we've not had a set partnership for large periods. In the early 2000's Svensson and Oakley were good, but the likes of Prutton and Delap didn't necessarily provide quality. For me the gold standard is Schneiderlin and Wanyama, and noone comes massively close. Steven Davis helped the Romeu and JWP partnership in the early days, and there were points were I preferred Hojbjerg and Romeu to JWP.

Think you'll be alright if you make him a supporter number as "friends and family" through the ticket site, and book through your account. I had the same issue but it seems to be fine as long as the person making the order had the account before the 11th.

He was also kept out of the side for years by Steven Davis and Hojbjerg, and was our second best player behind Redmond and Ings respectively across a few years. He represents hard work and longevity, coupled with a reasonably high level of performance, but on that basis for me he sits alongside Lundekvam, Dodd, Beattie, Lambert, Schneiderlin as players who were of good quality without necessarily being the best player and were of good service. If he carries on at the recent level, and is what keeps us up then yes that elevates him, but not to the top two.

11.22 so 12 goals is just above expected, so finishing the chances you would expect him to. One red card this year for a karate kick to the head of a Millwall player trying to bring down a long ball

It is a good metric for the quality of chance a team is producing against the end result, over a spread of games. For example, a team that has 3.5xg per game across half a a season but is only scoring 1 goal a game is making chances but not finishing them, but a team who have 0.5xg per game but score a goal a game are not making enough chances but are finishing those they do have well. It is also useful for measuring a striker's ability. If a striker is scoring above their expected goals, you can infer they are likely a better finisher, or more in form, than someone who is scoring below their expected goals. It is less useful when applied to specific circumstances, and better over a wider spread of data. However, it does represent Wednesday quite well, our two chances weren't the easiest, and so you would not expect us to score that often. Djenepo misses that chance more often than he scores it, so it has low XG.

Not sure there has even been a time or day set yet, just broadly the weekend the game will be. I wonder if the ties will all be set after the replays which is next Tuesday and Wednesday, so not long before the game should be.

Very kind, it is a touch tongue in cheek because he was clearly limited, but his goal against Everton at home will stay with me as a great Saints moment for a very long time

Proved this evening what an asset he is, he’s such a good defender and his ability on the ball is probably the best in the squad, he stutters and shifts his weight and the ball so brilliantly to keep possession

Ward Prowse seems to have the better of Phillips so far

Please can you put some sort of trigger warning if you're going to list this many awful managers. I had deep flashbacks to many of those eras watching awful football