Charlie Wayman

A very satisfying result after a nerve-racking first period when we were poor and just couldn't figure how to outwit a packed defence. Credit to Alan Pardew he does seem to be able to change tactics subtly as well as in the more obvious ways. A bit of a bummer that after such a gritty display and a well-earned victory we made no progress towards the play-offs. I'll bet I am not the only one who is disappointed about that and that we gained only one place. Now we are close to the 'winning' half of the league it is obviously going to be far more difficult to make progress upwards as dramatically as over the past few weeks. Even AP is cautious about it in his reaction piece. We must get something at Leeds so I'd let the Johnson's Paint Can go if I were in charge, put out the reserves or something but let's not get our blokes knackered, injured or sent off ahead of Saturday. We need our best team at Leeds even if they put Murty in a wheel-chair

There are also plenty of hard cover car parks around the stadium so why park in a field? The whole complex there becomes a Park & Ride sit for Silverstone on F1 Grand Prix days.

Let's all take a calm-down pill including our new Chairman. We have a free press in this country thank God and nobody should deny their freedom to publish what they want and to collect their news however thay have to. Do we really want our press controlled by background mandarins who can decide what and what not you are allowed to publish. Publish and be damned say I. We live in a democracy still (just about). OK maybe there are some boundaries when it comes to personal stuff but being quick off the mark to publish news of Staplewood is hardly damaging any particular individual. Quite the contrary in fact as it puts the new management team in a very positive light - a refreshing change for this City and Club so why would The Echo not wish to spread the good tidings to us all at this time of the year especially? They'll find a way around it once some kin passer-by picks all the toys up and oputs them back in the pram. Come on children behave nicely or Santa Claus wont be coming this Christmas! No wisecarcks about old-age either please.. This is no laughing matter... Ho! Ho! Ho!.

Not Wotton, he would be a disaster. His tackling is never anything other than full-on and desperate so we concede a penalty or two every week. Also he's slow so left wingers would have a field day waltzing around him at speed.

The sensible answer is for some of us to share cars and petrol cost but wifey has just reminded me that we're booked for a local Christmas bash on the 19th so I'm stuffed! S--T!

I know of a few 'posh' people who used to claim to be Saints fans when we first moved to St Mary's and were riding high under GS. Now thse same people never go and never ask me about Saints at all. But I'll bet my house on the fact that when the good times return they'll be back slavering with indignation at not being able to get tickets 'cos "we've been Saints fans all our lives" These people are nothing more than slimy barstewards to a man (or woman). We don't want them and don't need them at all. Unfortunately the Saints will need their money so I suppose it's inevitable that genuine 'thich 'n thin' fans like us will have to put up with the creeps all over again. Yuk! "Come OUR day, the B------S will be back"

Hey! We are only 9 points from the play-offs.. Why is nobody excited about that?

Sir David Beckham. Once he's finished winning the World Cup he'll be up for a new challenge and he loves teaching kids so he can run the Academy during the week and knock in a few goals at weekends.

Well **** me, it's 3-1 again! Pardew out! We want a manager with more imagination.

You didn't tell me anything useful so I'll have to go to the OS website to find out when I've got to brave the elements and make my way up to SMS. can never get the on-line thingy to work.

Now there's a story. Is it perhaps that (a) we are Swiss-owned business so restricting commercial opportunities and (b) we no longer have Rupert Lowe's influence who was a big-hitter at GHQ at one time. Remember the Macedonia game? We were 'persona grata' in those days. Still, do I care? DO I BALLACKS!

Where will they put it, it's all inside the stadium. Hope it's got mirror glass, I'd hate to see in!

They're probably over-training for the role, it used to be good enough to do a few stretches against the goalpost just before ko and a good old rub of the beer belly to settle any flatulence form the pre-match pint. They're all becoming too bloody precious by half. What's there to do except pick the ball out of the net from time to time and chat to the blokes behind the goal? All that diving around nonsense never happened before high definition telephoto lenses became 'de rigeur'. That Derby bloke Bywater now he looks and sounds like a real goalie, spends his time with other blokes wives whilst their out training rather than shifting weights and running around the training pitch like headless chicken. That's why he's up for it on match days. Get off your Rrse Kelvin and get back out there!

As we saw on Tuesday, there are many factors at work and in the end it is TEAM performance on the day that counts. On our day we can indeed beat most of this divison, on the other hand if it's not 'our day' we struggle against even the bottom clubs. I hope the new found solidity of defence was not a one-off freak occurrence, if the back line play as well on Saturday as they did on Tuesday at least we will have a basis for at least a draw. What concerns me most is how all of our younger lads and most of the older ones as well were well and truly knackered by 75 minutes on Tuesday. If those conditions prevail again - the weather forecast is not good for Saturday - then we might be totally ****ged and off the pace from the start. In which case expect a long ball afternoon, a scrappy match and probably a 0-0 or 1-1 scoreline if we're lucky. At the back of my mind is concern over the inevitable sigh of relief from our players at being out of the bottom four, if the lads go to sleep on the back of that there is a clear and present danger we'll be 2-0 down in a flash and out of it. It has to be 100% concentration from ko and I am not so sure our lads will be fit enough to do it.

'Au contraire' trousers, my friend. We should target the financially crippled clubs like Preston in the lower reaches of the CCC if our aim is to be back there next season, building for the future means better players than Division 3 can offer.

Um! We are still 12 points off which is worse than where we were about 6 weeks ago when we were 11 points adrift and Nick started getting hot flushes. Realistically, we are playing exactly on par with Millwall who this morning are running 8th, they match us every week so how will we pull back 10 points on them by season's end? My advice, don't set your sights so high as you'll be one very miserable bugger at season's end. Look forward to next year.

What a strange match. We were frustrated all night by the offside trap and couldn't beat it and they were useless and never looked like troubling our defence. With Stuart Pearce watching you'd have thought Adam would have turned on the magic but he seemed to **** it up time after time by trying too hard when the simple thing would have netted him about 4 goals. Superlative Schneiderlin, Mighty Murty, Peerless Perry and Juggler James... Wow! What stars, and Jaidi played a blinder as well. What's happened to Hammond, he seems to be all at sea since AP gave him the skip-band, now it looks like he needs a band-aid! After another woeful display of laziness and shooting incompetence amounting to grand larceny, I am convinced that Lambert is a waste of space even 'though somehow he manages to get his name on the score-sheet every week. He just isn't good enough for our team now. He was supposedly worth £1m, I'll bet Bristol Rovers have been laughing with their bank manager ever since.

Bolton, Blackburn or Wigan at SMS but not one of the BIG SEVEN and certainly not any of the crap sides we played in Division 2 last year promoted or not, we can do them over later when we've cashed in a few chips. A draw against in form WBA or Newcastle would be a bummer

Another good day at the office. The important point to remember is that we are winning on heavy pitches in rain-sodden conditions whereas or slickest football is designed for fast dry pitches. If we can win ugly repeatedly in these conditions then it should be fun when spring comes and we can knock it around a bit. SUID

Yeah! Typical Echo. Why make things up when somebody else has already done it for you?

Never mind the quality feel the width! It'll do for me for now. Well done lads!

A few weeks ago when this idea started about us reaching the play-offs, we were 11 points behind. Now, 6 or 7 games later we are 13 points behind. By any standards that is regression not progression. Forget the play-offs and look forward to maybe a top-ten finish, for which we should be grateful all things considered

Lambert just didn't seem interested yesterday, I wonder if Conolly is beginning to get to him. We saw from Conolly yesterday, how effective a striker should be and in truth Lambert has never been in that class. It seems to me that as Saints up the tempo and skill of their movement Lambert is being left behind. I fear he doesn't have it in hmi to respond in the way Conolly has either. It's not just Lambert that is poor at the moment, somehow Hammond was all at sea again yesterday as well. Why they chose him as Skip and not Murty is beyond me. Lambert, Hammond and Davis need a run in the reserves to sharpen them up... I know, I know who'd replace them?

We are not good enough for the play-offs this year. The limitations of our back four are starkly evident. In truth probably only Murty is good enough. Jaidi's age is beginning to tell, Trotman seems unreliable under pressure and Harding is an enigma somehow contriving to look better than he is, great going forward but defensively awful.

Well, not what you'd call an uneventful match, this was full-blooded end-to-end stuff that enthralled the crowd from beginning to end and would not have disgraced the premier league. It was hard to believe at times that we were watching third division football. Norwich were good, not spectacular but solid, well-organised and skillful and an odds-on bet for at least a play-off place. Saints were at their frustrating best and worst once again, at times magical at others pedestrian and awful. It is strange indeed to watch such an amalgam of sublime movement at one moment followed by sheer bloody incompetence almost immediately afterwards and moments of madness from some of our brighter stars that defy imagination and which seem not to afflict other teams. Who'd be a Saints fan? Who would not have wanted to be there on Saturday. The best match by far at SMS for many a long year. A draw was a fair result. This is our level in this league with this team. The positives to take away? The fast close-linked interplay of Schneiderlen, Lallana and Conolly, the breath-taking arogance of Antonio and the never-say-never, do-or-die, win at all cost approaches of James and Schneiderlen. The penalty, the fluffed shot-stop that led to goals? **** happens, every player has a moment, they'll get over it so will we. Don't expect promotion but please let's get away from the drop zone before Christmas. and... More games like this please!