saintant

Good result against a side with a decent away record. Still don't understand the thinking behind playing Clasie alongside JWP - one of them only and preferably Clasie. I'd like to see far more movement off the ball when we get into the final third - too many players are static limiting the options of the man on the ball. We need to be moving and playing between the lines to create openings. Until we start doing that we'll continue to look pedestrian and struggle to make chances. More movement and we'll be a greater threat and the football will be more entertaining.

Miss the brave high-press football under Poch. Puel's boring possession for the sake of it football is horrible to watch and just allows the opposition to set up their defence and leaves us nowhere to go when we get near their goal.

Ditch the rotation, it doesn't work. Pick your best team and play them in every match. If an individual shows signs of fatigue give him a one match rest. Don't change three or four players every match - the best 1X need to be playing together week in week out. Players don't give their best when playing one week and out the next. Otherwise why do we always hear these excuses that a player is not match fit because he has not had a run of games? - you can't have it both ways. Either you get match fit by playing games or you get match fit by playing every other game - which is it?

He seems to have been around for ever and is thought of highly enough to captain the England U21s and some claim he'll progress to be handed the same honour for the senior team. People rave about his deadball delivery. Yet how many really great games does he have for us? More often than not he is ineffective and I don't recall us scoring shedloads of goals from his pinpoint corners and freekicks. For me he remains an enigma, his finishing is poor as proved again last week and I am still not convinced he is ever going to play well on a regular basis at the highest level. Once more he offered precious little today. Would love him to prove me wrong.

West Brom are 6th on 20pts. If we'd bothered to turn up today that could have been us.

With constant rotation we are going to get games like this where we look really poor. I firmly believe matters are not helped by us setting up wrong for away matches. Against Arsenal with no Charlie up front we had pace and movement and played very good football. He doesn't fit in and is better used off the bench in away matches. At home where we normally dominate he is fine but I think we lose something when he is one of the front three away from St Marys. We carved Arsenal open on numerous occasions and surely that is the style of play we need to adopt for away games.

That's embarrassing to be honest.

Don't start with Charlie in away games - it's hardly rocket science.

Swansea put five past these jokers!

Still think we should have started with Charlie on the bench. We need pace in away matches - should have played Long through the middle. Could be too much now to come back from two down. Not the first half we expected and we need to get right into them from the first kick in the second half if we are to have any chance. Really disappointing after some good displays.

I don't think he was terrible against Arsenal - he caused them quite a few problems with his pace. Ok, he needs a goal or two but I believe away from home when we probably won't dominate possession he provides a good outlet. Charlie to come off the bench for me as his game is not so suited to away matches.

I'd go with; FF Cedric, VVD, Fonte, Bertrand Romeu Davis, Hojbjerg Sims Long Boufal

Well played Clasie :-)

Well indeed. Staggered but he does owe us considering it's his first goal. Humble pie being consumed :-)

Clasie! Why?

Can't believe some people are criticising the ball played by Charlie Austin. He realised he had to hit it reasonably hard to avoid it being intercepted so let's not make excuses for the fact that JWP opened his foot instead of slightly closing it which would have made sure of a good contact - he only had to guide the ball into an empty net so let's not blame Charlie for a horrendous finish by JWP. Other than two bad misses JWP had one of his better games and did cut out some of the negative square and backward passes but he must start converting good chances more regularly.

Have Liverpool put in a bid for Josh Sims yet? - must be only a matter of time.

Take a bow son that was a very accomplished performance by any standards. I'm guessing he showed up well against a strong Chelsea 23s side and was given his chance off the back of that as it possibly showed that he could play at a higher level. Played very intelligently and made some astute runs to receive the ball, never hid and was always available. Put in a few tackles, took some hits and showed that he is not afraid to take opponents on and got into a few goalscoring positions. Not forgetting his assist for the winning goal. An unexpected bonus to the first team squad for me as I didn't know a lot about him prior to watching him today.

If the injury was serious enough to require surgery shouldn't we be asking why Serbia allowed him to play on?

Have to say I'm struggling to understand the Tadic situation. Ok, it was a bad injury but he came back on and finished the match against Wales yet here we are two weeks later and he's not fit to play for us.

How do tennis players manage to play every other day for a fortnight at major tournaments? Some matches last 2-3 hours which is quite a bit longer than 90 minutes often in extreme heat and I would imagine they do far more intense sprints, twist and turns than your average footballer. From what I've seen of Saints the players spend a lot of time stood around so it's not as though they are on the go for the whole 90 minutes.Maybe tennis players are super-humans.

Haven't seen much evidence of pace and physicality from us this season - don't think we'd hold any great fears for the old Liverpool side. And I wouldn't mind betting that they'd have no trouble beating most of the current crop of Prem sides even with the influx of foreigners. I just feel we make far too many excuses for the players of today - you don't tend to feel tired or cry off with minor knocks if you're winning week in week out. Too many don't fancy a little hard work which, considering what they're paid, is a joke.

If I've over simplified it please explain how the great Liverpool side bucked the trend playing on far heavier, strength sapping pitches than the manicured surfaces today's overpaid prima-donnas perform on. Help me out - tell me how they did it. Explain how tennis players can play gruelling matches where they run far greater distances and expend far greater energy then recover to do it all again a couple of days later. Seems it's only footballers who need these long rest periods in between games yet back in the day Liverpool managed ok. You won't build understanding, confidence and match fitness by rotation of a squad particularly one as weak as ours.

To say that you can't stick to the same team week in week out and must rotate is nonsense. How much rotation was there in the great Liverpool side that dominated football at home and in Europe? They played pretty much the same set of players in every game - and all the players wanted to play in every match. This rotation thing is a myth perpetuated by the over bloated squads at clubs like Chelsea. Pick your best side, get some continuity and wins. You'll pick up a few injuries and one or two cases of burn out but just get on with it - these players are supposed to be trained athletes. How do tennis players manage to play gruelling five matches every couple of days at major tournaments? Stop wrapping footballers up in cotton wool and get them doing what they are highly paid to do rather than making excuses for them.

Nah, he's the next England captain don't you know.