Chewy

That’s right - he’s the laziest player I’ve seen since Le Tissier. Personally I’d sack Dibling after fining him for being sh1t. I think we should give him away for free. This kid is so crap. Seriously, I do wonder about the mental capacity of some of our supporters at times. Fernandes and Dibling both getting it in the same week. Of all the many things wrong with Saints right now, of all the utter misery we’re enduring under SR, and we start picking on the only 2 bright spots around the entire club.

Wouldn’t be so sure - suspect we might be less keen to do Wednesday many more favours after they advised us of their terms for progressing our interest in Rohl. If Shea doesn’t return in this month it’ll be down to the terms of the loan and/or Juric’s view on whether he’ll utilize him enough to justify recalling him from an almost guaranteed 20+ championship appearances. That in itself might depend on other transfer dealings.

I’m sorry but I genuinely don’t see the point. Our ability to spend enough to try and compete this year was significantly hampered by the millions we wasted 2 years ago trying to stave off relegation… and we had a chance then. We have no chance now, so every decision should be to help the reset for next season and more importantly the following (hopefully after a promotion, but if not we’ll need even further cost reductions). We need to be saving money this January, trying to shift any of our dross onto anyone stupid enough to want them. Our squad is huge, costing millions in wasted wages. Even if we lost half a dozen we’d still easily be able to field a squad … we have 4 keepers, 4 left backs, 3 right backs, 6 centre backs, 6 centre midfielders, 3 left wingers, 4 centre forwards. I’ve not counted any of our many out on loan either (have counted Wellington though). And the majority of them are not good enough. The only money we should spend at all is in tying Dibling down to a longer contract to ease the pain when we sell him … if there’s any chance he’d agree. Anything else is literally a waste of money (caveat of not including any random youth transactions - if a good opportunity arises there you can always take it). Spaffing millions on a player or two to help us get relegated with 18 points instead of just 12 would be possibly the stupidest thing SR had done as owners; given the litany of cock-ups they’ve made, that would be a pretty impressive accomplishment!

It’s a bit of an oddity that a number of the very best English teams from my lifetime have played a lopsided 442, normally with a left winger and more of a wide right midfielder than winger (Barnes/Houghton, Giggs/Beckham, Overmars/Parlour, Highway/I think Ray Kennedy). In each of those the left winger was definitely more of an attacker than their counterpart. they all also had a deeper lying second forward behind the striker (Beardsley, Cantona, Bergkamp, Dalgeish). And often one full back more attacking than the other, also on the left (Irwin/Neville, Kennedy/Neal). Its funny because we all line up our formations in some sort of symmetry but football doesn’t happen in symmetry on the pitch; I think the above suggests a rough balance of 343 from back to front works, but with a right to left balance of 442. On a personal note I don’t like being wedded completely to a system anyway; I kind of like setting up with ten and having one spare to utilize as the game situation dictates. So 3 to defend (2 cbs and a dm), 3 to be box-to-box (full backs and an ‘8’) and three attackers (2 wide one centre). The 11th guy can be a striker, number 10, another deeper midfielder or a 3rd centre back. All nice and symmetrical and completely at odds with my own analysis above 😂

18 year old kid having a dip in form - I’m not concerned. I’d rather it wasn’t happening this very moment but was bound to happen at some stage. Agree with the team listed, our best 11 at the moment

Couple of thoughts His first interview ended with him saying the word “premiership”. MLG and his ilk must hate him already. Excellent. ABK - if he doesn’t play within a couple of weeks will we all please finally agree that the issue is ABK and his attitude rather than 4 different sets of managers and coaches?

In the expectation that he doesn’t, I’ve been doing some swotting up on Serbia-Croat on everyone’s behalf so we can catch the all important words and phrases we expect to hear. Such as vjerute procesu (trust the process), najbolji funta za funtu menadzer (best pound-for-pound manager), and of course most importantly hrabar (brave).

If it’s 6 months then he’s a stop gap until next seasons Championship push so we can re-assess in the summer. In which case I’m ok with that; we’re down anyway. Of course if by some miracle he keeps us up he’ll get extended and quite frankly he’ll deserve it along with the freedom of the city and probably a knighthood too.

F me the defensive frailties really are permeating throughout the entire club aren’t they.

Anyone else concerned that if it’s taking this long we might be appointing Rudi Skacel?

Now that, my friend, is the perfect tune for a terrace chant. Amusing as the lyrics are, not sure they’re right. But with a bit of tweaking that would be our winner. Now all we have to do is appoint him …

Well, he has in the traditional way of looking at these things. But if you look at the situation tactically and look at the right set of statistics, he’s still in charge

Being brave is exhausting

My understanding is that Rohl likes to press as a rule; tactically he tends to set up 4231 as well. But he’s been flexible on both, playing 343 often, and playing a low block when needed. It’s exactly this sort of flexibility and pragmatism that I’m more interested in than a ‘philosophy’. Any philosophy becomes an issue when it’s fixated on - Ralph’s preference for Moi because he was good off the ball is as ludicrous to me as RMs preference for Bazunu in goal because he can pass. They were both sh1t at the bits of play I cared about. As a rule I prefer the press over possession-for-the-sake-of it football, so preferred Ralph to RM when it was going well, but I don’t want someone wedded to a philosophy whatever it might be.

I don’t know enough about the potential candidates to get too emotionally involved about whoever they decide on, but I sincerely hope they don’t let money be the deciding factor (within reason of course!). This appointment needs to be right with the aim of starting season 26/27 back promoted with a good squad, good coach, sound tactics and a fair chance of re-establishing ourselves in this league. We tried cheap with Selles and he was a lamb to the slaughter. And for the sake of SR it needs to be a PR success. You can never guarantee any manager will be the right choice, but if they don’t make an appointment that has us on side they’re on a hiding to nothing. They’ve not received a fraction of the fans’ ire they truly deserve. Come up with a meh appointment, or one who’s too arrogant or too mental like some of the recent attempts and when it goes wrong there will be no patience and little holding back I suspect. Hjulmand to me looks pretty meh and cheap. I doubt I’m alone in that assessment. We’ve had a Wednesday supporter on here telling us Rohl will manage in the Champions League - we had Swansea supporters on here when RM was appointed telling us he was tactically inflexible and defensively terrible. Chalk and cheese in the feedback. Please can we just go and get the one who is more likely to be good, one we can get excited and positive about immediately? I know it’s comparing apples and pears, but 10 million v the millions wasted on player recruitment is surely doable for the most important position at the club? PS on another angle, is it worth doing a poll on who we want?

If your employers had any interest in trying to stay up this season they’d have acted weeks ago. We are done. We hopefully won’t lose every week but we are not winning enough games to amass the required number of points to survive. Not unless 3 clubs get docked 50 points. Doing that as a planned damage limitation will waste 6 months - unless it is purely to tide us over because our preferred option would be interested in the summer but not now. If we’re down, IMHO we are better off using the time on the future. Disappointing if Rohl isn’t an option but let’s hope Rasmus is nowhere near the recruitment process and we can find someone decent, with a full quota of marbles and absolutely no ingrained footballing philosophy

Not sure there’s a love-in, but there is an element of truth in that there’s be a lot less noise about him without his prior spell here. But that’s probably just because without it we wouldn’t know anything about him so he’d seem an odd choice. Knowledge of him means some have watched how his career has developed and are so far impressed. His football style is mainly about aggressive pressing, a la Ralph - IMHO the best football period here since Koeman. And as a match-goer that’s important to me. He does, however, appear more flexible and pragmatic than Ralph, adapting his formation quite a lot. I like that too. He took over a virtually relegated Sheff Wed and saved them last year with no funds and turned that around quickly without months of blaming scar tissue, refs, fans or the lack of funds. Ok, nobody is saving us from relegation but stopping the rot quickly would be good. He’s continued over-performing this season; by rights they should be struggling again but are currently on the fringes of the play-offs, despite being skint. He coaches well (Shea Charles looks like player of the season material, seemingly not good enough for our team last year), organizes well, plays decent football, is flexible and as I have a link to Wednesday I follow them a bit - their fans are seriously impressed. He’s got the right sort of profile for SR (that doesn’t bother me but it’s a factor in judging what’s realistic). And finally I think he’s attainable. We are down. We won’t be offering a manager the chance to show off their credentials as a premier league manager for 18 months (discounting 6 months in the league overseeing our relegation). But if managed remotely well, we should be promoted next season. Our squad and budget will make us a strong contender next year. Experienced people will know we’re down and will know it’s a long project. Just think how many better premier league jobs will become available in the next 18 months. There’s already one more attractive position today so no one with a big name is coming here now - maybe if we’d acted after the Bournemouth result but not now. Someone however will fancy using us as the route to being a premier league manager in 18 months time. Someone young, confident and someone who would enjoy having cash to spend on it too. Rohl is approaching this January having to make an extra push for the play-offs by selling and loaning in - his club are skint and he’s over achieving. They have virtually no chance of offering him a crack at the premier league and we do. Id be a lot less aware of some of this if he hadn’t coached here before but I think the points are still very valid. It’s also fair to say there may be a few others equally plausible who I know nothing about so he’s not my “only him” candidate. But I think he’s an attractive, attainable and plausible option given our predicament and his circumstances

It’s about next season for me - we’re down. Spend the rest of the season drilling the defense so we’re hard to beat and getting us fit. I don’t want any money wasted this January either unless it’s on the defensive leader we’ve been lacking since Fonte left, or the striker we’ve needed since Ings departed. And given our predicament neither of those are happening. I’d also like some game time given to some of the young forwards, SAA, maybe a Robinson or Dipepa if they’re anywhere near. Makes financial sense too (pl appearances inflate prices). I’d like the people we want rid of to be left out of all match day squads so they and their agents know there’s only one option to pursue in the summer. Basically I’d like us to treat the next 6 months as a very long pre season where we focus on nailing the defence.

I think the main difference I see for saints is that before SR we were “sleep-walking towards relegation” to quote a certain poster. And now we’re driving head-long towards it at top speed, full Thelma and Louise style. Only we’re not surrounded by police, just doing it on our own to prove how brave we are.

When you have had the full revelation and seen football nirvana, nothing but pure possession will ever do again. It is the way, the truth, the only. There is nothing else. Any deviation will lead us down the wrong path, a path littered with mistakes made by referees, fans and players who won’t follow the correct instructions.

Agreed Ding dong pass it round the back In possession stats we’re winning Edit - could add another couplet Russ will never get the sack So we will keep on singing or something like tha

Given how abject and devoid of confidence Spurs look, this game would suddenly look actually winnable if we were to change manager this week. As it is, we probably won’t and spurs will and they’ll get the new-manager-bounce win. Of course if neither club act it could be anything. Each side desperately trying to out gift eachother.

It’s probably not a coincidence, but unfortunately for us I suspect they’ll be teaming up elsewhere. I hope I’m wrong.

There’s a poster who’s made blackadder jokes on here for a while, the mboto gorge username is also from blackadder. I don’t think it’s especially well disguised. Never understand having multiple usernames but whatever. As for Fabrice, he’s clearly not thick, but he never responds to well-structured ripostes because he can’t win those arguments so slinks off. As for RM … either he knows he’s going or he’s utterly lost the plot with his post-match comments. You can not attack the fans and survive. That’s on a tactical level. On a moral/behavioral level it’s simply disgusting. They pay your wages, follow the club passionately their entire lives, and many of them know a good deal about football. It’s contemptuous, arrogant and fucking rude. Which is increasingly what I find to be RMs most common personality traits. And I don’t care if the players and staff still like him. A) his job is to win games first and make friends second. It can be easier to achieve part 1 with part 2 in place but justifying failure with part 1 - your fucking job - on the basis that part 2 is fine, is the definition of cart before the horse. B) I couldn’t actually care anyway. Too many of the players and staff are used to being rewarded and praised for … not even mediocrity but downright sub-standard performances. I don’t want Jack Stephen’s ‘happy’ with his lot. Or anyone in the recruitment team. Or the marketing department. I don’t care if RM smiles at them and politely says hello, and tells them he thinks they’re wonderful. They’ve almost all been utterly crap since SR took over. This is a business and is one in elite sport where performance is the one metric that defines success. In no other business is it targeted quite so uniquely, on one final league table per year. Anything else literally doesn’t matter. Some of it is ‘nice’ and can help achieve that target, but the target is literally everything in football. Score a goal, don’t let in a goal, win a game, climb the table. And at all of those things, RM is an abject failure. Nice? Fuck off. Players like him? Fuck off. Philosophy and identity? Fuck off. Score a goal, don’t let in a goal, win a game, climb the table. And if you can’t do it, then go.

Apparently part of the A34 is now shut 🤷🏻‍♂️ Good luck to anyone who ventures out - if you somehow survive the storm and the game is somehow played you’ll have another chance to witness our football revolution. Just remember to watch the game tactically, not as fans. That way you’ll be able to appreciate how marvelous we are, despite what the 8-0 score line would lead you to believe.