Chewy

I saw it live too and thought Fernandes’ reaction was embarrassing. I’d have booked Young for being a plonker, but “reckless”? ‘Violent conduct’? Absolutely not IMHO. What caused it though was the ref and his assistant getting the throw in wrong - Fernandes was grappling to get the ball back because he knew it was our throw, unaware the ref had wrongly called it for them. That linesman was dreadful BTW. They got 2 corners which should have been offsides to us - it’s like linesmen have been told to never raise a flag in case they get it wrong. Fair enough if it’s a ‘goal’, you can let VAR do its thing as obviously happened later, but to ignore every offside because it didn’t lead directly to a goal is not what the modern rules were meant to do. Drives me nuts. As for the game … Two poor sides, pretty much balanced out by their different incompetencies. Fernandes (embarrassing reaction aside) was my MOTM; Ramsdale also excellent. ArmA showed good endeavour and really pleased for him to get the goal. Lallana was excellent first half; Downes had his worst 45 minutes in a saints shirt - somewhat better second half. Aribo very good, and good impacts by Dibling and Sugawara. Archer also continues to impress me. Delighted we got the win, obviously. Maybe we were slightly fortuitous but I feel like we’re due a bit of luck after Ipswich and Leicester (ok, our marking is terrible but 3 dropped points deep in injury time is part unlucky as well as part incompetent). Wolves will strangely be under more pressure than us next week so we do have a chance at getting more points there … before we hit a set of fixtures that’ll have us back hiding behind the sofa. I’m delighted with the win but we’re not very good, and there’s no way we stay up unless we get markedly better than we were on Saturday. 3 welcome points but let’s not kid ourselves!

That’s a shame, especially after their performance mid-week. Annoyingly I can’t find any possession stats on the website, though. Nothing about how brave they were either. Did notice none of the first team squad featured, so aside from injuries we have the full squad of way too many sub-standard players to choose from later

We might be able to sign someone based the SR vision of seeing Saints as the feeder club to champions league bound Goztepe? Who could turn that down? Half a season being coached by the messiah followed by the dream move to the Superlig

My bad (and people like me). I’m going, safe in the knowledge it’s going to be as entertaining as watching the dog produce a particularly messy turd on a wet piece of grass in the pissing rain with the added joy of knowing I then need to scoop it up.

Have to agree, this season is done. We need a boss in place long enough ahead of January to give him enough time to work out who to bin off, then they have a 6 month pre-season. On current form no one except Dibling and Fernandes (plus KWP due to contract) will be snapped up so it’ll be largely next years squad he gets to work with. There is absolutely zero point continuing the pretence. Everyone knows what’s going to happen, it’s just a matter of when. Let’s have a plan for once, please, as opposed to taking a punt on Jones, Ruben and Russell. Realistically I’d want a new person in place early December so there’s a bit of time, but the longer we leave it the worse the “scar tissue” will get

On the contrary, depending on the FA Cup draw this is quite possibly our last chance of seeing a home win this season. Now let that sink in!

As a neutral (and very reluctant) observer to this particular discussion, can I just say that to the casual observer you’ve lost this one. Give up and save some face, you’re looking like a bit of a plonker

I like him and love his attitude, but he’s fallen behind Dibling and Archer (rightly so) for those spaces, which basically just leaves the left forward berth as an option, otherwise the bench it is. I wouldn’t mind him playing out there, but have a big problem with having no left foot on that flank at all, so he’d need pairing with Manning (dreadful defender) or Taylor (out of favour apparently) at left back. So unless Taylor gets recalled or we risk switching Dibling from where he’s been most effective it’s a no for me

I hope we go pretty strong too - playing Tuesday means we’ve plenty of time to recover. Think it’s standard to rotate keepers which I’m fine with. Don’t think we should risk anyone with a knock or returning so thats Suga and Smallbone. I’d be tempted to rest the young kids more than anyone, as much as a mental break than a physical one. And if Lallana can’t play every game, save him for the league. I mean, we’re down anyway but we can pretend. McCarthy KWP Stephens Bednarek Taylor Aribo Downes Lesley ArmA Archer Sulemana or Cornet SAA and Taul Paul among the subs.

Didn’t Sugawara get booked for the opposite of this. Mind you, that was Taylor so maybe on this one RM is right

more importantly, he has a particularly strong variant of the accent. Not quite Carragher, but almost. I’d genuinely rather listen to either RM talk about bravery and scar tissue or Nathan Jones talk whatever lunacy he dreamt up as our boss than someone speaking that monstrosity of an accent. I am fully aware that basically makes me a racist.

In all seriousness if we have any sense that’s exactly what we’ll do: prepare for next season’s promotion push by selling anyone we won’t be keeping or want to lose, removing as much pointless wages as possible and spending nothing. Leave us with something resembling next years squad. Oh, and have next years coach in place to give them a 6 month pre season. We all knew we’d likely be relegated this season, but 8 games in and it’s already a total write off. Let’s accept it and plan for the next one

January Transfer window? What’s the point …

Compared to Sport Republics? F*cking fantastic to be fair

I don’t totally disagree - I do think every booking was technically correct, but he was too quick to hurry Suga on with the throw (once hurried, Suga then took too long). And two of the cautions were petulant fouls but resulted from Taylor not awarding free kicks we should have got (Tyler and Fernandes). He missed a blatant penalty, and you could argue he was letting the game flow, but Fernandes was being niggled all game. Plus it’s a consistency issue - the ref v Ipswich blew every time someone was breathed on. The standard of officiating is poor but VAR really doesn’t help. How we didn’t get a penalty from either the ref or VAR is frankly staggering. Having said all that, it doesn’t excuse the total incompetence of our in game management. The issue was not who was brought off - Suga was booked and been down twice, clearly struggling; Fernandes booked and tiring; ditto Dibling. But the players on in all 3 cases were wrong (I think Paul for Fraser was correct). Fraser sub (should have been Taylor), the Smallbone sub (Lallana), Dibling (ArmA, or if Sulemana stick him up next to Paul and go long). Every person in the stadium except RM and his sycophantic coaches could see it. Fatuwu was having a major impact and we weakened ourselves defensively in that very part of the pitch. We deserved to lose for that lunacy alone, whatever Taylor did. Final aside - watch the last goal back and follow Kamaldeen and tell me if you want that attitude on the pitch, certainly in a relegation fight and quite frankly at any stage. Last kick corner and that’s his urgency? I don’t care how fed up with RM he is, or that he’s a striker not a defender. F*** off.

According to his bbc interview the turning point was the red card. It just wasn’t. The turning point was Fraser for Suga, with Smallbone for Fernandes. He panics with his in game decisions; he chose Sulemana, then deployed him too deep. He’s utterly out of his depth at being a manager of a football game. He set us up well, planned well (well, except at last minute corners obviously) and to begin with we executed well. But things happen in games that he has to react to; the second he’s under pressure, whether in a game making a tactical decision, or even in an interview, he mentally goes to pieces and makes terrible decisions. Unfortunately for RM being a manager means managing a game as well as doing the coaching. He might be ok at the coaching, he’s p1ss poor at managing football games. He needs to go I’m afraid.

He’s clearly here until the Leicester game at a minimum. Nothing will happen until then so there’s zero point in hoping otherwise

Probably the worst possible result; we got nothing but didn’t get thumped so can paper over the cracks somewhat and extend the slow death of RM’s tenure for another week at least, possibly for another cycle of games until the following international break instead of this next one. Without regurgitating a lot of what’s been said above, my other comment is that I think Downes is getting a bit off a bit lightly here. Big Les was really poor v AFCB and got slated and dropped - Downes was equally bad v AFCB, poor v Ipswich, and gave away the equaliser in amongst another sub standard performance yesterday. I really like him, but he’s not in good form. For me he plays a similar game to what Lallana has been doing and we don’t need both. I’d rather have Lallana at the moment. Finally, Delighted for Archer - a really good goal. Please can that be an end to the BBD experiment.

I’ve literally no idea what team he’ll pick. He’s so far gone I wouldn’t be surprised to see KWP recalled and have Taylor, Larios and Manning all on the bench. Not happy with 5 strikers?? Well try three left backs for size. Stick that in your electronic pipes and vape it!!

Jim Ratcliffe already given up And wants somewhere more fun to invest?

Some interesting points, and want to pick up on one of them which is the coaching piece. Of course you can only coach what the recruitment team provide, but I’m struggling to think of players, particularly the young assets SR want to monitise, that RM have improved. It depends on your parameters but arguably you can put Bazunu, Larios, ABK, THB, Edward’s, Wood, Downes, Charles, Smallbone, Edozie, Sulemana, Meghoma and SAA in the not improved column. Downes and THB have done well at times, but I’d argue haven’t moved up a level. His commitment to a team ethic has helped some, notably ArmA and Stephen’s last season. But in terms of coaching to technically improve people? No. And if our model is to buy cheap potential, develop and then cash-in, seeing a load of talented kids stagnating is as likely to cause an itch on the trigger finger than some poor results. I guess the point is that RM isn’t getting results or hitting the brief of developing kids for cash. It’s not looking great for him

Not as far as I recall, just felt he’d done his time as Ralph’s number 2. In hindsight I think he was right! Obviously he’s tactically aligned to a type of football most of us enjoyed, knows the club, some of the staff and some of the players. On the face of it his stats at Sheff We’d aren’t overly impressive but in the context of a relegation battle, an unhappy supporter base (fed up with their owner) and a lack of funds he’s done an excellent job there. He’s even got a tune out of Shea Charles (motm in a win v Corberans table-topping West Brom). Unfortunately I wasn’t aware of @Disco Stu news that he’d recently extended his contract there … but managers shelf lives are even shorter than players’ so that in itself doesn’t mean it can’t happen. It probably won’t, of course, but he looks more appealing to me than many of the other names I’ve seen.

Just gonna throw Danny Rohls name out there

I’m going with regrettably yes, with the caveat that only if we have a competent replacement lined up. Im not against the man or his style, but I just don’t think he’s capable at this level - he seems to mentally wilt under the slightest hint of stress and that’s not helpful in this job where there’s tonnes of it. There was pressure last night and he lost his mind with that selection. I don’t see how things improve with him here. He has built a real team ethic which is underestimated by many on here and he’s been let down by the failure (yet again) to buy a striker. Added to which we were always likely to be relegated this season, so that in itself isn’t necessarily a reason to be sacked. But if we continue on this form and with these tactics, I fear the team togetherness will disappear and we’ll be left with a quality squad for a championship challenge lacking in confidence and belief, led by a mentality fragile RM and I don’t see the point in going down that very predictable route. Added to which the fan-base rightly or wrongly doesn’t seem to like him or his football. It’ll get toxic and even if it’s not fully warranted it’ll be an impossible environment for the players. Having said all that, I think we only do it as and when we have someone lined up who is worth it long term. I make no bones about being a fan of Potter and if he’s keen I’d go now. We missed out on Howe by dithering years ago, I don’t want to make the same mistake. But if we’re going to sack RM for another random punt or for someone who plays football that requires totally different footballers to the ones we have, I would be much less supportive of pulling the trigger now. I also think we need a 48 hour breather before deciding. Last night’s first half was as shambolic as I can recall and I suspect we’re all still seething so maybe giving ourselves a day to calm down will help make a more reasonable judgement

I’m not too down on the team, but the bench is definitely wtf Lallana has been excellent but he does the same job as Downes. Lesley has the energy and physicality we need, and Fernandes the creativity from an advanced spot. I like all 4 but when choosing a 3 for the correct balance, it probably needs to be Lallana or Downes that drop out. Defence is fine, I would personally have left Fraser as a sub but he’ll enjoy being the pantomime villain and may be inspired a little. I don’t see what Archer did especially wrong against Ipswich though. I’d probably have gone him up front and Cornet wide. The bench, though!!! No Centre back although Taylor can slot in via KWP but that’ll impact the whole defensive balance. No winger - obviously ArmA, BBD and KWP could play there (Archer and Stewart also?) but they’re not wingers and KWP is already covering 4 places. Bizarre not to have a cb, surprising to see Onuachu and annoying not to have wide options. But her’s hoping anyway …