Tommy Mulgrew

Deserved to lose but we gifted Villa the game. Dibling gives the ball away and we concede a penalty to the resulting counter-attack, with Bednarek sliding to block the attacker, who slows down and hangs in a leg to touch Bednarek and fall down. Fine save. Then Dibling gives the ball away again and they score. Smallbone gives Rogers acres of space in front of our penalty area and they score. Stephens goes to ground when too far away from the ball and makes a double movement to make sure the ref gives a second penalty. Another fine save but no defender thinks to run back and clear the ball. Masters of our own misfortune. Ramsdale and Fernandes the only ones to emerge with any credit and even Fernandes gave the ball away too many times. Good game plan but not enough strength in DM to make it a goalless draw and not enough potency in attack to score. Archer and Fernandes at least tested the keeper. We seemed to give up on the rough stuff in the second half, except for one memorable moment from Stephens; a shame because it showed that we still have some fight left in us. Sadly, we are no better than well adrift of all the other teams in the league. Pathetic indeed. Still two more points needed. Let’s hope Leicester bring back Vestergard from the cold when we play them.

Bookmark this; it’s good every week: http://www.fawanews.com/

That’s nothing; SR has achieved that arguably four times with Southampton. I cannot wait for the next one. Ooo er missus; titter ye not.

A blank calendar for August: the COT has no f***ing idea what will happen in that month. Par for the course. Will it ever know and will we ever know whether it does? No prizes for the right answer. 🤔

Despite his sometimes strange selection and substitution decisions, Juric was IMO spot on in his post-match assessments, his appreciation of the fans who attended the matches and were vocal in support of effort from the players, his insistence that the players applauded the fans and his criticisms of past decisions by the club, specifically those connected with recruitment, which gave us, as he emphasised, an unbalanced squad that lacked the physicality to compete in the EPL. I just hope that he bemoaned the crap that he found here and the reasons why that came about in his internal discussions with DS and others at the club. I am disappointed that he did not do better but not really surprised that it ended as it did. Two more points and the world will be a better place.

If you have to be pedantic, WSS, please ensure that you are right; the text should have stated “Spors’s”, not “Spors’”.

http://www.fawanews.com/

Don’t all rush, everyone!

Choice of two. 1st one went uninterrupted through the first half. Always reliable. http://www.fawanews.com/

Hard to disagree with that, MG and SA.

The club’s PRESENT department has been hard at work to talk up Tyler’s value: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/articles/cn4yen2xgrxo

Victor Wanyama looks set to play in Scotland again. Apparently, he’s only 33 - I had thought he was older. A bit of a comedown to play in the Scottish Championship, though. https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/articles/cp8l6k88xg3o

England squad for the Latvia game. According to the BBC: Southampton stopper Ramsdale is the only player from the original 26 not to be included in a matchday squad. Another commentary on our season.

Interesting article on pages 6 and 7 of the sport section of Saturday’s Times: all about TransferRoom and its (presumably annual) summits, which attract about 300 clubs, started by Rasmus’s brother. Apparently, THB’s deal between MC and Saints emerged from a pitch from Citeh to Saints at a TR summit. That was news to me; I had thought it arose through Wilcox’s connection with both clubs. I’m not an online subscriber and so cannot give a link. The accompanying photo shows almost 100 tables with two or three blokes sitting at each in what looks like speed-dating for middle-aged men, not that I would know what that looks like of course. (Yes, I am an old codger who reads a Saturday newspaper, not necessarily on a Saturday.)

38,502 attended Newcastle v Sunderland earlier today in the women’s championship, a new record figure. Now, that’s a proper derby and puts our attendance figure on Saturday into perspective. The previous record was 15,387 in the reverse fixture in October in Sunderland.

Dan’s brother. 😏

Fans of Burnley probably will if they are old enough. For us, he was “One that got away”. https://www.saintsplayers.co.uk/player/steve-davis/

a great talent in Saints promotion year to the first division was a lad called Tony Funnell. McMenemy let him go! see below: https://www.saintsplayers.co.uk/player/tony-funnell/

I seem to be in a minority on here, despite me not liking at all the lineup that Juric selected for it, but IMO I thought the players were almost entirely to blame for the Wolves defeat and the manager hardly at all. We created enough chances to win the game but with one exception could not score. The goals we conceded resulted from woeful defending by Manning, ABK and THB. And Ramsdale should have saved the headed goal; if Macca or Bazza had let that in, the criticism on here would have been deafening. With few exceptions, our players’ speed of thought and physicality were lacking throughout the game; we were often beaten to the loose ball and frequently got shoved/barged/outmuscled off the ball by a more determined opponent (notably Downes, Dibling and Sulemana). I thought the withdrawal of Fernandes at half-time was bizarre and the only explanation I can see is that, by saying that he did not like the way Fernandes played, Juric meant that the player did not carry out instructions on how to play during the match. I would have preferred it if either TP or CA had played the whole game but the simple truth is that our players were not as good as theirs and that as a team Wolves were better than us. And, once again, our play when chasing a goal in the last 15 minutes or so was embarrassingly lackadaisical. We got what we deserved.

The automatic redirection to the sexy nuns page on xvideos.com working well for me. 😉

I think we shall do well in this top v bottom game. I can see Manning having Salah in his pocket the whole game. Ditto, Bree with Gakpo. Archer will bully Konate and van Dijk and soften them up for Tall Paul to come on and score with ease, brushing Alison/Kelleher aside. Sully will roast TAA and create the chances for TP to score. On the other side, Dibling will skin Tsimikas at will. Talking of Will, Smallbone, Les and Aribo will smother Liverpool’s midfield and ensure we face only two shots on target all game. Gravenberch and MacAllister don’t know what hit them. Fernandes does enough to ensure a lucrative summer offer to move to Anfield. Macca, coming on for the injured Rambo, will chew gum throughout and impress with saves from both short and long range. He dominates the box and punches all Liverpool corners away, at least all those that do not go to the opponent, loitering on the edge of our area, whose shot is blocked by the rapidly closing down Smallbone. Liverpool’s inevitable penalty is beaten away from danger by Macca with aplomb. Sugawara and Welington stand like a colossus repelling the late Liverpool onslaught in the 23 minutes of extra time. ABK and THB outmuscle Nunez and Diogo Jota every time, shutting out all threats to our goal. Yes, we play 4:3:2,1 and it works a treat. 0:2; who saw that coming. A real-life David and Goliath story that ends with Callagher, Merson and Sutton eating the Anfield turf. Who cares about merely beating Derby’s points total? The greatest escape of all time is well and truly under way. We finish a point above Wolves in May and all of the previous games this season are lost in the mists of time. Juric is hailed as our saviour and the Northam is renamed in his honour.

Some rare sightings in the latest u21 game: Southampton: McNamara, Payne, Fry, Moore (Abu 64), Kayi Sanda, Bragg (c), Robinson, Sesay, Stewart (Dipepa 45'), Udoh (Charles 79'), Larios (Akachukwu 45) https://www.southamptonfc.com/en/news/article/u21-report-saints-3-3-sunderland

What is the Italian national debt like? Perhaps we could suggest that Italy buys out Dragan to rid us of SR once and for all. Ciao.

That augurs well for next season if we do not sell him. He seems to think and move more quickly than other players on the field, not what I could say about many of our team this season - I know we are in a different league but we won’t be next season. He seems to have bulked up a bit and does not get outmuscled as much as he did when playing for us last year. I’d certainly prefer Charles to Smallbone in our midfield in the foreseeable future.

For those wot don’t know, Plainmoor is Torquay’s stadium.