Tom & Gerry

This is difficult. I am torn. I don't want Liverpool to succeed. Not because of any vendetta but it might ever so slightly help persuade players see that no one who has left Southampton for Champions league football has ever truly fulfilled their potential apart from Gareth Bale and he didn't leave for a team in the Champions league. Getting in to Europe would be success and I want that but I am desperate for us to win a major trophy and I know that we should be focusing on things we can win and that will be more difficult with the boring and tiring Europa League. I think I'm more ambitious than those who want European football just so they can have a nice holiday. But then again it is progress so I guess we just have to take it and see what happens.

I've dusted it off now. It was on the Diana Ross and the Supremes join the Temptations album. Any how thanks for the info and whatever version play it load and proud

Come on, it would be one of the greatest achievements in the history of football if we finished 4th. So dust off your old Diana Ross records " Dream the impossible dream". Just 1 more win than City and Liverpool in the next 5 games and we go to Manchester with a stab at history. It's on...at least until Saturday!

Midfield players are not the best defenders or goalscorers in the team. They sometimes shoot and sometimes tackle, run around a lot and mostly give short easy passes to players better placed than themselves. Occasionally they produce a defence splitting pass that leads to a goal and that is how they are usually judged by the public. Where as if a forward shoots narrowly wide or has a shot saved it is a good effort if a midfield player's pass is slightly off so that the ball is intercepted or goes out of play then he is a bad player. We once had a midfielder called Matt Oakley.Nobody thought he was that good but he stayed in the team and people ignored him and almost forgot he was there. Then one day the manager WGS said he was the best midfield player in the league (or words to that effect). We said - is he? we didn't know. So we looked and saw that yes, he was quite good, his experience meant that he knew when and where to run, pass, tackle and shoot and he helped knit the team together. I'm sure the same will be true of JWP and experience will make him much better top class player.

According to the "I" he is due to join up with the squad on Sunday

In 2012 we did not have the defence we have now. Kelvin will be perfectly adaquate for most games.

I am actually slightly more optimistic of Champions League football than I was. From thinking it was imposssible I now think it's just about possible given Man U's remaining fixtures and ours. I am also not totally convinced yet that Man U are the real deal. Yes they've had 2 great results but 2 weeks ago they were rubbish and the Manager was facing the sack. We would have to show our very best form of course.

You don't get those at Matalist

Yes, winning the FA Cup is pretty bog standard. Just a day out, then a night out, then the next day out parading the cup round the town, then a year of celebrations ,viewing the cup, having your photo taken with the cup, then there are the anniversaries and the legendry status of the players, but I take your point, I'm sure you will have a great time in Qarabag and Dnipro. Other competitions we've played in Europe were not the interminable Europa league. Don't get me wrong. I want Saints to finish as high as they can, it's just the reward I'm not fussed about.

Enjoy. I hear watching paint dry is pretty good too.

If we qualify for Europe it will be a great achievement but the Europa cup itself doesn't excite me in the slightest. If we draw some East European or Scandinavian minnow I probably wouldn't go (home or away) Would have much prefered a trip to Wembley - not that I am saying that is a greater achievement.

If you are having trouble scoring from open play you would think the coaches would work doubly hard on free kick and corner routines. It's another way to score a goal and it doesn't just have to be a forward that scores. They may be but I haven't seen much sign of it. Even the best teams use this as a get out - take Chelsea at the week end. They are playing sh*t and Terry scores from a cross from a free kick. The forwards relax and Costa scores in the second half.

Pelle produced one of the passes of the season. It was probably the best moment of the match from a Saints point of view.

We are not Man City, Man U, Chelsea or even Arsenal, Liverpool or Spurs. We never can be and probably never will. That has nothing to do with ambition it is just reality. The fact that we are trying to break in to that group our own way makes us far more interesting and worth supporting. It means that players who want to maximize their income and have more chance of winning things will always want to leave if coveted by the above mentioned clubs. It takes skill and patience to replace them. The personnel of any team will be broadly the same for only 1 season. Get used to it and get over it.

3 blind mice, see how they run, They all ran after the Champions league and now they don't play in Premier league, 3 blind mice. They're sitting on the bench, just sitting on the bench, what a glorious feeling they're sitting on the bench.

Me Dad took me. At first I preferred the Albion Band and wanted to get home for the Lone Ranger but it gets in your blood doesn't it? and there is no cure.

There are 3 things that contribute to the atmosphere at a football match. Firstly the players and the state of the game. Secondly singing and chanting of which there are various types. Thirdly the position in the crowd of your main vocal leaders. With regard to the first point one bit of skill as Waynyama demonstrated against Arsenal can do more to lift the atmosphere than a hundred renditions of tired old songs about getting your father's gun. Self evidently the atmosphere is going to be better when we are winning than losing but it is those boring bits in between where signing comes in. There are times when quiet can add to the atmosphere. It's called tension and was in evidence at times against Chelsea, but mostly it's difficult to shout when your team doesn't have the ball or isn't doing much with it when they do get it. Then you need your vocal leaders to liven things up. There are songs for individuals which do encourage the player but only get sung when he does something good. There are tribal songs which I suppose are designed to bring unity to the fan base but don't do much to encourage the players or improve the atmosphere. There are hostile to the opposition songs which are part of the game as long as they don't go too far like that vile song about Wenger which just for a few seconds created a very bad atmosphere and was just embarrasing. There are original songs which can uplift the crowd and best of all traditional songs which start with the vocal leaders, get taken up by the whole home crowd and create a great atmosphere. So to get that great atmosphere you need your vocal leaders in the best position. It seems to me it was a bit dumb to choose an end where a large proportion was going to be away support as your main signing end. I know the idea is to wind up the opposing fans and create banter and I admit that does lead to some creativity in some songs and a good local atmosphere in that part of the ground, but I don't think the reason that some clubs have a reputation for a good atmoshere is because of the proximity to away supporters of there main signing area. Look at the bigger picture and change ends, it happened at the Dell.

You'd think these big clubs would have learnt by now after the impressive work of our double agents at Liverpool, Tottenham,Man U and Arsenal.

I think beating Stoke home & away and Hull away in one week is quite tough. I'm not sure that many other teams could achieve that, big or not.

Wow safe before January

Yes but Arsenal never beat the top teams but still always finish in the top 4 - and any how who says we are going to lose those games?

Let me re phrase that. The only time you can tell if a player is NOT worth what you paid for him is when he leaves.

The only time you can tell if a player was worth what you paid for him is when he leaves, not after 8 games.

Yes they should work, but not all footballers make good pundits or coaches for that matter and there are too many chasing too few jobs. Can you really blame them for chasing the big money while they can? I think most people would do the same.

I tend to agree with this. Why should I get bitter and twisted about Alan Lallana and spoil the memory of the last 5 years. Footballers have a short career which can be ended at any time so like everyone else they are looking for the best deal they can get. We are all the same be it job, broadband, insurance or fuel. No one stays loyal to Tesco if they can get their groceries cheaper else where. Did he make a good decision ? financially probably yes, but in my opinon only Chelsea or City can win the league or in Europe, perhaps United in a few years so what will be his legacy? He may play in a few Champions league games and Liverpool might win a cup but it will only seem like a consolation prize for them. He will never be revered like Bobby Stokes or the 1976 Southampton team. For us though the reality is that he is gone, whether he and the others did things badly or not makes no difference we have a new team now and we march on. As fans we can only take one season at a time and support the team we have. Football is so fast changing that it will not be the same team next season or the season after that.It might be better or worse but don't get to love any 1 player too much because sooner or later you know he's going to leave.