ozzyman

The die hard fans were great tonight , and at times the atmosphere and chants were top notch. The ‘Man City we’re coming for you’ chant was probably the best. When faced with disaster you can either turn your back or stick with it and show some pride in your club. i agree we are total sh*t at the moment and we look nailed on to go down, but we’ve been here before and will be here again, that’s the price you pay for supporting the Saints, but even after a night like tonight i would ‘t swap us for any other team. I don’t even subscribe to the opinion that the players arent trying , it is just that they as individuals and as a team are nowhere near good enough. Clutching at straws , my only consolation is that we can’t get any worse , but then i look at our next 2 games and i wouldn’t put it past us to plumb even greater depths.

totally agree Spurs played a 441 in the second half while we continued with a defensive formation with 3 at the back, even if you you accept that JWP and Bertie were pushed into midfield, it still meant that we had 7 midfield / attackers against their 8 midfield defenders, and man for man their 8 are better quality players than our 7. Ralph seemed more concerned that we did not concede another goal rather than going for an equalizer and winner. With Ings isolated their central defence had a really easy ride as we seemed incpable of getting round them on the outside. When we did we either played a poor ball in or did not have enough bodies in the box to capitalise. Spurs obviously played really deep so we could not get behind them. In which case, if he insisted on keeping Vest on why not play him as a target man alongside Ings, his awkwardness might have caused some panic and some scrappy chances. It would certainly have given the Spurs defence something else to think about. Also Boufal was the only one who was trying something different but most of the time he was isolated out on the wings. By putting him around the D he just might have conjured up a bit of magic to unlock them. ah hinsight is a great thing but we really did not trouble them much at all in the second half, in fact we looked more dangerous albeit wasteful when they had 11 men on the pitch. .....No-one ever said it would be easy in supporting the Saints.....but we had the choice, we could always have been glory hunters and supported one if the big clubs, so we really only have ourselves to blame!

Dont have any truck with it, they’re just trying to distract attention from the fact that we stuffed them 4-0 on their own patch. I don’t remember the News featuring that c**t Westwood ****ing on seats at St Marys back in 2012, or was he just flashing his little spratt to the Skate yoof!

...and they filtered out the real horrors in order to get it past the British Board of Film Censors. The original version made the Hills Have Eyes look like The Partridge Family.

...and they filtered out the real horrors in order to get it past the British Board of Film Censors. The original version made the Hills Have Eyes look like The Partridge Family.

I am a little concerned that we will pay them too much respect as we did in the first half against Spurs, and also that we will repeat the tactic of playing a sack of potatoes up front against a very mobile Liverpool defence. Given that it could be viewed as a free hit I would not be too disappointed if we went for it in the same way as we did second half against Spurs. How about Gunn Val Jan Yoshi Bertie JWP Hoj Rom Redders Long/Armstrong Sims

We have a poor defence which we over-compensate for by playing the extra man, which doesn't really help much as they always make half a dozen mistakes in a match which even the poorest sides will capitalise on eventually, see Cardiff. So a clean sheet is almost impossible. We have an OK midfield albeit one dimensional, defensively orientated and slow, so when we go a goal down due to one of our defensive mistakes, it is very difficult for us to step up and change a game. We have a poor attack , given the current injuries so we compensate by playing an extra midfield player, who is neither quick or skilful enough to trouble even the poorest of Premier League defences. Unlike even the poorest of teams we do not have anyone who is dominant in the air , especially at the back so corners are a problem defensively, especially against the poorer side who generally have big bruiser centre backs who can get on to the end of things and either score or cause havoc. At the other end our corners are ineffective even with Ward Prowse decent deliveries as none of our centre backs want it enough (or are good enough ) to get on the end of them....apart from Yoshi, who is currently deemed as the worst of our 4 centre backs. We are playing 2 young full backs as wing backs and they are doing OK but rarely look like they are going to cause an attacking threat. Other teams play wingers as wing backs but we dont have any. We also lack pace throughout the side so quick counter attacks are off the menu. oh and we have nothing in reserve, in times of need we bring on Ely ....enough said there. Am i being overly negative?

Yeah and the really sad thing is you try not to care because there's only so much disappointment and frustration that you can take. The real danger is that you start to question why you bother ..... once you lose that unquestioning faith and passion then it is very difficult to reignite. This has been going on for over 2 seasons, and some really good supporters have fallen away and there are plenty more on the brink. The club has to show some balls to get rid of Hughes etc and take a chance with an ambitious hungry young manager. Many on here laughed at the suggestion we should go with Graham Potter but at least he would have been a change , a breathe of fresh air , and surely couldn't have done any worse that the current management / coaching regime.

Clutching at straws .....but perhaps a real tonking might concentrate minds that a fundamental change is needed right now , starting with getting rid of the dinosaur Hughes........but I doubt it, we will wait until March and get in another dinosaur like Fat Sam.

I have reached the point where I never expect us to score no matter how good the chance is, and when we do I cannot get too excited as I know a) if we are leading it won't last , or b) if we are losing or drawing we won't get another one. At the moment I cannot see any way out of this situation, plainly we are just not good enough as a team, there is just no belief at the club and no leadership on or off the pitch to get us out of the hole we are in. This has been the situation for the past 2 years and the club has chosen not to do anything about it. Unfortunately if you change nothing, nothing changes.

Just got back from the game, tired and deflated and can't be bothered to read the previous posts but my take on the game and Saints in general. First the positives , won't take long Lemina and Hojberg played their socks off and did all they could to hold it together. Cedric had a decent game and no blame on McCarthy. Ings kept plugging away and kept coming deep to try and get the ball as no service from the wings. The rest ...... Defence a shambles, can there be a worse central defensive pairing than Hoedt and Vestergaard - apparently the tallest pairing in the Prem league but neither can head the ball , shocking in defence and no threat at all from set pieces. Both are so slow it is embarrassing, ponderous on the ball and always likely to misplace a pass. Bertie is a shadow of himself former self and really doesn't seem to care, no great credentials for a captain. Enough said, but cannot ever see a clean sheet if we stick with them. Our wingers (?) did nothing, created nothing, threatened nothing. People constantly criticised Boufal last season but I would have him back in a shot in place of Redmond and Ely., why on earth did we let Sims go out on loan, at least he was positive and had a go. Austin, my fridge is more mobile and can probably control the ball better. Pairing him with Ings was a great mistake....what has Gallagher got to do to even to make the bench. Hughes...doesn't inspire at all, took an age to change what was clearly not working , when he did we went from bad to diabolically bad. Cannot see how we can improve as there is really nobody in the wings that I can see making much of a difference. All that time and money we had over the preseason was wasted. The quality of the players we spent good money on was very poor. We lack pace, skill, creativity, steel and passion.....apart from that we are pretty poor , and sooooooooo boring to watch. Enough ...I need a drink

Lucky we decided to go with a tight defensive formation, or else could have been facing a real hammering.

We are so easy to play against ....it seems that even the poor teams can keep it tight and really make opponents work for anything they can get , we either shoot ourselves in the foot or roll over and make it easy for them. It's going to be a long season!

......just my sort of people, I just don't care about the others to be honest.

...exactly this....having supported Saints for over 50 years I cannot remember a time when everything just goes against us. Rest assurance if we are 3 nil up against City the ref will find a way over sending off 5 Saints players, and adding 120 minutes of added time.

I really believe that The footballing gods have given us the thumbs down. I know all the bull**** that you get the luck you deserve...it evens out over a season...you get refereeing deciosions for and any against ...but let's be honest we have got the rough end of the pineapple more often than not this season. I'm not saying we haven't been poor this season but for F***s we have been on the wrong end of some diabolical refereeing decisions and if we didn't have bad luck we'd have no luck at all. ..........it's the hope the hope that kills !!!!!

Yeah, it's strange being a Saints fan , how many fans of the big clubs would look back and pick out a brief 10 minutes of a game that we heartbreakingly lost as being one of the best ten minutes of following the Saints ever. Wembley Saints end was absolutely rocking. I turned to my 20 year old son a minute after we scored after finally coming down from the air to find him crying. I asked him what was wrong, and he turned to me and said 'Dad , I'm so happy'. Now that should be what football is about. Let's not get above ourselves , I would hate to be a bid club plastic fan and expect to win and nothing else matters. There were more Saints fan in The stadium at the trophy presentation that Manure fans , soaking up the atmosphere and and clapping the players. Tomorrow should be no different, win or lose we stick with it and relish those small moments

Look , I am as sceptical and disappointed with the team as everyone else. I believe we are going to lose if not get a hammering tomorrow and am having trouble getting up for the game. But Christ, these games don't come along often....semi final of the FA Cup and at Wembley I have been supporting the Saints for over 50 years and can virtually count on the fingers of one hand the number of times we have been here. I am in my 60s now and past history suggests that I won't see many more. So let's forget about the all the ****e for a day, have a few drinks, have a few laughs, support the Saints throughout, even if we are shed loads down within 10 minutes. We are expecting to lose, so nothing to worry about. We've all got mates who aren't around anymore who would have loved to be there tomorrow. Life's too short not to enjoy these rare occasions, so come on you Saints surprise us!

I agree with almost everything that has been said, we are a mediocre team playing mediocre football mediocrely. We cannot play blood and thunder football, it is not in the DNA of most of the players and the team as a whole. They think they are better than that. All the clubs we are competing against down the bottom have some balls and are prepared to put it on the line. That's why they can get surprise results against the better sides and grind out wins against the lesser sides. Hughes seems to have quickly caught the Saints manager malaise of only playing one up front and pack the rest of side with defensive minded and predictable players. The real nail in the coffin was taking off Long for Austin, when all of us would have gone with both up front for the last 20 minutes. Christ ...we needed to win this game and Hughes seemed more concerned about holding onto a point. On that basis we might as well have kept Mope. We are deservedly going down, the real shame is that it is with a whimper and really could have been avoided.

Tadic's as our creative attacking midfielder .... Wtf , given the match time he has had this season he really is garbage. (Now go and score / make the winner ).

It looks like Hughes is just trying to keep it tight and hoping for a lucky break. That's worked well for us so far this season (not). The thing is teams destined for relegation only get bad luck e.g Alonso not getting sent off and then contributing to the Chelsea goals. We really have to try to make it happen and if it doesn't then at least we gave had a go....I am trusting Saints will make me look stupid and Hughes's plan works out in the end ...it's the hope that kills.

I agree. Why people keep suggesting playing Tadic and or Redmond is beyond my comprehension. Neither have shown anything this season and when the chips are down and you want players to at least show some fight they always go missing in action. Come to think of it when the chips aren't down they are still a waste of space.

He'll start next game !

Yeah let's keep sticking with the prolific Tadic and Redmond, they never miss a chance. The Mope mantra , change nothing and hope for a miracle.

My thoughts entirely ... I just give up , the problems are so clear to anyone but our clown of a manager. It is so frustrating. I am trying to get numb to it all as it hurts less. Will still be a season ticket holder next year but this was all so avoidable.