kwsaint

The Dell was only sunk at the sides, which was normal practice for Leitch stands. Improved the sightlines for terraces, and enabled the ground staff to get at the drains! At some point before I started watching (may even have been in the thirties), the pitch at the Dell was lengthened, but the Milton and Archers were not reprofiled at the time. Which meant that standing at the back of a full Milton in the seventies you couldn't see much of the goal. This was fixed during Lawrie Macs time, when the Milton was rebuilt and the Archers sunk down. Meant that during the eighties the Milton terrace was an excellent place to watch football. Think we might be going off topic here!

Completely agree. When they used to read out lower league half-times, we used to cheer if Pompey were losing and cheer if Bournemouth were winning. Good to put them in their place yesterday, but like to see them do well. They are a well run club with a top manager

just back from the game. would have taken 0 - 0 at the start but we were totally dominant. just no way of scoring goals. genuine concern now. thought it was a blip but it seems a bit more. thought the ref had a good game though.

Think that we will get someone in January that none of us has thought of, and it will simply be announced. That's how it seems to work. Management must know that we have a problem and will be looking to do something about it. Doubt that it will be anyone 'proven'. That doesn't seem to be the way that things are done here.

Not much of a rest until Wednesday's game. Never been to Stoke before so should be an experience. Will definitely be a tough game although they didn't look great against Arsenal. Predict 1 - 1. Suppose the question is, can Saints do it on a cold, wet, windy Wednesday night in Stoke?

Puel got his tactics completely wrong last night. On the rare occasions that we pressed them, they paniced, and their keeper looked very dodgy and was flapping at crosses. Instead we sat back, got hit by a sucker punch. OK to keep it tight against Liverpool, not against this lot. We simply didn't move the ball quickly enough to trouble them Also don't understand why Redmond was still on the pitch at the end. I am sure that there is a decent footballer in there somewhere, but he was clueless last night. We need to get a striker in the New Year break, offload Rodriguez. I am sure that the famed black box has some names.

It does

Fair point. Anyone who is a regular user of Southern Railways has my sympathy. Their treatment of passengers is appalling. I commute to London with SWT. It is generally OK, except that I often don't get a seat at Winchester - but the capacity changes at Waterloo next Summer will help. The problem with SWT is that they set the timetable, then are completely unable to manage problems. And don't plan ahead for times when there are major events. When it goes wrong on SWT (as it did last night), then it tends to go spectacularly wrong. The simply cannot manage anything out of the norm

Was seriously overcrowded - and only 5 carriages. So much so that people could not get on at Clapham. Also 45 minutes late getting to Winchester, and presumably even later further down the line Just sent a complaint to SWT. Just a bit of thought could have avoided this by running 10 carriages. I was one of the lucky ones with a seat, but there were some seriously squashed people on the train - which was the last one before buses.

Was at the same game. Bale looked class even at 16. McGoldrick made his debut in the same game and looked out of his depth

I was at the Millwall game when Gareth Bale made his debut at 16. For me that was the best debut that I have seen. But Josh Sims had an excellent debut and really didn't look out of place at all. Really good to see Puel giving him a game. Thought JWP had a decent game as well, although the less said about his miss the better

Got to be the first time that Lukaku has played for the opposition at St Mary's and not been given a sniff of goal. VVD was immense (as usual).

We cannot compete with the top 6 financially. Our matchday revenue is a lot less and so is our commercial revenue. The current model is sustainable, and we seem to be a fixture in the top half of the table now. It gets frustrating to keep losing players, but I would much prefer this to where we were 6 years ago. Football history is littered with clubs who tried to 'buy' success (Leeds, Pompey, Blackburn etc). I guess that we will lose VVD at the end of the season, as we lost Aldeveireld and Lovren. But we will get good money for him. He will be replaced (and the club already have options) and we move on. The good thing is that players want to come here. They know that they will get a chance - and some (Fonte, Davis) stick around.

Why don't we just play all the eligible first team players (JWP, Redmond, Targett, Reed, Stephens and we can all go to Wembley again

Of all the Saints players who have left in the past three or four years, who would you want back and could fit in the current team/squad. Plenty to choose from: Lambert, Clyne, Mane, Lallana, Lovren, Shaw, Schneiderlin, Wanyama, Alderweireld, Oxlade-Chamberlain, Walcott, Chambers, Steklenberg to name a few. I would have Clyne back, as he is clearly better than what we currently have. Your thoughts

Still think Wanyama at his very best is better than Romeu. But Romeu is far more consistent, has a much better attitude, and you know what you will get. Wanyama goes AWOL in games or gets himself sent off So I would pick Romeu every time

31 Euros for 3 excellent pizzas and a beer each in a pizzeria round the corner from the main railway station. Avoided Duomo as it is stupid prices. Fantastic trip - pity about the result. You hear a lot of English spoken in Milan. Just that everyone I heard on Thursday seemed to have a Hampshire accent. We were everywhere. San Siro was great to look at, but needs upgrading. Exits are terrible. And cheers to Alan and his son for sharing the taxi from Bologna airport to station.

Will look out for you. There are three of us. My guess is that there might be others on the flight.

Looked at that one. Also looked at the flight to Genoa from Heathrow. Ended up on the 8.45 to Bologna from Stansted. Got a cheap price and an hour by train from Bologna

Took Kwsaint junior back to uni yesterday and took in Camb Utd v Accrington. Which turned out to be a cracker. The Cambridge winner on 80 mins was a worldie - volley from a 40 yard pass that nearly took the keepers head off. Accrington had a penalty saved on 90 mins after a defender was sent off. From the resulting throw-in the ball was crossed and punched off the line by a defender. The keeper saved the second penalty and Cambridge finished the game with 9 men. Bedlam as you can imagine. Brilliant for a neutral. Which got me thinking. Apart from penalty shootouts, has there ever been a Saints game where two penalties have been saved. The best that I could come up with was a game in 73-74 when Eric Martin saved a penalty (against QPR I think), then saved the rekick after having been adjudged to have moved. Any ideas?

The Saints gag is a bit too close to the truth to be funny

i do have a certain level of respect for noble. anyone who's willing to stick at one club.

Tadic penalty against Arsenal in the league cup wasn't much good either. We have been spoiled by the likes of MLT, Beattie and Lambert who didn't miss.

The disallowed goal was offside by inches. Lino actually got it right. Agree that Austin looks like the only one of our strikers who can score goals, but we need to play to his strengths.

Odd game last night. Looked good for 30 minutes and then sat back. But very comfortable. Penalty was ridiculously harsh. But the disallowed goal was offside by about 6 inches - really tight. Nice to see Austin get a couple of goals and Jay Rod took his well. Long can't buy one at the moment