Saint Since '51

Don't know what second half you were watching if you think they didn't have a shot till the 93rd minute. Were you there? Good win yes. Great entertainment. Great first half yes. But Barnsley will finish in the bottom 6, so get real. If someone had walked in at half time, they wouldn't have thought they were watching the Championship leaders.

Just back from the game. Proverbial game of two halves. First half, we looked so much the better side. Controlled the game, created chances, prevented any real pressure from them. Lallana through on last defender twice and missed a headed chance on the far post. Barnsley poor. No single player outstanding for us. We were good as a unit. Seaborne surprisingly good; Cork excellent for the last 25 minutes. Second half, we played pretty football for 20 minutes, but they had more of the ball and created pressure. Cork told loudly from the bench "Jack, Jack, sit, sit!" - which allowed them onto us and reduced our outs. They became more physical and one or two of ours (including Fonte surprisingly) didn't cope with it. For the last 20 minutes or so, we rode our luck. Sending off looked ridiculous from our end. We sat even deeper and the last 10 minutes was like the Alamo. Kelvin excelled himself. We were lucky to survive. Great game to watch. Good performance one half; great excitement second half. And a win. But not the win of Championship leaders.

Precisely my point. He plays in deep positions, but what he's good at is building from the back when we have the ball; he's not good defensively when they have it.

Point 1. Good defence starts with good shape and closing down in front of the back four. In middle of midfield, Cork is good at this. Hammond and Chaplow better options to Schneido in this regard. Is Schneido's creativity enough to warrant a place? Point 2 Davis is still good enough. Makes some silly decisions, but no gk is perfect. He's as good as we could wish for. Point 3 CB - Of all our defenders, Fonte is the only one from whom we couldn't hope for better. Stick. CB - We all have our favourites, but basically the other centre-back is a matter of picking the least bad option. Not a good situation. RB - Richardson has been a disappointment; Butterfield is a better option, but he's really not exceptional. Adequate at best. LB - Dickson has also been a disappointment; Harding is a real weakness defensively - he's ok when they run at him, but is marking at the far post is woeful. We're vulnerable here. Conclusion 1. With creativity from Lallana, Chamberlain, Connolly further forward, I'd go for Cork and Hammond in middle of midfield. 2. If I were Adkins, I'd be desperate for another top quality CB. Fragile full-backs is one thing, fragile central defence is crippling. Ask Arsene Wenger.

Agree with most of this. We certainly did not play the kind of passing game which Adkins says he wants. Chaplow and Hammond were not creative forces and Chamberlain hardly ran at defenders at all. Generally, our close control was often poor and even short passing regularly astray; our standard ball seemed to be high to Lambert or down the channels for Guly - and often missed the target. Distribution from Davis and Jaidi was particularly poor. Jaidi had some jittery moments at the back too. H'pool got the ball forward quickly and looked to head or knock it on first time for fast runners to push onto. Not what Jaidi likes. Having said that, defence from Butterfield and Fonte was excellent; Harding was less solid defensively, but had a good second half going forward. In fact, second half was an improvement; Lallana came in off the wing more and we occasionally passed through midfield to put in runners going between their defenders. Stats which show 7 shots on target flatter us. We had lots of possession; we got balls in the box and created tension. But we created very few clear-cut chances and I can't remember their keeper being really stretched. Sorry to report that we didn't deserve to win and we could easily have lost.

To watch a football match???????

Huddersfield started with more muscle (esp their No19, Alan(?) Lee up front) and energy than us. We were bullied and hassled off the ball constantly for the first 10 minutes and it was no surprise that they got an early goal. Huddersfield played good, quick passes on occasions, but mainly relied upon balls in the air and Seaborne and Fonte looked like ballet dancers in a bar fight - footballers trying to look class in a brawl. Who is to blame for this? Added to this, the back four and Kelvin were like the Keystone Kops when they tried to play it out from the back. It was a bit like a game of Chicken (how close can I get to giving away a goal before you actually score). Adkins is correct; we tried to play football in the wrong areas. Who is to blame for this? As a result of the chaos at the back, our footballers (Chaplow, Lallana, Guly) never got a look in, while Puncheon seemed unwilling to take on the full-back and Sir Ricky, who can mix it, never had the appetite for it. All in all, a woeful performance. Better in the 2nd half - but how much was this because Huddersfield were just protecting their lead. Milles off promotion material.

'Nuff said.

I salute his principle of not considering resignation just to avoid compensation - and he is apparently short of sleep. However... ...he waffled. ...he repeated himself over and over again. ...he didn't control the interview - eg by refusing to answer again questions which he'd already answered. Not a good first impression for me.

Curbishley? Phil Brown?

Read the official statement. They are "evaluating candidates". They DON'T have anyone lined up.

"While we have commenced our careful evaluation of candidates and longer term requirements..." ...no-one lined up.

Wotton may be the Huxford/Walker/Case type of defender we need right now, especially as " skill " seem to be at a premium in L1. Huxford!! Blimey, how old ARE you?

Because the view is better at the back - just like the cinema. And, since you mention the cinema... ...Would you think it reasonable for someone to stand in front of you there?

Fine. That's a deal. I'll sit. You stand. No problem. If it's free when I arrive, I'll sit behind the goal, towards the back. My choice, as you say. And it's all seating after all. And I have bothered to get there at 2pm. I promise not to moan at anyone "creating an atmosphere". I shall, however, moan at anyone selfish enough to come late and stand right in front of me. And you can stand anywhere you like that's free when you get there - so long as it's not in front of me. The sides are usually pretty empty.

Yesterday, it gave the miserable jobsworth stewards the ultimate sanction against the 100 or so people who did want to stand up. Have a word with yourselves. 700 fans there 100 wanting to stand up... ...(in front of the other 600?) All-seater stadium. Geddit? You have a word with yourself

Just back. One of our better performances this season. We didn't look a good footballing team, but we did look stronger (3 CBs + Harding at the back, Hammond in midfield and Lambert helping out at corners and defensive free-kicks). Mind you, Stockport were poor and we still didn't win. I can't agree that we "controlled the game". We did have lots of possession, but hey had as many corners and more shots on target than us for example. Either side could have scored two or three. I don't think we can moan for conceding late; we should have made more of second half possession and tied it up. How many shots on target did we have. 4? Ref had a poor day. Upset both sets of supporters. (Though I've never heard a crowd moan more than theirs). Penalties looked identical. Difficult to be sure from 100 yards away, but both seemed to be attacking headers onto defenders' arms held high. Lots of steady performances. Thomas had the best game I've seen him play this season at right back. Trotman, Hammond, Lambert all strong. Lallana better than usual. I agree Mellis wasn't good. He's out of position there. It's a bit much to expect him to play like a winger. He did have good energy. But I agree, he was knocked out of possession too often. Best you can say about him is that he was 5 times better than Thompson would have been. I'd leave him there; there was something of a pattern emerging in the second half down the right. Worst player, for me, was Saga. Doesn't contest and hold it up; doesn't burst off Lambert's knock-ons; doesn't threaten from crosses; has no pace; had one chance for a 20 yard lob and missed by 5 yards. Has no function whatsoever.

This whole thread was started by the comments above. I've read the link. Actually, it doesn't say there will be more signings even if the Poles stay. It says he thinks there will be movement in and out. It doesn't mention the Poles. It doesn't say there will be movement in if there is no movement out.

We have no-one in the side who's a natural wide-right player. We have no-one in the side who's a natural wide-left player. No-one really thinks Paterson is better than Rasiac and / or Saga. We're still a team in transition. It will be a couple of weeks yet before we get a medium-term, balanced team.

Why are most of our songs about Pompey? And why so bitter? It's fun to enjoy a laugh at Pompey's expense from time to time. But some supporters define themselves more by their hatred than by their support. It's out of proportion.

I'll tell you one thing he doesn't know. When KD and Bart came out with their new GK coach before the (Huddersfield) game, they spent 5 minutes playing 'football golf' trying to kick the ball closest to the centre spot, penalty spot etc and then another few minutes seeing who could be the first to hit the crossbar. Fair play to KD. Can't fault his performance in the match. But if this is what the new management team call warming up and if that's the attitude to preparation that our captain represents to the team, then no wonder we started second best, were muscled off everything for 90 minutes and finished a poor third behind Huddersfield and the announcer.

All true

Just back. We were very poor. We didn't control the game at any stage. We just lumped it straight up the middle to Raziac and tried to feed off the pieces. He won his share and, to be fair, tried quite hard (by his standards); but he was often muscled out of it. A total of 4 shots at goal in the whole game tells it own story. Tremendously powerful header from Lambert, but, generally, he didn't look dangerous. At the other end, it was the Alamo in the first half. Could easily have conceded 4 before HT. Kelvin was outstanding. Second half goals came from uncontested headers right in front of goal and Perry getting stranded wrong side to concede penalty. We desperately need that commanding CB. We looked lightweight in midfield. Mellis isn't big either, though his passing was impressively neat and accurate and he made good runs into the box. Morgan was in and out. Wotton is a lumbering oaf. Lallana and James are something and nothing - neither good wide players, dangerous midfielders, powerhouses. Just moderate, ineffectual beginners. Sorry to be so depressing. It was dire.

Wot Next? We have, nailed in, 1 KD, 2 Murts, 3 Harding, 4 Lambert. We need 5 CB, 6 holding/passing MF, 7 Wide Right. Ok for filling in gaps 8 (ANO CB) Perry/Thomas, 9 (ANO MF) Schn/Gi, 10 (Wide L) Mills/Holmes, 11 (Striker 2) Lal/Pat/Sag/Wh/McL

If we got a point for every cliche in this message, we'd dead certs (there's another one for good measure - oops, and another) for promotion already!!!