goodymatt

Looks like Watford are resigning Dennis, wonder if he will be available for the weekend?

Little clip from Radio 5 Live interview: https://x.com/5livesport/status/1749566967785324709?s=46&t=7raSKCMt6LV8RJ1C2d39WQ Full interview from 43 mins: https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p0h6jl7g

Non-penalty expected goals 🤓

MLG would approve! 😂

I’d keep, 5 goals in his last 6 - we can’t sign a player capable of that for £6m unless we get lucky. Recent transfer windows suggest we aren’t on a lucky streak for CF options. Perhaps if we do make it up he might sign a new contract. If the numbers were right for us he would be worth keeping on as a squad player for the PL. Otherwise we all move on, which seems the most likely outcome this summer really.

Last thing we want is a replay, but with some expected rotation a draw wouldn’t be a surprise.

10 days to go and it’s gone a bit quiet. I’d be happy if nothing changed from here but a new exciting RW option would be a nice bonus. Preferably we don’t see a key target go to a rival and that turn out to be a key signing for them, looking at you Dirty Leeds.

I think that is the point, we are doing far better than last time but it still might not be good enough. Shows how much harder promotion is for us this time around and a bit of fun to just see how we compare against last time out for Saints, a side often labelled as stronger than our current one in various forum topics/discussions.

58 points from 28 league games so far. Just had another look to see how that compares with last season and our last promotion season in the championship. 7 ahead of our last successful promotion and 4 behind ‘Mission Burnley’. If Leicester win tonight they will be on 68 points which is quite ridiculous.

Eurgh, with 3 mins to go of added time you start to think a decent result might be coming. Leeds are going to be like WHU were last time we were down here. Pushing us right to the end.

It’s no slight against Saints to say there is no chance we are catching Leicester this season, they have been on a run as good as our current run for the entire season. I personally don’t think we can do it, even if we carry on our current PPG from this run. I’m usually on the optimistic side of things too.

Our momentum over this 20 game run has been just 1 point better than Leicester. To catch them we are going to have to do even better, is that really possible?

Another way to be like Manchester City! I’d take their kit from this season in red and white stripes tbf.

Our points per game in our record breaking unbeaten run is 2.4ppg, Leicester’s all season is 2.4ppg. With this in mind, I find it hard to back an Ipswich win, based on our form being good enough to catch Leicester. Nothing suggests so far that they can be caught. More likely they break the record points total. An Ipswich defeat seems to be the result that will benefit us the most.

Break from the league as we travel to Watford to see if we can keep this unbeaten run going. I’d expect to see good minutes/starts for the players on the fringes like Alcaraz, Charles, Stephens, Holgate, Rothwell. I wonder if any of our injured players might be back with a few due to return the end of this month? I think this will be a tough game, but going for a 2-1 win. We definitely don’t want a replay given the fixture schedule in February!

He cost Plymouth just £1.2m and we employed his former manager. If only they had a good relationship, he would have been a great signing, over risking £8m (rising to £10m) on a long term injured player.

Martin’s post match press conference for those interested in watching: https://x.com/justinallen1976/status/1748735395162980781?s=46&t=7raSKCMt6LV8RJ1C2d39WQ

Feeling nervous, lots riding on this game: unbeaten record, taking 2nd for the weekend and putting all the pressure on Ipswich. Come on Saints!🤞😇🙏

On the bench today. Did he drive straight from Sheffield to Swansea?

Fabio Carvalho got their winner 👀

Pretty sure Charles was £10m rising to £15m with add ons? £10m is still a high fee for this league mind. I expected him to be a starter fairly quickly but still think he’s going to be a decent signing for us over time and likely make us a tidy profit as our model requires.

I think we will see a record breaking points haul from Leicester and 2nd place will be higher than usual too. Would be just typical for us to get relegated the season before the bottom 3 in the PL are so much weaker, combined with getting enough points to go up normally this season but ending up in the playoff lottery. There are no free hits, we are going to need to be relentless. Normal champions points may be needed just to get that 2nd place. So keep it up Saints, starting with tomorrow and breaking that unbeaten football league record. We have the momentum over this amazing run but harder fixtures are to be faced. Go to Leicester in March and win for example and it will really feel like we have got this.

Free transfer/low risk is a fair point. He’s still our weak link though IMO, although his performances are improving of late. This a player brought in to hit the ground running and be well versed in Martin-Ball but I still see huge gaps being left when he plays that Bree doesn’t seem to leave when he plays. He’s also not contributing anything like the goals or assists for us that he did at Swansea. Creating our most goal scoring opportunities though to be fair to him, helped by how spread out across the team that is due to our style. Is the defensive side that I remain unconvinced on. I’m a bit underwhelmed overall and pretty sure on promotion he will need to be replaced. Therefore ‘beating’ Leeds to his signature doesn’t feel like the win it did when we signed him.

Still trying to work out if Manning was a ‘win’ for us. Lavia was a nice profit for us at least.

We continue to be linked with Ben Johnson of WHU, whose contract expires this summer. I think he will be our KWP replacement, whether that’s this window or most likely in the summer. Leeds interest in Benson is interesting. I think this is our most likely RW signing now and it would be a shame to lose out to Leeds. I’m sure Burnley would rather he went there if they are truly holding a grudge over nothing. Brooks is apparently needed to cover for Bournemouth’s AFCON players/injuries so I don’t think this is dead, just would be a late window move if it does happen when they have options back. Diallo would have been my first pick at RW and Carvalho for the Rothwell role. Diallo has confirmed himself it’s Sunderland only in the championship but perhaps unlikely he even makes that move. Rothwell was clearly happier with the game time limitations than Carvalho who was straight in Hulls starting 11 last time out.