Rod Le Shearer

For some matches, against teams who park the buss in their own box at SMS, playing with two strikers could be the better option. We completely dominated against both Sunderland and West Ham, and only drew because of poor finishing and bad luck. But playing away, rotating Rickie and Osvaldo as lone strikers seems the better option. And please, lets not forget how amazing Rickie has been in the lone striker/target man role during the years! I dont think Osvaldo can match Rickie as a target man/lone striker. And this sort of questions the signing of Osvaldo; He is too good to be an understudy for Rickie, but not good enough to displace him as a lone striker...IMO. Rickie suits our style of play immensly better than Osvaldo.

If your question was directed at me, then yes; I was at the game. Miserable Norwegian Saints-fan over here..

You must have, because Forren was awful. Rash, poorly timed challenges troughout, looked fat, slow and unfit, clearly lacked match practice, and didnt pose any danger at all when in attacking positions. Based on that showing, we have (for the time being) 3 other CB`s who are head and shoulders in front of him in the pecking order.

What else to expect when Jos and Fox are playing. Slow, immobile & poor, poor defenders!

PLENTY of other fans say this. The first reaction of two of my mates (Villa and Newcastle fan), was to drivel over the unlikely prospect of having NA at their club. He`s held in great esteem throughout the football community- from fans, players, punters and colleagues alike!

Thank you very much, Nigel. You have made me feel well for 2.5 years, thats something money cant buy! Top man.

Ridicoulous decision, and totally wrong timing! To maximise our chance of staying up, NA should have stayed until the end of the season, regardless of percieved "long term benefits". Our long term benefit is depending on us staying up FFS, and this decision, at this time, could cost us our PL-status!! **** Off Nicole C, you *****.

Whatever team we play against, Rickie is be ten times more usefull than Jay. Yes, Rickies work rate isnt as good. He isnt particularly fast. But the outlet he provides for the rest of the team means that 4-5 other players have to work less! the net positive effect is huge, and frankly I`m baffled if Adkins dont see that! I assume he (Nigel) is forfeiting this game, and saving Rickie for saturday. From our last match against chelsea it was obvious we missed what Lambert offers, thats for sure.

Right now he`s about the same as Fonte. And thus a good replacement all the time Jose is injured. IMO Forren has much bigger potential, though. He can become a very good signing, if given time to accomodate to the EPL.

You`re right, he`s not that quick (when it comes to turning, reaction and moving sideways). Maybe the tempo would be challenging for him in that regard. But in a straight line he actually is pretty fast.

I`m norwegian. Have seen him play many times last year, both for club and country. He`s a modern centre back, from the same mould as Sergio Ramos and David Luiz. He has good passing, reads the game well and is pretty fast. He`s efficient in moving the ball out of defence. Although he is not the biggest CB, he very often look dangerous on attacking set pieces as well. Out of our current CB`s, I would rate Forren and Fonte about the same. Both good defenders, but a little weak for my liking.

Interesting. Those stats echoes my perception; the team plays a lot better with Gaston on the pitch. By the way, havent we lost a lot of points after he has been substituted aswell?

Absolutely. And Rickie seemed to enjoy the responsibility, playing like a deity. What a player!

We scored 4 goals, out which Ricky scored two, and was second or third last on three (!!). My vote goes to him. Although Gaston was very good, he shone the most when Villa had given up.

Stupid move by Adkins, everything went flat after that. And the three subs were invisible - both in defence and attack.

I don`t think its fruitfull to compare Jay and Rickie`s performances in this match, they played different positions. I guess my point is to question what warranted starting with Guly as the striker. Lambert won one header, Guly none. Lambert held the ball up/linked a couple of times, Guly was muscled off every time - and he did have opportunities to hold the ball. Lambert would IMO also have relieved a lot of pressure from the back four in those situations, and should (both on attacking and defending grounds) have started. It was also noticeable what effect Lambert`s physical presence had on City`s defence - something not measured by OPTA! Guly isnt exactly a workhorse himself, so I don`t buy that arguement either. Guly played well when put in midfield, but a striker he just aint..

Surely you cannot completely ignore the point made though? We didnt create anything until Lambert got on. Nothing. It`s not like Adkins told the team "Rickie is on , lets attack". Rickie completely changed the game in our favour, through his skills. We were the better team after he was put in. his touch, presence, strength, link-up play and finishing was superb - better than any other striker on the pitch. To say we/he would have done worse if he had started is just speculation. Personally i rue the fact that he didnt get the nod from the off. If he created that much havoc in half an hour, how much could he create in 90 minutes - even against City ? The undisputable fact is we were dire when attacking in the first half, and lucky not to see the game put to bed before SRL got his chance.

Norwegian media (usually reliable) reports the deal as done and dusted: http://www.tv2.no/sport/fotball/england/premierleague/southampton-snyter-storklubbene-for-ramirez-3853619.html#.UC4hSio-Kbo.facebook

Thanks for sharing, that was a good watch !

But you`re wrong. Having great pace is obviously much more rare than having mediocre pace. This is very logical, as the definition of "fast", is compared with an average - in this case all the strikers in the prem. Saints have had two previous top goal-scorers in the prem: James Beattie and P. Crouch. None had more pace than Lambert. Infact, a players ability to score goals in the PL, regardless of team, over the last few years, seem to have no correlation with pace at all ! Van Persie and Holt this season;not one goal scored as a direct result of pace. Drogba; almost never ran/run past players or in behind the defence. The list goes on with recentluy successful players such as Adebayor, Carroll, Yakubu, Felaini, Dzeko etc - all without much pace. If one does study the top ten goalscorers in the prem for each of the last ten seasons, you`ll find that under half of those players can be characterised as "fast". Other qualities can, and does, compensate for a lack of pace. Its all about playing to the strengths of your forwards, and no team does this better than Southampton does with Lambert.

Fonte and Hooiveld..Best centre forwards seen at the KC this season ! Thanks for sharing so quickly.

Congrats to Rickie. Fully deserved,the best player in the Championship by miles !

This pretty much echoes my opinion of him. IMO, he is a luxury we shouldn`t grant ourselves.

Oddly enough (given his experience) he seems to be the first player to shrink when we are under pressure. He performes reasonably well when the team is playing well, but is too often the biggest underperformer when the team is having a bad day. Anybody else noticed this ? This suggests to me he is relying on the rest of the team, and doesnt really add any value in his own right. I wouldnt want him on the bench either,as he isnt an impact player. Release him ASAP, and use the wages on someone who make things happen,rather than waiting for things to happen.

..Was horrible last night - and has been ever since our first couple of games this season ! Recently he hasnt shown any glimps of any imaginable quality to justify his place in the team. No pace, no strength, finishing like a schoolgirl, passing/decisions like a half-wit. Granted, he gets a couple of tap-ins now and then, but so would any other striker feeding of Lambert, Lallana & co. No wonder Adkins is looking for new strikers. We need a back up for Rickie, and a new striker to partner him. Two strikers, Nigel, and promotion will be much more likely. Only Rickie is a forward good enough for a top two championship club, with Guly as an acceptable option for some games.