Rasiak-9-

One day we'll be able to punch *****s like this in the face over the internet.

If in doubt, if the team isn't great, if players are inexperienced, then at the very least keep the team/formation/strategy 1) simple 2) balanced ----------Davis------------ Cork--Perry--Svensson--Mills (experienced keeper and CBs and decent enough young FBs) Lallana---Wotton--Schneiderlin--Surman (again, simple and balanced, left winger/right winger with two win-it-and-give-it CMs) John---Pekhart (two tall strikers who can bring others into play as well as score themselves) This team won't get promoted but its certainly good enough to stay up and at the very least beat teams like Doncaster.

Leicester have got a decent up and coming manager.

Its not so much my pride thats hurting at the moment (that was destroyed long ago) I'm more disappointed that this is a massive missed opportunity to have got some much-needed cash in. All we had to beat was ****ing Rotherham and we'd have been in the last 16.

Jan! Jan! Wherever you may be You are the king of Saints FC and you can ****, my wife on your settee If you get us promoted at Wem-ber-lee. If i had paid my fiver i'd start a thread about our lack of chanting in support of the guy but we should certainly try and get something going, he's only human and he too needs our support through the first few matches.

I agree with the original poster. This is our young teams first major test, having got nothing at all out of Blackpool and QPR the pressure really is now well and truly on and I don't think anything less than certainly at the very least 4 points will cut it.

Surely it'll be Cork and Perry vs QPR right?

Against Birmingham (yes, 2nd league game of the season) the guy next to me was saying that Poortvliet was a poor manager because he wasn't screaming hysterically at the players when we were 2-1 down and even more ludicrously that he was probably arrogant as he was "standing there like that with his arms folded - you can see he thinks he's better than everyone". Not only that, but this guy seemed fairly level-headed and wasn't some 14 year old chav, so if fairly normal fans want to get on the managers back after 1 and 1/2 games then who the **** knows how long JP will get. The key games though must be Ipswich and Barnsley (a defeat away to QPR so long as the performance is fairly spirited would be forgivable). However should JP get anything less than 3/4 points out of those two home games then I think he'll be in trouble.

Someone who's definately out for the QPR game is Emanuel Ledesma - he got himself sent off today so should be suspended - not a massive thing but the opposition losing their star player can only help i guess.

Usually i'd agree with and to some extent that is true but for Saints i think that it genuinely IS the problem. I'm very very sceptical at the moment of the 4-3-3 system. Not only does our centre-forward become very isolated all too often but we struggle to keep our shape, especially when time is running out and we need a goal. We need to become adept at playing 4-4-2 as well as the main 4-3-3. The 4-3-3 relies on players bombing forward from midfield in support of an attack and a strong target man who has enough presence and can handle himself all alone up front - Chelsea are a good example of this. Drogba as the front man with players like Lampard, Essien and Deco in the midfield. Today we really had neither and that caused problems. Players didn't know what their jobs were and what they were supposed to be doing. The defensive midfielders gave us very little in support of the attackers or in protection of the back 4 and we ended up with nothing up front because of the lack of off the ball movement from the wingers and McGoldrick having to drop back to get the ball - leaving us with a 4-6-0 mishmash as opposed to a 4-2-1-2-1 like its supposed to be. The same thing happened in the Brum game in the 2nd half - we're struggling with this formation at times.

I'm glad to see i'm not the only one that thought Svensson was ****ing woeful today. Criticising the man has lately been viewed as sacrilige by many fans and whilst i have nothing against the man as a person whatsoever and love him like we all do - he really did have a dreadful game. Aside from his positioning being poor he was beaten far far too easily and was caught flat-footed far too many times. Steve Kabba ran rings around him and really deserved a goal for his efforts, it was only thanks to his lack of finishing that spared our blushes. Being dropped to be replaced by a 19 year old would be the kick up the arse that he needs - not so much to put more effort in - i don't think theres any problem there - but just to switch on a bit and make sure that even Killer doesn't take his place in the team for granted.

I'm always mystified as to why anyone would want anyone other than a **** easy team at home. Surely going as far as we can in the competition makes the most sense?

if 0 is total utter certainty of losing and 10 is total utter certainty of winning i'd go for Blackpool 7 QPR 4 Ipswich 6 Barnsley 8 Doncaster 5 Norwich 6

So who's goal was it? Lallana's or McGoldricks?

I'm watching soccer saturday at the moment and i've never been more sure of anything in my life: We'll dominate them for 89 minutes They'll score from a deflection in the 90th minute and i'll have to put up with Jeff Stelling screaming "AND A GOAL AT DERBY! AND THE WAIT FOR PAUL JEWELL AND DERBY COUNTY COULD BE FINALLY OVER!!!!!!!" from what i've heard we're absolutely all over them.

all yours Luggy my friend, all yours

Honestly i'd be happy with letting Jason Euell go for a free as he must be on a good 15k a week at least. If we can get a million or so for Skacel I think that'd be a good price, the problem is that clubs know just how desperate we are for money and can pretty much rape us on the negotiating table. I wouldn't be suprised if Skacel was sold for 250k or so.

In fairness one of the things that stuck out for me in the 2nd half against Birmingham was the lack of structure we had compared to Brum's far more solid 4-4-2. Our midfield became a bit of a mish-mash and McGoldrick who is an out and out striker clearly wasn't sure whether to go forward or not because he was unsure just how much defensive duties were placed on him. One very simple change that I think would make a lot of difference attacking-wise would be to simply change the shape of the midfield triangle. Lallana - Thomson Schneiderlin when we're trying for a goal with the original Lallana Schneiderlin - Gillett to defend our lead. Oh and btw, they're pronounced Jillette and Shnyderlan, not Gillitt and Shnyderlinne stupid stadium announcer - that was a ****ing embarrassment on Sat that we can't even pronounce our own players names.

damn not being able to edit posts. Yeah one further thing i'd add is don't sit IN the Curva Nord (their equivelent of the Northam end) before the game a load of balloons are released that form the Italian flag and there are always the massive banners flares and general spectacular **** from the Ultras and whatnot, stuff that you'll probably want to actually see rather than be in - so best place to sit is 2nd tier but towards the blue seated end - you'll get a great view of the hardcore Ultra's area as well as the playing action.

Yeah i went to see Inter play Livorno (Inter won 4-1 - cracking game) only real tip i can give you is to look into websites like footballweekends or whatever its called (there are a fair few of these) that do flight/matchticket or flight/matchticket/2 nights in a hotel bundles. They're cheaper and easier and usually fairly reliable.

I was actually talking to a Fulham supporting friend of mine on this very subject. He said that if they're willing to let Omozusi go on loan to Norwich then most of the fans would be cool with us having Baird on a season-long loan. Sunderland also have a massive squad of good c/ship players that aren't up to Prem standard - so i'm sure we could find a few in there. We really need a couple of decent full-backs more than anything.

Guys, I know i'm probably the only ****head that doesn't get this but what is the deal with Kevin Phillips and his wife and how does it relate to carphone warehouse or w/e it is. Can someone just give me the whole background of the story

can you explain in greater detail?