S-Clarke

If we win our last 11 games we can get to 42 points, so we can still do it!

He's an odd one isn't he, he talks a good game and seems to have the right sort of character. I think attacking wise he has decent attributes, but I honestly don't remember watching a RB as bad as him in a defensive sense. Even Jack Stephens has been shown to be a better defensive full back than him.

That illustrates that point even more, those 8 wins are 'in spite' of SR's involvement. A true figure would be 5 wins in 76 PL matches, 2 relegations and 4 PL managers under their full leadership. Awful doesn't even come close to describing that record.

As a player, I'd feel pretty embarrassed to pickup any sort of award on the back of this season tbh, even if the player has been relatively 'ok' in comparison with the rest. It's a pretty low bar.

We've basically managed to create a squad full of average 'squad' players, not players who should be starting for any competitive side. Charlie Taylor, Ryan Fraser, Ross Stewart, Larios, Archer, Gronbaek, Wood - just absolute wasted wages.

That goal was like a non-league goal, I've never seen anything quite as bad as that. It was 6 on 2 at one point, it was ridiculous. No one was busting a gut to get back, and that video emphasises that. I know Sulemana has won some fans in recent weeks, but that clip there is exactly why he's never going to win me over.

Surely that needs to be cancelled, as well as any 'lap of appreciation' at the final home game. 'Read the room Saints' comes to mind.

This just romance, there would be no benefit to anyone by having Nigel back. I wouldn't want his reputation here to be tarnished by the horrendous group of ''footballers' we currently have. It's light a day to the team he was able to pick back in the day.

When we lose 4-0 as tamely as that, no player comes away with any credit. Period.

As good as that day out at Wembley was, that result has created one of the worst ever seasons in my Saints supporting life. What I'd give to have lost that and be enjoying a Leeds style season now (although that wouldn't have happened, as SR own us). But anyway, this promotion was the worst thing to happen to us. The only positives we can potentially take are finances, but when SR are spending the money I don't even think that is a positive. The days under Port and Wotte were bad, really bad, those were some low days. This is a high level but it feels worse, it feels lifeless. It honestly feels like the entire club has taken a year off of football. Being as uncompetitive as this in any league is shameful and lots and lots of heads should roll in the summer, there cannot be any hiding away from the damage this year has done.

The players I consider as good players won't stay, and we'll be left with the scraps of utter shit. So, on that basis, we need to start again. It feels like we need a L1 style restart in terms of squad, build a new team of players who can grow and evolve with the club. This lot are damaged goods now.

Chelsea have been pretty poor, the fans were on their back, any competitive side would have put them to the sword. We're not competitive, so a team playing fairly poor end up thrashing us in the first half. Defensively a horror show, but what on earth do you expect? Aribo, Bree are not fucking centre backs. They never have been, never will be and should never, ever be put into this position. I feel for them, it's like we're putting those guys out to the slaughter. Some of these players will never, ever recover from this season. As a club, I fear we will struggle to recover as well. Structurally everything is wrong, everything. This is not an overnight fix.

What I have noticed with the 'press' approach is that guys like Airbo, THB/Bednarek and the full backs push high, if they miss the tackle then we are wide open. Some of the aspects of the Brighton and Brentford games reminded me of our suicidal high line we played under Ralph, at the start of the season 4 or 5 years ago. We also have zero midfield cover now, the only player offering us an ounce of physicality is Lesley. We don't have the legs or the pace to recover and it's really exposing the limitations of players such as Bree, THB, Bednarek and such. I think it should be the job of a manager to make the players feel comfortable in their own skin, understanding their limitations and not asking them to do things they simply can't do. I get that a manager will play around a bit during his first few weeks, but surely by now he should realise that Aribo and Bree are not central defenders. I fail to believe that Lutons 11 last season was better than our team this year, but first and foremost the players their manager had available were playing in roles which suited their attributes.

Think of that as a blessing!

If we do decide to switch 'again', I'd like our next appointment to be someone our fan base would look at as a no brainer - relative to the level we're at. I don't want any stupid gambles on unknown coaches or up and coming assistant managers from other clubs. I just feel we need someone all fans can agree on from the start, someone aligned with a 'project' (i hate that term though). Will that happen? Probably not. Going by SR's record up to now, they love to go for left field.

To add a genuine positive, no more VAR. Just watching the Sheff U v Leeds match, and being able to know it was a goal without waiting for check clear/check over was just refreshing. (If you haven't seen it, that was the sort of goal VAR would have spent a month checking, for various reasons)

Wasn't that in the summer we last went down? I'm sure Sheff U were strongly interested, as then a PL side (he was stalling on a contract with us too). Don't think we had any interest this summer.

It's just a normal internal coaching move around by the looks of it, nothing more to it than that from what I can see. We were a coach down after RM's cronies left. We did it with Craig Flemming and Davis under Ralph, and Carl Martin under Selles or Jones.

What a time to be alive.

That Jim Radcliffe takeover has been a total disaster for Man Utd, funny to watch it all unfold though. The Glazers have always been shit, so everyone assumed this would be better - but he's gone a bit Elon Musk on them all!

I think the £30-35m Joachim Andersen went for in the summer is a good benchmark for what we should expect for THB, with the added English tax.

To rephrase it slightly, what I meant is that he's way, way too good for us in our current guise. I agree, we needed Ramsdale level players in at CB, CM and ST to really stand any hope (the same will go for if we are ever promoted again).

I don't think he's ever been much cop to be honest, certainly had the physical attributes I thought we needed back in Ralph's days, but technically he's pretty piss poor. Add that to a genuine lack of conditioning after not playing for years, he looked pub standard. The crazy thing about him is after all of that, he'll still throw his toys out and demand a move in the summer as he'll think he's better than the Championship. Wilcox called him out last season by suggesting there are players who think they have a PL market, but don't. He's one of them.

You've picked out Ipswich as a game we dominated, but we lost it. In many ways that game highlighted the flaws of Martin's approach. Some good moments in the attacking third, but absolute nuts at the back - always giving teams a chance. That was the story of our season really, we vary rarley put teams to the sword - I can think of a handful of games at best. We gave everyone else we played a chance. We gave Huddersfield a two goal head start, we allowed Rotherham back into the game against us, we dominated a first half away at Swansea, went 3-0 up and managed to just about scrape a 3-1 from the second half. We got absolutley destroyed by Sunderland at their place, Leicester home and away. It wasn't as good a season as many try to make out. We were a bit of a oddball in how we approached games and saw them out, which is why I was really happy we got promoted but dreading how we'd cope with better teams. Alas, we haven't.

I think it's been mildly refreshing to have a goalkeeper in between the posts who is capable of making saves. We expose him so much, so he'll always let in a few, but he does actually make saves which is light and day between Bazunu who isn't capable of making saves. He's the least of our issues, but I'd say he's more of a Villa level GK than an Arsenal/City etc, but he's a very good GK and way, way, way too good for us. We'll miss him next year, trust me!