Saint Pete

Really poor from us today. Apart from KWP, none of our better players really turned up. Not sure where Salisu's head was today and Armstrong also particularly poor with his passing and decision making. Should have probably been given the day off today. No excuse for our performance, but I have to also say the ref needs to do more to deal with the constant falling over, feigning head injuries and disrupting the flow of the game from Watford throughout. I have never seen so many drop ball restarts in a game as today. I know all teams try to waste time and delay the game to some extent when leading but I felt Watford took it to a new level today and the ref seemed either unable or unwilling to do anything about it.

Yes, I reckon Ralph will be using the postponement heavily in getting his players bang up for this one.

Just deeply depressing that the FA Cup is now reduced to an opportunity to give some of the boys in the squad who don't play much a run out. Even for a team like us who have only won 1 major trophy in its history. Pretty obvious the lack of respect that Ralph has for the competition that he would contemplate that line up in the 5th round.

Yes, I understand we need to rotate players at some point, I just don't agree with the presumption that seems to exist now that this rotation needs to happen in cup games, irrespective of what the position is in the league. Hopefully we're all worrying unnecessarily and Ralph will pick a strong starting line up with just the odd change if absolutely necessary.

So, putting aside your preaching about how much money other Saints fans should spend on attending games for a moment, what is your own opinion on whether we should be prioritising finishing 8th/9th place in the league or trying our best to win the FA Cup? I hope this is all a bit of bluff from Ralph and we see as close to first choice as possible tonight.

We won't have no chance at all of winning, but I will be really disappointed (and not a little confused) if we make a number of changes in this game just to give squad players a game. I was always under the impression that one of the major goals of top flight teams was to win trophies, and it's so depressing that the premier League is so all pervasive in clubs and managers minds now that they may prioritise getting an extra place in mid table over the chance of winning the FA Cup. I accept the need to rotate and give players like Armstrong a break at points during the season but in our current league situation, I don't accept that the right time to do that is in the Cup rather than the Villa game (or indeed the Norwich game just gone).

We should only rotate anyone if they are genuinely struggling with fitness. I don't see any argument for rotating in the cup so that we can go back to the first choice 11 for the Villa game at all. It's all about priorities. I think most Saints fans would reluctantly accept a defeat or draw in league Vs Villa if it means we stay in the cup. And would hope Ralph feels the same.

Fatigue has to be taken into account though. We played a full throttle match on Wednesday night and we're playing at 12.30 Saturday. And Man U have an extra days rest on us. IMO if Ralph makes changes it won't be "tinkering", it will be based on condition of the players. We will likely need Redmond and Livramento if they are available either from start or as subs.

23 shots away at Spurs. Stunning performance from all of our lads (and manager) tonight. Incredible stuff.

If we can get in front, Diallo and Long may be useful subs but not much there to get back in it if we go behind.

Yes, I think Ralph sometimes has a naive side to him and this seems one of those occasions. Will be interesting to see how it plays out. It shouldn't really matter that he has announced this if everyone is grown up about it as 2.5 years is a long time and I applaud his honesty. But we know that premier League football is not the most grown up environment and I fear this being known will change attitudes of players and fans when we go through bad spells of results, which undoubtedly we will at times in that period. And that may force a change earlier than would otherwise have been the case had it not been public that he plans to leave at end of contract anyway.

Well, Small had to be hooked at half time despite us "only playing Coventry" as you put it so would have thought it IS relevant to question whether it was the right thing to throw him in alongside so many other reserve players?

Not sure what you mean there. Looks like pretty much Leicester's best available team except Schmiechel? Fair play to Forest, great result.

I think that's the biggest issue. Giving Small a chance in yesterday's game wasn't necessarily wrong, but doing it in such a weakened side (and defence in particular) from the normal 1st team certainly wouldn't have helped him.

Yeah, not unhappy with that. Home draw and not City, Liverpool or Chelsea so it's winnable. And shouldn't be any temptation for Ralph to play the reserves again.

So our plan is to go a couple of goals down, then bring on the real team and hope we can pull it back? Great plan.

You clearly have far more faith in our reserve players than I do.

Yep, I’m very surprised to see that many changes. I would say we are only playing 2 of our best 11, JWP and Livramento. That seems unnecessary to me after 2 weeks off, even with a couple of tough away Prem games coming up. How will we line up? Livramento may play further forward? If so, will be interesting to see how that goes.

I don't like sound of the "contract is clear" part. That suggests club has an option to buy so thinks they can leave til summer. But we've been there before haven't we? Reality is if he continues to improve between now and end of season, it will mean he will have much more options available to him at that point. In my view, I can't see us signing him in that scenario, probably not even on another loan. That is why it makes sense for us to try to do something now, even if just to get an additional year on the loan done now. But obviously we don't know what Chelsea and/or the player have said, they may have ruled that out at this point.

Yes, agree. Although realistically I still think the best we are going to get is an extension to the loan for another season with no option to recall/sell to anyone else before the end of that loan. Chelsea have all the cards here as he signed a 5 year contract with them recently and I’m not really sure what’s in it for them to sell to us now for what we would be prepared to pay.

Not our day.

Yes, agree the sudden clamour about signing more backup at RB (and Ralph's own comments) seemed odd to me. As Ralph has seemed reluctant to use Perraud so far, it would make slightly more sense if we were looking at LB options? KWP is a more than adequate substitute for Livramento and arguably should have been playing at RB more often so far this season anyway.

Think for Prem league it's based on how many "first team" squad players teams have left available. So effectively any absences count, whatever the reason.

Recently, we often seem to get Prem opponents that we are about to play in the league in cup draws. So I predict we'll get Spurs away.

Hard to say whether it would have made a difference with this particular injury but I can't help feeling that we have pushed Tino too far with too many games for such a young player. It seemed pretty clear that he was tired in some of the games in recent months so ought to have been given a rest, particularly given that we did have decent backup with KWP and Perraud in the squad to cover full back positions.