SaintJackoInHurworth

I was born in Southampton and grew up in Hythe. I have supported Saints since childhood. My Dad was an Arsenal fan but he brought me up to support Saints as the 'local' football club. However, I have taken a different line to my Dad and I have brought my kids up to support Saints even though I now live in the North East. The eldest is 17 and not bothered about football; the youngest is 14 and is a keen Saints fan and comes with me to a couple of matches each season. I also have a friend who grew up here who decided years ago to support Saints even though he and his family have no connection to Southampton. So, make of that what you will... Was my Dad wrong to bring me up to support Saints? Was it wrong that I supported Saints growing up out of the city in Hythe? Is it wrong that I support Saints now I live up north? Am I wrong to bring my kids up to support Saints? Is my friend disqualified from supporting Saints because he is not even from the South? Clearly, the answer in each case is 'no'. Finally, calling yourself a scummer is weird. It is a term of abuse used by Skates to slag of people from Southampton and Saints supporters. However, in the face of a Pompey fan calling me that I might possibly own it just to put them down by saying something like "I am not sure what a scummer is, but presumably if we are scummers it's only because we kick the scum out of you Skates!"

Isn't it more likely that Ings still owns a house in Southampton and is now selling it? I saw mention that this mural is one of three - all of a player wearing an England shirt, but with different numbers - 9, 14 and 19 I think he said (though don't quote me on it). It was also commented by someone that those were Ings' England numbers.

Sorry to get technical, but £5m would be a £7m loss not a profit considering we paid £12m to buy him. What I think you mean is that it would be a cash flow into the coffers of £5m due to liquidating one of our assets. I think a lot of clubs would be keen to sign KWP and start him. Newcastle are rumoured to have renewed their interest in him having realised that Saints are not going to reduce the amount we want for Tino. I can't see us necessarily being more open to cashing in on Tino bearing in mind that if we sell to anyone other than Chelsea we will have to pay a Chelsea a large dollop of whatever fee we receive. Having said that there are rumours that Chelsea are now interested in signing him and in that case we may have no option but to sell as Chelsea would be able to exercise their buy-back clause. At the same time, Chelsea could launch also bid to buy him for a lower fee than the buy-back figure and we could potentially be prepared to receive that on the basis that we would receive the full amount of any fee that Chelsea would pay. Hopefully though we can dig our heels in on that and insist on a fee much closer to the buy-back amount.

So, let's see... Walcott, Elyounoussi, Orsic and Caballero have gone from the first team squad. Chauke, Nlundulu have been sold from the B Team and Lis, Wright and Lawrence have been loaned out, while 10 other B team players were released. Abu and McNamara have signed for the U21s and we have taken on 15 new academy players. We have brought in Ryan Manning (formerly Swansea). Rumours suggest we are about to sign Shea Charles from Man City. We are also rumoured to be interested in Amad Diallo (Man Utd), Matt Grimes (Swansea), Mason Holgate (Everton), Jacob Bruun Larsen (Hoffenheim), Sydney van Hooijdonk (Heerenveen), Carlos Borges (Man City), Nathan Wood (Swansea). Lavia is likely to leave - probably to Liverpool. West Ham are offering peanuts for JWP. Maybe no-one will offer what he is worth and he will stay? Burnley seem to have given up on Tella. No recent news about Bella-Kotchap going to Villa. Tino may well be staying... or may go back to Chelsea. KWP may go to Newcastle. Onuachu may go to Germany. Lyanco may go to Besiktas. Caleta-Car may go to Genoa. Salisu may go to Real Betis. There are no recent concrete reports relating to any other Saints players. Have I missed anything? At this rate we could end up with a bigger squad than last season instead of a smaller one!!

I can't believe what I am reading!!! 10 months ago, Salisu was being feted on here by all alike as our greatest player while Bednarek was a pariah. I pointed out at the time that Salisu had his weaknesses that few at the time were prepared to admit, while I also suggested that Bednarek was not as bad as some suggested. Now you are all berating Salisu as if he is suddenly our worst player, while some are even admitting they may have been wrong about Bednarek. The actual fact is that Salisu is a player with huge potential, but he is a young player and is prone to indiscipline. He is also perhaps a little moody! Bednarek on the other hand is a player who frequently covers for other players but in so doing can get caught out himself. He was clearly affected by the criticism he received but still has much to offer - not least a degree of experience. I wish we could be less critical of our players and sometimes just recognise that form is up and down and that none of our players are world beaters but many of them have huge amounts to offer if their strengths are well utilised by good management.

Personally, I think Edozie did alright - not spectacular, but alright. At first we saw a player who offered a lot going forward and who showed skills at running past opposing players, but he then struggled to find someone to pass to, causing his hard work to end in frustration. However, I think that was not entirely his own fault - often it was mainly as a result of other players around him having lost the confidence to move and provide him with an outlet. Sadly, after a while and despite giving him more opportunitiues at first, Nathan Jones did a great job at undermining his confidence and trying to force him to stop using his skills and instead try to emulate Elyounoussi and Adam Armstrong (though to be fair, in the first instance Jones did seem to appreciate Edozie's directness). However, once he began to be coached to dribble less and just run about headless chicken instead, even the brilliant dribbling ability that he had demonstrated at first disappeared. I don't think Selles had the ability to see how to utilise Edozie's talent and his decision to frequently not even select him on the bench just added to the pattern of undermining Edozie's confidence. Indeed, while I always prefered Selles to Jones, sometimes it just felt like he was picking or not picking players purely to be different than Jones! With good coaching and encouragement, I am hopeful that Edozie can rediscover his dribbling ability, while players around him will hopefully also develop the confidence to create an outlet for him when he does get past opposing players. I am therefore looking forward to what he will give us this season, if he is given the chance.

Assuming only JWP leaves I would go with Stu Armstrong or Romeo Lavia... If all 3 go, then Bella-Kotchap... If he goes too then Bednarek, Grimes or Perraud

I happened to go and see the away match against Middlesbrough's U21s last season and it was striking how far short of first team standard many of the B team were. However, the standout players in that game and the only players who looked like they might be worth considering for first team football were definitely Ballard and Doyle. I've argued ever since that Ballard, in particular, deserves to be given his chance and I was disappointed that he did not get a look in at the end of the season when we were clearly struggling for goals. I felt that Ballard played with a kind of nonchalant freedom in his game and that he could have come in and got some goals and given us some much needed hope. I was disappointed that he was not given his chance until it was too late.

Is he hoping to bring those other three with him??!!!! 🤣

Crazy on both counts!

Why would we need to do that? Their contracts are up in the summer. If we wanted to place any players in the shop window then surely that would have seen us playing Tall Paul or other players who have been hopeless for Saints and whose contracts are not up for renewal this summer - i.e. players who are going to take wages out of the club to do nothing but rot in the reserves. My only guess why they were playing is that Selles believes his own deluded publicity and genuinely believes he is in with a chance of staying at Saints next season; and with that it is his hope to re-sign Elyounoussi and Walcott for next season!

One name we won't hopefully hear anything more of in a Saints shirt is Mo Elyounoussi. His contract is up at the end of the season, so let's hope he will follow Selles to his next club - potentially someone like Rochdale who have just sacked their manager following relegation to the National League! That is probably more like the appropriate level of football for both of them. Meanwhile Theo's contract also comes to an end at the end of the season, so one would expect he won't be with us next season. So, why, then were both of them in our starting line up against Brighton? OK, Elyounoussi scored a goal and Theo had one disallowed, but so what? We are relegated already. We needed to use this game as a chance to give experience to players who will be with us next season. I do get that those players may not be ready to start yet and some of them did get to play today, but why play players who won't be playing next season? And why put players who pretty certain not to be with us next season on the bench too? Ainsley Maitland-Niles may have said he wouldn't mind staying with Saints next season, but are the club really going to spend money transferring him permanently in the summer or even loaning him for another season? Meanwhile Amo-Ameyaw wasn't able to get on the bench despite travelling with the squad! Another opportunity missed!

So, a quick flick through the last two pages suggests our responses range from: Please no, he is going to be a disaster.. Through to... Let's just give him a chance... maybe this is the best we can get at the moment with the most positive view being: He made some improvements in the past taking a relegation contender to mid-table obscurity. Let's give him a chance. We have previously appointed managers who didn't look that good but were better than we feared. All in all then I don't see resounding approval for the guy! Let's hope he isn't just a 'keep the ball and faff about with it at the back' style manager, but I guess we all fear that this is exactly what we are getting!

Welcome to Southampton - probably the most significant city in England, south of London! I hope you will enjoy watching Saints - just recognise that, while we have spent more time in the Premier League than lower divisions over the past 40-50 years, we have always been a relatively small club in Premier League terms.... but we do take joy at having spent most of that period and some time before it in a higher division than our closest rivals. You are probably on the wrong thread to ask these questions and you can actually start a new thread to ask them all. Nevertheless, to answer this specific question, I would say there are plenty of players to look out for: Will Smallbone has been out on loan at Stoke City this season and has done really well. He is keen to return to Saints and could definitely do a job for us in the Championship next season. Nathan Tella has set the world alight on loan at Burnley this season. Saints fans would love to see him return next season to bring his form back here and to help us push back up to the Premier League. Smallbone seems to hint that Tella may do that, but don't know whetehr or not that is realistic or whether Tella will move permanently to Burnley. Sam Edozie was signed from Man City last season and his dribbling skills certainly scared a few Premier League defences. Sadly he wasn't able to combine it with a good final ball, but hopefully he can improve on that next season in the Championship. Dom Ballard is one of our under 18 academy talents who has scored bucket-loads of goals for our B team having been promoted from the academy team. There are many fans who hope that the Championship may give him the opportunity to break through into the first team. Sam Amo-Ameyaw, Kamari Doyle and Tyler Dibling are among other Under-18s who could make the step up in the next year or so, given the opportunity to do so. Juan Larios was another exciting youngster signed from Man City last summer. He has spent most of the season injured but hopefully he may be able to challenge for a first team spot next season - though he may have to challenge Romain Perraud for that position if the Frenchman stays with the club. Finally, I will also mention Tino Livramento. He actually was an exciting breakthrough talent in the Saints team last season and made a first team spot his own, but sadly he suffered a swerious injury that has kept him out for a year. We are hopeful he will soon be back playing for the first team and also hope that he is not snapped up by another Premier League Club. There have to be serious questions for them about his fitness, so hopefully that will keep them at bay until January at least. In terms of signings, it will depend on who leaves and where the needs are. In particular we all anticipate that our captain James Ward-Prowse will leave and it is also likely that Romeu Lavia will leave too. Our third central midfielder, Ibrahima Diallo has also declared that he wishes to leave, so aside from the return of Smallbone (see above) we may be short in that area and could well need to invest in bringing in one or two players with a bit of experience of the Championship in those positions.

I used to spend time pointing out the positive possibilities, but after our defeats to Bournemouth and Palace I knew our time was up. Only an unlikely win against Newcastle was going to change that. I still find myself clinging onto the positive possibilities but even those seem so beyond likelihood now that there is no way anyone can realistically believe we can stay up. For example, here is a (hugely unrealistic) scenario that I have posted in the 'Relegation run-in' thread: Gameweek SAINTS Result? Pts Leeds Result? Pts Leicester Result? Pts Everton Result? Pts Forest Result? Pts 35 Forest (A) Win 3 Man City (A) Lose 0 Fulham (A) Lose 0 Brighton (A) Lose 0 Saints (H) Lose 0 36 Fulham (H) Win 3 Newcstle (H) Lose 0 Liverpool (H) Lose 0 Man City (H) Lose 0 Chelsea (A) Lose 0 37 Brighton (A) Draw 1 WestHam (A) Lose 0 Newcstle (A) Lose 0 Wolves (A) Lose 0 Arsenal (H) Lose 0 38 Liverpool (H) Lose 0 Spurs (H) Draw 1 WestHam (H) Draw 1 Bompey (H) Draw 1 Palace (A) Lose 0 Extra Pts 7 1 1 1 0 Current Pts 24 30 30 29 30 Final Pts 31 31 31 30 30 As you will see, even with this hugely optimistic scenario where we get 7 points, we are still likely to go down on goal difference with Leeds narrowly escaping! To escape relegation, therefore we are going to need 8 points at the very least and that is highly unlikley - even taking into account the fact that we often beat Brighton at the Amex! Having said all that in the unlikely scenario that we do beat both Forest and Fulham and our relegation rivals lose both of their next two games, then I am sure I will find myself believing we can escape!!

We have no realistic chance of staying up but there is a semi- realistic chance that we might not finish bottom and/or that our relegation may not be confirmed until the final match of the season against Liverpool. Of course, there is also a purely theoretical chance of us staying up and there are two sides to that: Our results - In theory we could get up to 12 points (though realistically we won't get more than 6 and we are likely to struggle to even get 6) The results of others - It is more realistic to suggest that some of our rivals will also not get many/any points (albeit as they have a 5/6 point advantage on us already this is unlikely to help us!) So, it may be interesting to look at how things could go even in an optimistic scenario. Here's is what it might look like: Gameweek SAINTS Result? Points Leeds Result? Points Leicester Result? Points Everton Result? Points Forest Result? Points 35 Forest (A) Win 3 Man City (A) Lose 0 Fulham (A) Lose 0 Brighton (A) Lose 0 Saints (H) Lose 0 36 Fulham (H) Win 3 Newcstle (H) Lose 0 Liverpool (H) Lose 0 Man City (H) Lose 0 Chelsea (A) Lose 0 37 Brighton (A) Draw 1 WestHam (A) Lose 0 Newcstle (A) Lose 0 Wolves (A) Lose 0 Arsenal (H) Lose 0 38 Liverpool (H) Lose 0 Spurs (H) Draw 1 WestHam (H) Draw 1 Bompey (H) Draw 1 Palace (A) Lose 0 Added Pts 7 1 1 1 0 Current Pts 24 30 30 29 30 Final Pts 31 31 31 30 30 Sadly, even with the other teams getting no more than 1 points (not an impossible scenario) and with Saints managing to get 7 points (which is really stretching reality I know!) Saints would be dependant on goal difference to stay up - and we all know that Saints GD is worse than everyone else except Forest! In actual fact this scenario would leave us comparing our goal difference with Leeds. At present our goal difference is 8 goals worse than theirs, so we would probably need to win by 2 goals against Forest and Fulham, lose by only one goal against Liverpool and rely on Leeds to lose by 2 goals against Man City, Newcastle and West Ham. In other words, even in this highly unlikley and hugely optimistic scenario we would still be likely to get relegated on goal difference. Sorry for anyone who thought I was about to say we could stay up - realistically we can't; and in reality even avoiding finishing bottom is highly unlikely! I think the best we can actually hope for is the joy of seeing Leeds or Everton get relegated with us - or even both of them!

Key Reasons that have been contributing factors to our relegation: 1. Failure to sign a striker (e.g. Gakpo) last summer because we were penny pinching and thought we could save money by brinkmanship - instead Leeds came in and screwed it all up and we cannot score. 2. Sacking Hassenhuttl and appointing Jones. Even keeping Hasenhuttl would have probably been enough to stay up, but why couldn't we have appointed a quality manger like Fonseca or Gallardo instead of Jones? 3. Failure to recruit an experienced player to replace Romeu. We could have played that experienced player as CDM and given Lavia and JWP more freedom to push forward and control midfield. I think there is also a fourth and maybe a fifth too!... 4. Only signing one quality centre back - ABK has been good but he got injured as did Salisu and we didn't have enough quality to cover. 5. Injuries: Livramento, S. Armstrong, Lavia, Bella-Kotchap, Adams, Walker-Peters, Perraud have all been key injuries for us at the wrong times. There have been others too that may be of less significance: Larios, Walcott, A. Armstrong, Djenepo.

A lot of people are rightly questioning that any of these managers should have been managing Saints. Some people seem to be thinking that in my OP I am suggesting we shouldn't have got rid of Hassenhuttl or that I am in some way suggesting that it is the fault of our fans that we brought in rubbish replacements. None of that is the case! Let me be clear: I believe Ralph was a huge improvement on Hughes and Pellegrino but his star had most definitely waned some time ago. His approach was based on a fixed one-dimensional methodology. As soon as other clubs understood that we were found out, with alarming regularity. The most significant weakness of his approach was that it depended on a slow, keep-ball approach that allowed opposition defences to gather and organise so that any penetration of our attacks was lacking. I believe Nathan Jones had some right ideas about how we needed to change (in some of what he said especially a need to be more aggressive), but he had zero ability to achieve it in a way that was relevant in the Premier League. Whatever he may have encouraged in aggression was seriously undermined by poor possession and ball-retention, a lack of pressing and dreadful passing, plus a general feeling that the players were not with him. Selles has been nothing short of a second class Hasenhuttl, implementing many of the same methodologies as Ralph, but with even less impact. Whatever success he had at the start was nothing more than a new manager bounce and the relief from the players of playing in a more familiar way. However, he has not instilled the same ability to press that Ralph instilled and has not helped us to improve on Ralph's painfully slow approach to build up play. My argument then, is not that we should have kept Ralph, but rather that our wish for a better manager was in no way delivered. That is clear testament to a failure by the club and its owners. The fabled black box is well and truly dead! I will, however, go as far as to answer my own question and say that of the three Ralph is the better manager. Whether he would have been able to keep us up is clearly an unknown, but such has been the poor form of Leicester, Everton and Forest, I suspect we would now be just outside the relegation zone if he had not been sacked... assuming, of course that he had maintained the same level of performance and results as before. Nevertheless, we would all have felt that was not good enough, just as his results throughout the end of last season and the start of this season were not good enough and led to our appalling record for 2022. For that reason, we all must agree, of course, that it was right to sack Ralph - I am just incredulous that we can have made such a failure at replacing him with someone more capable! In terms of what we should have done, I don't personally believe Dyche would have been the answer, though he may have kept us up. Nor do I believe that Potter would have been the answer if he had been available. Redknapp - no thanks! Wilder - no way! But there are managers out there who we could have appointed who would have been much, much better - Gallardo and Fonseca to name just two examples. Yet we appointed Jones and Selles! Finally, yes, of course, there have been many other mistakes and it is hard to argue that any manager could have coped with our singular lack of attacking talent - except that Villa and Wolves and Brighton also used to have problems in that area, but now, with different, more aggressive, fast-attacking managers they suddenly seem to have great attacking ability!

Earlier in the season we were begging for Saints to replace Hasenhuttl as manager. While the vast majority of fans got to stage of pressing this view by the time he was sacked, some were less quick to call for him to be sacked and one phrase that was mentioned was 'Be careful what you wish for'. Now, I am not wishing to criticise anyone here - it was clear that we were no longer delivering what we all expected under Ralph this season and so we did need a change - but I do wonder whether our enthusiasm for change failed to account for the possibility that the club may not have a clue what to look for in a replacement. With the benefit of hindsight, I would suggest that it has become clear that in this area Sports Republic have been woefully lacking. It also leads to the question: Which of our managers has been the worst this season and which has been least bad? My suggestion is that Hasenhuttl has been the least bad of three below-average managers. I find myself wondering whether we might have been in a better position than we are now if we had kept him on - especially with the opportunity to vary things with new signings in January.

To play Onuachu as an old fashioned centre forward would require Selles to adopt a very un-Spanish way of playing with wide wing play. His decision to not use Edozie is a clear demonstration that that is not his preference. Personally, I would love us to explore this as an option - even if only as a plan B. If we played this way we could utilise Sulemana and Edozie together with the wing backs to create openings to cross to Onuachu in the centre. On the other hand, I also think we could explore using Dom Ballard. He is good at creating and finding space in front of goal and would be a bit of an unknown entity for opposing teams. We certainly need to explore some alternative striking options. Always doing the same thing is not going to deliver anything different!!

I think the original post is spot on. In most positions we are better now with the exception of striker and possibly keeper. I agree too that we were unfortunate in some ways to go down in 2005. This season we are not, in my opinion, one of the three worst sides. As some have said, some key disastrous results and the managerial changes (especially the appointment of Jones) are among the factors that have left us staring down the barrel of the gun of relegation. Of course, not purchasing a decent striker has been a huge factor. One interesting comparison between the two is that in 2005 most people thought we could/would escape until we didn't. This year it seems that most believe we cannot stay up and logically that is the most expected outcome. Nevertheless, the closeness of the competition this year may still give us some hope if we can beat Palace this weekend - especially with the form of Leicester and Forest and Everton's next few fixtures. Not that I am for a moment suggesting we will stay up!!

I am not sure as many will definitely leave as some think. Here are a few thoughts: Highly likely to leave for a decent transfer fee JWP He will be in massive demand and will want to be playing in the Premier League in order to stand a chance of getting into the England squad in 2024. KWP Like JWP he will want to play in the EPL and will want to try to impress Southgate to get in the England squad. Adams He has been mentioned by a number of pundits as someone who they think is a decent striker and we have seen some interest in signing him in previous seasons. Even though he is not really a PL quality striker I can imagine someone will take a punt on him and with the right fee he may well leave. Tella Burnley are bound to want to keep him and he is bound to want to stay with them. I don't think we will stand in his way. May leave but may not ABK Has he done enough to attract attention of other PL clubs? What about his tendency to get injured? Will Saints let him go when we only signed him last summer? We could demand a fairly large fee and will other clubs be prepared to pay that? Lavia Of course there will be a lot of speculation about him and a lot of interest and no doubt he will be interested in pursuing those opportunities, but there must be questions around the buy-back clause with City - does that have to be included in any deal to sell him? Also, is there some possibility that Lavia may want to wait until 2024 to get his chance to return to City? Or might Saints prefer to wait and see if the opportunity to sell him back to City for a large fee may materialise? I expect he will go but there may be some significant reasons to doubt it. Salisu Is he rated highly enough by other clubs to buy him after a season when he has not set the world alight? Will they be prepared to pay enough for Saints to allow him to go? Unlikely to leave Alcaraz/Sulemana/Onuachu/Mara/Edozie Whatever promise they may have I don't think any of them have done quite enough to warrant another PL seeking to buy them for anything higher than what we paid for them. They are young and will improve and could do well in the Championship, so I think we will seek to keep them and seek to yield a profit from them in the future as that is our model, like it or not. The most likely to leave of this lot is probably Alcaraz but only if we get back what we paid for him or at least close to that. Livramento No club will take a risk on a player that he been out injured for more than a year. Summer Challenges Trimming down the squad, particularly by getting rid of the fringe players. It is a no-brainer that there will be some who we will want to move on, but will we be able to do so? Replacing JWP - especially if Lavia is also sold. Smallbone could be brought back but is that enough? Even in the Championship a central midfield of Smallbone and Diallo (if he stays) would not give me huge confidence! Will we rely on the current squad or seek to sign a striker? Will we seek to promote Ballard, Payne, Dibling, Amo-Ameyaw, Doyle or any others to the first team? (Personally I suspect Ballard is the only one that is close to being ready to make that step, but who knows?) Finding a manager who can lead us straight back up.

In the real world everyone recognises we have absolutely no chance of getting anything from today's match... except that a battling performance, low scoreline and maybe even a goal could all give us some encouragement for the remaining fixtures. Of course, every now and then a side near the bottom will pull of a surprise result against a top team and I'm sure we all hope and dream that today might be that day for us - even if in our heart of hearts we all know it won't happen! Nevertheless, the dream is nice!!! What is perhaps slightly more significant on a day like today is what will happen in the other matches. If other teams around us also do badly, a narrow defeat against City won't be the end of the world. Whereas if the teams with whom we are competing to avoid relegation get good results and we get hammered the despondency around Saints will grow and the task will seem even more impossible. Hopefully, other results will go our way: Man Utd must surely beat Everton - I say it will be 2-0. Villa are on form, Forest dropping like a stone so that won must surely end in a big win for Villa - I say 3-0 to Villa. Fulham v West Ham is much less clear-cut with Fulham's form dipping while West Ham's win against us gave them hope (that was fortunately smashed away by their midweek defeat) - I predict 1-1 but a win for Fulham would be great. Leicester v Bournemouth is obviously of major interest and I fear we don't want either club to gain any confidence from it. A 0-0 draw with dodgy defending, poor finishing and crowd discontent from both sets of supporters would be great. I'm not sure it will be quite as a good an outcome as that but a 1-1 draw seems a realistic result. Wolves v Chelsea is hard to predict but hopefully Chelsea will demonstrate a new manager bounce and perform for Lampard. I'm going for 1-2 to Chelsea. With all those scorelines, we could go into our game against City knowing that whatever the result we will not be set adrift... at least not yet!

I can't believe there are people on here defending Jones!! It makes you wonder who some of the people who post on Saintsweb are and what agenda they have!! I'm not for a moment saying that Saints haves set the world alight under Selles, but at least we are now showing the semblance of a team that can compete at this level! With Jones we would just about be already relegated! Like others have said, real, meaningful stats and fantasy stats like xG are very different. If you prefer the fantasy variety, go back to playing Football Manager derivative games where you can dream of a side containing all your favourites from other clubs!

I've just got a few comments to make... I don't think West Ham v Saints is exactly a MUST-WIN game in the big scheme of things - at least it is not any more important or winnable than any other games. On the other hand, however, a win would be massive! If we go down we won't suddenly be in some amazing dream scenario where we are one of the dominant teams in the Championship winning most of our games. The fact is that we will lose a lot of significant players as well as a lot of other staff; the club will find itself reeling from the impact and confronted by a post-relegation wave of depression. It will take time to turn that around. Relegation does not guaranteea glorious winning season next year! I don't accept that relegation is a foregone conclusion; we are one of the form teams in the bottom half of the table (especially in terms of the past six league fixtures) and our fixtures are no more difficult than those faced by Bournemouth, Forest, Everton, Leeds and even West Ham. Crystal Palace have got the easiest run of fixtures on paper, but they also have the worst form and have just sacked a manager who some believe has equipped them to perform beyond their true capabilities. Matches against relegation-threatened teams are also not necessarily the easiest fixtures at this time of year. An ideal fixture would be one against a team who have no threat of relegation and no hope of Europe. No-one is yet in that category with European football still a possibility for Villa, Chelsea, Fulham and Brentford and not just the teams above them.