Lallana's Left Peg

I thought Stephens was decent with the ball in front of him but when the ball was out wide he needs to find the balance between getting into a sound position and being aware of where the danger is. He often falls back into what would be a default position but it leaves the striker free if he holds back a bit. That will come with experience. On the other hand I thought his distribution was excellent and I was also impressed with the way he would lay the ball off to a teammate if he knew he was being unchallenged from one of Watford's numerous hopeless balls lumped forward. Considering his relative lack of experience I thought he was quite accomplished and I see no reason to drop him yet. Lets see how fit Caceres is for the U23's.

He's only a good signing in the context of being someone we could sign after the transfer deadline passed. The bigger picture is that we're heading into a major final and last third of the season with our first choice centre backs being those who came unto January 3rd and 4th in the pecking order. VVD's injury was unfortunate but occurred in the middle of the month and only served to highlight the need to replace Fonte (as we were told we would). Failing to do that (I don't care how hard Les Reed says the market is in January - he is the one who sold Fonte without having a replacement) isn't too clever. That said if Caceres is anything like the player he was then he is a good pick-up. But he isn't a very Saints signing and he is clearly someone who was quite down the 'list'.

Keep going - I just released my ticket back into the system as buying a ticket for Watford away didn't make me eligible.

The players looked very comfortable in a 4-2-3-1 though the start to the game was shocking. I was genuinely worried but we steadied the ship and after the second goal went in you could see the confidence come back into the team. Ever since the takeover we've been a team that has thrived on confidence and momentum and the second half showed that. Gabbiadini offers us something different up front and he looks good. Was blowing out of his arse after 15mins of the second half - I am sure his fitness will improve. Thought Jack Stephens did brilliantly against Defoe as well and also clearly wound up Defoe at the same time - plenty of chatter between the two as the game went on. Think Stephens likes a bit of that.

Be interesting to see how long the deal is - if it is 6 months with an option for a further year what would the option be down to - automatic based on a set criteria or would player and club both need to be happy with it? Can't see him hanging around if it went well as he'd have bigger clubs after him. But even if we did keep him for another year that's 80k or so a week swallowed up and be interesting to see how / if that impacts our planned spending on the other one or two centre backs we've targeted.

He's had two bad transfer windows. No matter what his body of work before it, it only takes a couple of bad decisions and the club is severely impacted - both in terms of its own prospects and allowing others to catch up (which have both happened). He should be feeling some pressure as the owners are driving a hard bargain for the sale of the club and with every passing week the value of the club is falling.

He will replace Jay Rod in the squad this summer. Funds from Jay Rod sale invested elsewhere (defence).

The sort of no nonsense defender I find endearing, even if he can be overly aggressive at times. He'd be an upgrade on what we have so it makes sense. I wouldn't be against him signing.

Whenever I post too soon after a loss it's usually a bit whiney as I am annoyed at losing. So I've waited a few hours to post these thoughts - as much to see if anyone else feels the same way as it is it to vent a little. Over the course of the last few months I've seen people try and pinpoint a single reason why we've been struggling as though by doing so the solution to our problems is then identified and thus it can then solved. I don't think it is as black and white as that and what we're experiencing is the culmination of a number of issues which is causing us a big problem - and that fixing one of them may help a little but it doesn't make everything good again. I had half expected an up and down season - my thoughts pre season were that our recruitment was lacking in quality but we had beefed up the squad for many more games and that was understandable to a degree if we continued to get more out of players than expected and the new signings would be better than they looked on paper. I would be happy with a mid-table 'nothing' season if we gave the cups a good go and we kept (or re-established) the pathway for youth open. What has unraveled is more concerning than things you would expect in a typical an up and down season and has shown that issues exist at all levels which are impacting us: 1. The Board No doubt it is very hard to rebuild every summer. Getting deals done is an elongated process. Do I think the board have made the most of the means they had at their disposal? No - and I think this summer we saw other teams of our size make a more committed financial investment to their team and that bridges any gap we had established for ourselves in previous seasons. Have those teams done it at risk? I don't know - but enough of them did it to make me think they can't all be taking risks. Does spending money guarantee success? No. Will you have success if you don't invest? No. We finally invested in the striker we needed 6 months too late and at a time when we needed to invest in a defender. I don't think trying is good enough - you need to get deals done as the product on the pitch is what matters most. I absolutely understand that you can't replace a great player with a great player. But you need to make the most of the means you have at your disposal. I don't think we have. Is there a wider agenda at play here impacting investment? Is Les Reed working under restricted circumstances? 2. The Management I have some sympathy with Puel. I think the players he has been given off the back of last season are inadequate and are not suitable for his way of playing. In addition the games have come thick and fast so the opportunity to address certain things is limited (but does exist). I don't mind his tactics too much - they have some logic to them on paper. But they do not appear to be suitable for the players or our league. They rely on a specific set of circumstances in the game and when those circumstances don't exist we seem lost as a team. That's really bad. We're awful at chasing games and too cautious when we have the lead. It's a bit naive. Where is the game management? What I haven't seen is any attempt to adapt and we're now 38 games deep into this season. Isn't that more than enough time to be clever enough to work things out? Or is it just going to be the same old story every game? 3. The Players I've not witnessed such poor body language between the players since we went down to League 1. They play like strangers, they are at pains to point out mistakes to each other and overall spirit seems lacking. We're a momentum team and it seems heads go down too easily, most notably when we concede. Where is the backbone and resiliency? This then manifests itself into how we play and players passing sideways as no-one wants to do something wrong. There is an issue here. I think there is some talent in the squad but we do not play to strengths and we increasingly allow opponents to exploit weaknesses. It's a recipe for disaster. We must be coached and managed better. What we see on the pitch is less than the total parts on it - even if recruitment has been iffy recently. 4. The Takeover Who knows what is happening here but it is clearly unsettling. You have all sorts of rumours coming out about it and it is definitely impacting the club - and I would suggest the team either directly or indirectly. So, poor recruitment, inflexible management and little team spirit all with a takeover hanging over the club. Not a great set of circumstances. You may argue that if you 'solve' one of these things then the others are also solved. I don't think it is as clear cut as that. I don't think we'll go down. As a supporter I know we don't have a divine right to success and I know we've had it good in recent times. The 'we used to be in League 1' rhetoric is a complete cop-out - you have to judge the season on its own merits. This season I think too many mistakes have been made and it's absolutely fine to point it out and say it's unacceptable if you think they could have been avoided. I think some key ones could have been avoided. For example, bad luck is losing VVD to injury. An avoidable mistake is failing to get cover for him in the same month we sold Fonte. It gives the fans the impression the club are not ambitious or just plain incompetent. It's annoying. Fans don't like being lied to and having expectations mismanaged. You want to get rid of Fonte for whatever reason but assure us he'll be replaced - fine, we'll trust your judgement no matter what our emotional investment in the player. You want to then fail to replace him and watch our season adversely impacted - that will get fans backs up and we have every right to be ****ed off. Things can get better this season without drastic change (somehow we can win a cup!) but hopefully this summer the club has the nous to assess and address purposefully or at the very least will start treating the fans with more respect when it comes to its transparency promise. There are a few positives this season and we shouldn't forget them, but the overall feeling is that we're going backwards because of lots of issues and some of it we've brought on ourselves and that is very frustrating given the position we were in last summer.

It's not - it's their third choice keeper Joel Pereira.

I just don't understand the thinking. At a time when we clearly have issues in the final third and need our defence to keep us in games while Puel and the strikers figure it all out we've edged towards a scenario where we may have to score two goals in a game to get anything out of it. How can anyone at the club think that is acceptable? Cedric already alluded to the mentality of the players changing given our personnel in defence and now we've got that until the end of the season!

Failure to get a centre-back in when we were a) told we would if we sold Fonte, and b) knowing VVD is injured for 12 weeks is basically negligence of incredible proportions. Didn't think Les Reed and his team had it in them to be honest. I wonder what on earth they must have been doing all month to end up asking for Jordi Amat on loan at 22:55 on deadline day. Jordi Amat - a player who lost his place in one of the worst teams in the league to a defender from Barnsley. Can you even begin to imagine who else the brain trust approached in the closing hours of Tuesday night?

I remember the season we went down from the Championship. Just about every single game I saw away from home had us beaten in the first half (usually by a couple of goals, sometimes three) and then Dodd and Gorman would lay into them at HT and they got a reaction and you'd go away thinking there was hope. Then the next game it was the same old rubbish. Then you realised that the team only playing one half a game was not good at all and they weren't good enough. I don't think its quite that bad of course but it's not a good sign.

Conceding a goal from your own corner is U14 stuff. It's atrocious. Our league record away from home this season: L, L, W, D, D, L, L, D, W, L, L , L. That's 9 points from 36. We have not conceded two goals in a league game and got something from it this season. In fact the only time we have done it at all this season was in a cup game (against Norwich). We can't keep the goals out and we can't score many. It's the sign of a poor team unfortunately. We lack luck but we also don't deserve much. I would suggest we are in no danger of going down but we'll be looking over our shoulder well into May. Is that acceptable? I don't know really. Feels like the season really does hinge on the cup final.

Tadic and Boufal make a very brief appearance around 43 seconds. No Jay Rod in video.

I've not seen much of him, have had to go to YouTube to see what he is like. Only thing I can really deduce is that he has a lot of quality in that left foot and seems to have good awareness with his movement and a lot of composure and technique. Hard to know how a player will adapt to another league but he does seem to have some quality.

Having taken the decision to exit this competition the expectation is now that our league form really picks up. If it doesn't then we should be asking questions. If it does then the end justifies the means. Also means we get over two weeks rest before the EFL Cup Final. Man Utd have to play three games in those two weeks off (two in Europa, last one is away on the Wednesday before the final) and an FA Cup game at the weekend inbetween them assuming they qualify tomorrow.

Not seen such an obvious attempt to lose a game from Saints in a long time but not going to get too upset by it. Feel sorry for those who paid money to see Saints though, the team selection is clearly cheating paying punters.

I read something saying that the construction industry in China is very competitive and that by Lander being associated with Saints it will differentiate them from the market (they can also say they can build football facilities endorsed by a Premier League club etc.)

Don't remember feeling this anxious about an injury since Bale ahead of the the second playoff leg against Derby.

Les Reed, January 5th: So there you have it - a condition on him leaving is that the club believe they can replace him. You can interpret that in two ways of course: 1. You can technically argue that if the club felt Stephens could step up or that Gardos was fully fit they are entitled to consider that Fonte is replaced. Of course, that would be a complete horsesh*t move by the club. 2. We will buy / loan a replacement. My expectation is firmly in 2 as anyone who thinks Fonte (even in an average season) can be replaced within would be accepting an inferior player replacing an important one. Over to Les Reed and Ross Wilson...

The value of the Fonte deal is entirely down to how good his replacement is. Sell Fonte for £10m and don't replace him = I'd rather have Fonte. £10m in the bank to a club that is already rich is pointless to me as a supporter. Sell Fonte for £10m and attempt to replace him with a better player by using that money plus some more = good deal for Saints. Sell Fonte for £10m and get in a cheap replacement = I'd rather have Fonte. That said I have no doubts the club have attainable targets. I do wonder about Semedo - Lisbon got dumped out of Europe altogether in the first half of the season so have little to play for really and he does seem attainable to me.

It did but the football was dire. It made us stop conceding goals and we snatched the odd one up front when we had slightly better finishing. Not sure 3-5-2 is the way to go in this case. I'd rather put one of the midfielders further forward in support of the striker and get more men in the box in addition to more of an urgency in our play.

If Fonte signs for either West Ham or West Brom and his deal is similar to his Saints terms (either or existing or offered) I'd love to know the reason he's left. VVD fallout as suggested on here? Has club pushed him out? Has Fonte falled out with Reed? Alot of questions we likely won't know the answer to.

His own form and this statement is not mutually exclusive to be fair. Had he still been playing up front then I would agree he is being played out of position but ever since we went to a 4-3-3 with two wide players he should be in his element. He shows glimpses but his decision making or execution lets him down too much. I don't know if that will change - he still seems like the same Nathan Redmond that frustrated at Norwich 3 years ago to me but I appreciate progress with young players is not always linear. I am desperate for him to play with instinct more and use his pace when he has the ball as much as when he doesn't. There was a break on Saturday in the second half where it was 4 on 3 (Saints had the ball and the man advantage) and Puel was on the sideline screaming at Redmond to move quickly and Redmond slowed things down and played a poor ball behind Tadic's stride which brought things to a halt and Puel went absolutely berserk.