Chap in the Chapel

'If we play like that every week we'll have no trouble staying up' will doubtless be the spin employed after the second home game in three that we've thrown away a winning position by conceding a late goal. Wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong. If we play like that against the teams in the Championship (90 per cent of them) who don't try and get the ball down and play and instead employ lug-it-forward football we'll lose, as we have done on most occasions this season. The first time Reading hoofed it forward from a set-piece towards a target man they scored, and I can't see this changing unless the transfer window heralds an astonishing burst of common sense and realism, and two tall, physical centre-backs are signed. I will admit that I was surprised to get a draw, as the team announced (probably what we'll have at our disposal after January) looked like lambs to the slaughter, but we're now in the bottom three, and the table does not lie. It's time for a long, hard, brutal think about the future of this club, and a shifting of thinking away from romantic 'give-it-time' to pragmatic 'do something now'.

Scooby doesn't post on here now to the best of my knowledge, at least not under that name, after he was humiliated when his true identity as a 'performance artist' wind-up merchant living in Washington DC was revealed. Sundance is a different kettle of fish - he can be obnoxious but at least he's consistent and able to string a sentence together. I wonder what his take on Lowe's alleged behaviour at the AGM is? This isn't baiting - I'd genuinely like to know.

Yes - a report of the early proceedings is on the Echo site already.

No. It's the Leon Crouch who wanted to cut costs but was continually outvoted by Hone, Dulieu, Oldknow, etc - the executives that Wilde brought to the club. Crouch only properly got his feet under the table this time last year, by which time contracts had been signed and deals done. He was fire-fighting pretty well from day one.

The problem is that we try to play football in the wrong areas. I'm all in favour of the short-passing malarkey in the final third, but we have to get the ball forward faster in order to do it, and the player receiving it up front has to be able to hold it up. John could do this, Rasiak could too. THEN we could build without having to worry about losing the ball and the opposition being in on goal immediately. Poortvliet doesn't learn from his mistakes, is evidently unwilling to change his methods and is not, I'm afraid, competent enough to manage at this level.

Forest had done their homework. They came realising that if you get in our faces our short-passing game breaks down quickly because we lack the technical ability. It is then that they can work out how to score themselves. Additionally, they also knew that as our players are physically weak all you have to do is lean on them and we will lose the ball. That takes care of defending against us. Ten teams have done this at St Mary's so far this season - one would think that our managerial team might have done something about it before now.

McGoldrick is a Blue Square South-standard footballer with a Premiership-size ego.

Southampton Football Club is unfit for purpose, plain and simple. That performance was an insult to all the fans, season ticket holders or not, who paid to watch it. Any Lowe, Wilde and/or Poortvliet apologists who watched today's game and still believe that they/he are taking the club in the right direction are deluding themselves.

This is a ridiculous rule. As I've said before, it will prevent managers from picking their entire matchday squad solely on the basis of merit. I'm astonished that clubs voted in favour of this.

I strongly suspect that Mr Smith is posting with his tongue solidly in his cheek!

I'm not surprised he's scathing - McGoldrick's performance in particular was an absolute disgrace tonight. Since he got his new three-year contract off the back of two goals against Exeter he's been abysmal; lazy, arrogant and selfish. He obviously considers himself undroppable and therefore thinks he can do whatever he likes. Drop him and put Euell up front.

Apologies for not making it clear that I was posting with my tongue wedged firmly in my cheek!

Well, as I look at the table tonight with my beloved Saints in 20th position, with everyone below us having a game in hand, and the chance of us being only one point above the relegation zone by the weekend, at least I can comfort myself with the fact that doubtless tomorrow Neil Warnock will have confirmed to our official site that we're the best side that Crystal Palace have played all season and that we're the top footballing team in the division. On an unrelated point, does anyone think that empirical evidence has any part to play when discussing a football team's merits?

Who's complaining? I'm simply pointing out a fact. The '1997 was year zero' approach to the club's history has always annoyed me though - there's a lengthy list of the young players SFC produced prior to that, although prior to 1998 we were admittedly in a fallow period.

It's worth reminding everyone at this point that the 'we set up the Academy' line has a caveat attached to it. FA rules made it mandatory for all Premier League clubs to establish them - it was not a visionary planning decision by Lowe et al.

How exactly do we 'benefit' or earn a 'reward' from this? We are basically playing young home-grown players anyway, regardless of whether this proposed ruling is accepted or not, and the article doesn't say what tangible rewards the club could or would get. In short, this is apparently saying, 'Saints are already doing something that other clubs may be compelled to do in the future and there is no actual benefit other than feeling virtuous.' In fact, this proposal could restrict managers from picking the teams they actually want to pick as they have to include home-grown players. Perceived merit could no longer be the criteria for selection! Or have I missed something?

The best result of the season by quite some distance. Like the Preston win though, this is absolutely meaningless unless it's built on. Plymouth are seventh tonight so Tuesday is by no means a certainty. Keep two up front though and we'll have a chance. I really hope that this means Poortvliet is starting to learn!

Wayne Bridge is comfortably the best left-back I've seen playing for Saints. Niemi, Bridge, Lundekvam, Svensson, Telfer - now that was a back five...

Antti Niemi. Shilton has said himself that his best years were at Nottingham Forest and I will be amazed and delighted if I ever see a better goalkeeper than Niemi play for Saints.

Plenty of effort and endeavour, particularly in the second half, but the damage was already done because Poortvliet sent out the wrong side AGAIN. Lancashire and Gobern are very obviously not ready to play in this league - Gobern's inclusion today after his anonymous full debut last week was absolutely baffling. BWP was a big improvement on him. The young players MUST be brought in gradually. Poortvliet is proving as much of a novice as far as Championship football is concerned as some of the more perspicacious observers on here feared. We weren't helped by the genuinely poor officiating, but I'll reserve judgement on Euell until I've seen a replay as it was up the other end from me. Another home defeat though - anything next week would be a bonus, and then we simply have to win at least one of the Plymouth and Charlton games.

Well, I can see now why Lowe appointed Poortvliet - he's a man in his own image: i.e. he does not learn from his mistakes: A) Six goals at home in the league all season and we still play one man through the centre. Pekhart should have been bought on at least ten minutes sooner. B) A young lad has a decent sub appearance away from home (viz. White against Derby), is then ploughed in for a start and is totally out of his depth. They HAVE to be bought in gradually, and not as knee-jerk selections. Apparently there was 'a buzz' at the training ground this week - I wish the noise of some training had drowned it out, as tonight we looked like a team that had never played together. We were extremely well beaten by a side that had two absolute dominators at either end of the field. McCombe and Adebola are the type of players we are absolutely crying out for, even though I thought Pearce played quite well at the back for us. It's now getting to the stage though where the question has to be asked: how long can this go on for? At what stage is Poortvliet's position untenable? We've got 30 matches to go and we probably need 37 points to be safe. I back the young players to the hilt, but they simply aren't being used properly or with enough experienced heads around them. Ask yourself: whose mistake is that? And will he or they learn from it? They're going to have to, and pretty soon.

A fantastic comeback to get a much-needed win. We MUST now build on it. There's a lot of euphoria flying around, much like there was after 25 minutes of fancy-dan stuff against 10 men the last time we won, and we then proceeded to take two points from fifteen. This result should properly be judged by how we get on in the next five matches. For tonight though, things look a little rosier!

Anyone brave/foolhardy/pig-headed enough to dispute this?

I see what you're getting at, but it depends if you consider last night's team to be a 'weakened' one. I don't know if it was a 'weak' team at this stage, so it comes down to judging the overall, full 90-minute performance. I don't think that Poortvliet knows what his best side is - even allowing for injuries and suspension, the fact that we've used 24 players already so far this season suggests that there's still a lot of tinkering going on. I also don't think that 25 minutes of olé stuff against 10 men glosses over the fact that we were second best for much of the first half and the start of the second, and we still face the same problems - physically we're not yet competitive enough and we lose too many headers. Yes, it came together last night, but it didn't against Blackpool. Still, we're on a little run now - I hope it continues.

A splendid result - but let's not get carried away. For the first half-hour we were second best and Robertson's cracking goal from absolutely nothing was, I thought, against the run of play. We did improve after that but following half-time Norwich were again in the ascendancy before Lallana very cleverly won the penalty. From where I was he was looking for it but there was contact and he earned us the second goal. That's three penalties awarded in two games, two of which have been won by Lallana. Defenders will now be very reluctant to tackle him in the box now. I was amazed at how unprofessional Stefanovic was in getting himself sent off for dissent. With 11, Norwich could still have been in the game. After that though, we were able to play fancy stuff with a man over for 25 minutes, and we probably should have had a couple more, but perspective has to be maintained. Stefanovic shot his team in the foot and Kelvin kept us ahead when we really needed him. Against 11, we weren't all that good and could easily have been behind before we scored. Still, four unbeaten in the league with three clean sheets is progress. I still worry about Lloyd James though. He's obviously not a full-back. Interestingly, Norwich's right-back Otsemebor was impressive - if we ever have any money again we could do a lot worse. Special mentions to Robertson and Lancashire, who I thought were splendid. It'll be tough on Saturday but we've got some momentum and can get a result, no question.