mrfahaji

I think his entire post was sarcastic. Don't worry, I fell for it too...

Doesn't make sense for it to be us then. Walsall, on the other hand...

No problem, happy to oblige Perhaps my post made you as irate as yours did me.

Ha, I guess I missed the sarcasm of his post - the "parentage of Portsmouth" bit sounded genuine and reasonable enough to convince me!

While I totally understand a reluctance to sing inane or offensive songs, don't you ultimately go to support the team and ideally see them win? Cheering and singing helps the players. There's plenty of time to "ponder possibilities" - no-one is calling for non-stop singing - your response sounds a little bit high and mighty!

Not sure how they were tactically abysmal. Maybe for the first 40 minutes, but after that they got it spot on tactically. Hence why we lost...!

That's ridiculous. If you're going to get abuse, it shouldn't be for shouting at a football match, it should be for writing "would of" instead of "would have".

I don't think not playing the "full 90" should be a concern when you play a position that is commonly replaced and we have several ready made replacements. If we're in need of a goal, then sacrificing one of the two 'middle' midfielders for a more attacking minded one would make sense. Equally, if we're winning then replacing them with fresh legs also makes sense. Hard to see how Puel could prefer Clasie, although recently Hojbjerg hasn't put in the level of performances he did at the start of the season.

Haha, good one, definitely should be added to the list.

I like that you've made a thread about two players, and spelt both their names wrong But as many have said already, Puel is rotating the squad, and this week was Hojbjerg's turn for a rest. I thought that was something every Southampton fan knew...!

I tend to agree. Davis was disappointing yesterday and was poor for the first goal, but he does carry the ball well, and is occasionally creative - when Tadic is off form or being double man marked, Davis is often our best creative source (which is a pretty damning indictment of our team, but still). Not sure I've ever seen Clasie do anything decent. I would say that yesterday when he went off we did seem a bit more open in midfield, but that was probably because we replaced him with Boufal who was obviously going to play further forward as we chased the game.

Everyone knows the only things that get crowds excited are: 1) Scoring a goal 2) Winning a corner 3) A crunching challenge 4) Playing the ball to a wide player in space

I blew my top at Martina with about ten minutes to go when Boufal did well against a couple of their players on the byline, passed it back to Cuco who should have whipped one in. Instead he controls it, and gives the defender chance to get a block in on the cross, which they did. Then there was the pathetic defending for Costa's goal. Chelsea nearly scored a second when Clasie lost it in the middle, and then turned to the ref claiming a foul instead of chasing back. There were a few players not on their game (or perhaps nullified by Chelsea), but these moments can't help but stand out. I thought we were decent for half an hour after they scored, I felt that if we kept playing that way eventually we would create some openings, but in the end we ran out of steam/ideas.

My concern is that Inter worked out how to nullify us in the second half in the San Siro. Presumably they'll just come here and do the same from the outset - put two men on Tadic and close down the flanks when the full backs get forward.

Think it would have been all over on the penultimate weekend, sparing us those last day nerves, and then Danny Mills scored a last minute goal for Charlton and gave them a 4-3 win (don't recall who they were playing). Thankfully the last game turned out to be one of the most memorable days ever!

I remember that game - they were in black with green trim I believe, Cole & Yorke absolutely took us apart. We couldn't live with their movement. Having said that we were also pretty bad at that time. Everyone at my school had to enter a poetry competition and I won with a poem about our dreadful start to the season, including a reference to the 5-0 at Charlton and 3-0 Leeds. Have a feeling our first point of the season was a 1-1 at home to Spurs, with Ruel Fox getting their goal... if that is right, it's weird the sort of things that one remembers!

Like a fool he went and signed Shane Long Rickie left and Dejan's head had gone Les Reed said, Liverpool: Signed, sealed delivered, they're yours Since that time we've been moving up Now we're back in the uefa cup Les Reed says, we march on, Koeman, Pochettino, up yours Not a feasible chant for the terraces admittedly...

After Inter a lot of players said "we keep missing our chances" - looks like they see the solution as not to make any chances in the first place!

These are the ideal games for Rodriguez, he's nowhere near being good enough for Premier League at the moment. So frustrating for him to pick up another injury.

Yeah, 3-1 was the grey shirts game, then 6-3, then 1-0 which I think was Kevin Davies. We definitely beat them at St Mary's, though I thought the Beattie goal was in a 1-0 win (87th minute or something like that). We also beat them in the penultimate game at the Dell (they played a number of youngsters), one of the two results that helped Stuart Gray secure the job full time, despite us being woeful for every game beforehand!

You don't agree with Fonte?

https://www.whoscored.com/Articles/cAWJVubp60q7mW9yVj-YLQ/Show/Form-Guide-Is-Van-Dijk-the-Premier-Leagues-most-underrated-defender Just saw this article, thought it was relevant. Although, the thread is actually meant to be about who we could get to replace him, not how likely he is to leave!

As I've only been reading here for a couple of years, I may be wrong - but when all the Jack Schitt stuff was going on, I saw someone called 'Bearsy' on the other forum, and he seemed quite amusing. In fact some people on here were referring to him at the time. If that's who you mean, looks like he is just another defector to add to the list!

Nearly level-pegging on both counts now...!

Interesting that they describe Romeu as 'briefly brilliant' at Chelsea. I don't remember seeing him play, but I did a search to see if I could find any Chelsea reaction to when we signed him and there are quite a few comments about them making a mistake (by keeping Mikel instead) and how he's going to be a top player for us in a few years time.