SaintStinger

Terrible from Ings there. He's been awful so far.

What a pathetic thread.

This man gets it.

Are you for real?

If he relegated Stoke then you have to say Pellegrino kept us up.

He didn't want to stay at Yeovil, instead opting to come back to Saints.

Austin has never been fast even when he was younger, but he makes up for it with quick thinking and this usually allows him to beat a defender and get a shot off even from very tight angles. If a nice ball isn't played in he will create a chance for himself. He does need some support though, he's a great header of the ball yet how many decent crosses has our fullbacks put in? And yesterday, how many times did he get into a decent position only for Redmond to just give the ball away? He can't do it all. Then JWP comes on, one of the few that can ping a ball in and Austin comes off. Instead of replacing him how about replacing some other players that can actually feed the strikers? We moan about lack of support for Gabbi, well it's the same thing surely? If he does go it will be to another Prem team. I would be very surprised to see him in the Championship next season. I hope he stays.

Keep Austin, replace the rest.

Seems same team as midweek with Yoshi in for Bednarek and Pied replacing Carillo on the bench.

Never liked this guy from the moment he scored and ran straight to Pellegrino pointing his finger, ignoring the fans, just to make a point. His point being that he can score goals like that so should be starting games regardless no doubt. Terrible attitude and not good for the squad or manager. Someone mentioned above that he would of been a Koeman signing. I expect that his attitude would have been different if Koeman didn't leave. We know he would drop Mane on a couple of occasions for being late, even though we needed him really. He also shipped Safir Taider straight out after only playing in one friendly saying he had the wrong attitude. So Puel and Pellegrino were too soft, yet i think both were brought in as yes men, men that made sure expensive signings actually played regardless of attitude or form. Not good for anything if players call the shots. Hughes coming in seems to making it clear that he will play who he wants. Our expensive new signing has been dropped (which needed to happen tbh) and i'm not surprised Boufal is crying. He's not getting his own way again.

Classic Long first touch.

Wouldn't surprise me. Remember when he scored then ignored everyone to run at Pellegrino pointing his finger? Seems he thinks he's the dogs danglies and deserves to start regardless.

Agree. The first half of the season is repeating itself. Austin fit but on the bench, we cant score, bring him on at the end when we're desperate. Then he get's started and starts scoring (as a lone striker, to those bringing up his mobility again) Then he gets injured. Now fit again comes back in and scores, then dropped to bench to be brought on when desperate. He needs to be starting games over any of the other strikers we currently have.

To be fair i've watched it again on motd2 and he looks to actually move out of the way altogether and just stick his leg out. So it was a pretty lame attempt to stop the shot and i'm sure Hughes will have had a word with him about that.

Players have died from being hit in the chest from balls hit at them very hard. It's happened multiple times and the most recent was just a few weeks ago. Look up Bruno Boban. It's obviously very rare and i'm not suggesting players don't attempt to block goal bound shots but getting hit in the chest by a football at full pelt certainly can and does cause serious injury and even death.

Garry Monk for me. Currently pulling Birmingham out of the relegation mire and hasn't been that bad anywhere imo. Still plenty to learn (he's younger than Eddie Howe) and makes mistakes but has the right attitude and i've no doubt he'll be managing in the prem again someday. I expect Hughes will stay though as i think we'll survive the drop.

Hilarious.

Unlikely Austin will last much more than a half, but i like that he's getting used at the start rather than throwing him on to chase a game. Get the damage done early!

Sadio Mané - So good on the ball, great pace and great finisher. Will always remember his record breaking super fast hat trick. Infact that game, when the ref pretended to take away his match ball at the end, was one of the few times i saw him smile. Shame he's gone. Graziano Pellè - Ended up being a bargain and took to the prem with ease. Lots of really good goals and the occasional lovely flick on. Never forget that worldy he scored against QPR, which totally overshadowed the stunner that Austin scored against us earlier in the match. Seemed to bring the best out of Tadic. Shame he chased the big money. Another season here would have been better for us and him. He hasn't had a look in for Italy since he left us. Steven Davis - A great server since our return to the Prem. And excellent passer and reader of the game. Time may not be on his side now as he's started to pick up the odd injury which he's pretty much avoided his whole career when you looks at the shear number of appearances he's put in. Still has plenty to offer imo. I can't leave this without mentioning Jay Rodriguez. The game he got injured he was on 17 for the season and was on a streak of 5 goals in the previous 4 games. Who knows what may have happened if things turned out different. Such a shame.

Maybe Man City will be too focused on winning everything else and put out their £500m reserve squad or something. Maybe we'll just have a real good game like last years LC final. Maybe Austin will be fit again.

Haha indeed. A bit of mud didn't stop Le Tissier making it look easy. First clip on here is a classic

Always sad to see a player of his ability leave the club, but glad the whole thing is over with now.

I'm going to repost a post from myself from the friendly thread a while back just before Austin got his first start. I should of posted it in this thread originally. All very relevant considering people questioning why fans like him still and still calling him crap basically. Plus his goals vids should be here The first paragraph was in response to him not being a proven prem player because scoring 18 goals for a crap team doesn't mean anything....

Back to slagging off Austin again are we? Or should i say the usual faces slagging him off. Him getting a few starts and proving them wrong (like he needs to prove anything) kept them quiet but now he's out for a bit back they come to tell us how crap he really is.

He's been called far worse than slow and championship standard by some posters on here for the last 6 months or more. A dog**** footballer, we only got him cos no one else wanted him, and Stern John had a better record are a few standouts. Also, whenever Austin didn't score in his usual 10 mins cameo it was because he's fat, slow and ****, yet Gabbi not scoring for 70 mins in the same games was only down to poor service of course. He got himself fitter recently as bit parts don't help match fitness or motivation to improve but fair play to him for working on it and basically forcing himself in our managers 1st team. I'm glad he's now playing, because, like i said in that friendly thread, he would be off in the Jan window and it would be totally our loss.