Diabolus Ex Machina

Well if we want to see a similar start we only have to go back to 2019-20 under Ralph where we also only had 8pts in our first 10 games and only 9pts after 13 games though that was also the season we finished 11th! Seems even having a good striker like Ings didn't guarantee a good start. Longer period of form - again don't need to look too far back, we have 22pts in our last 13 games and between 16 Jan 21 and 14 Aug 21 we only got 14pts over a run of 22 games, again under Ralph. As much as people like to complain about the lack of quality in our squad (which I don't fully agree with) I think it's also worth pointing out that only 4 players (JWP, S.Armstrong, Elyounoussi, McCarthy) have played under a different Saints manager to Ralph and only 3 other players (KWP, AMN, Walcott) have ever played under another manager in the Prem. The majority of the squad has only ever played Prem football using Ralph's tactics, coaching and guidance and i'd personally be very interested to see how they could perform under a different manager before i'd write them off.

The statistics aren't pulled from a particular site, I see a lot of arguments on this forum that are never backed up by any sort of evidence so when trying to make a point I like to make sure I have figures to at least back up my point. I started tracking stuff myself a couple of years back during our first terrible run under Ralph to see how it compared to runs under other managers so worked backwards a bit and then continued to track certain things going forward. The main thing i've pulled is just results either from Wikipedia or the official premier league site and then used those to calculate things like win percentages, points per game etc... Key stats I track mostly go back to when we got promoted back to the Prem as that seemed the best starting point for comparisons. I did make a list of all our league results going all the way back to the 1987-88 season when seeing how bad our end of season run in 2020-21 was though. I didn't bother going further back as couldn't find a data source in a good format. You are correct though in that when pulling the data from several other tables into this final one I hadn't updated some figures and so the figures for Ralph are slightly incorrect in that table - the total number of games was correct but the wins, draws and losses from this season hadn't been added yet. Corrected figures after the City game would be as follows. Manager Games Points Goals For Goals Against GD W D L PPG GFPG GAPG AVG GD Win % Adkins 22 22 30 40 -10 5 7 10 1 1.37 1.82 -0.45 22.7 Pochettino 54 75 73 66 7 19 18 17 1.39 1.36 1.23 0.13 35.1 Koeman 76 123 113 74 39 36 15 25 1.62 1.49 0.98 0.51 47.3 Puel 38 46 41 48 -7 12 10 16 1.22 1.08 1.27 -0.19 31.5 Pellegrino 30 28 29 44 -15 5 13 12 0.94 0.97 1.47 -0.5 16.6 Hughes 22 17 20 38 -18 3 8 11 0.78 0.91 1.73 -0.82 13.6 Hassenhuttl 146 172 181 248 -67 46 34 66 1.18 1.24 1.7 -0.46 31.5 That means that Ralph does currently have an equal win % as Puel did (at least in the league) though it's worth noting that a full half of those wins came in his first season and a half (61 games covering 23 games in 2018-19 & the whole of the 2019-20 season) compared to the other half in the past 2 and a bit seasons (85 games covering 2020-21, 2021-22 and this season). And just in case anyone wondered what the figures look like for this season so far, it's not pretty reading being basically as bad as we were under Hughes (if not slightly worse). Manager Games Points Goals For Goals Against GD W D L PPG GFPG GAPG AVG GD Win % Hassenhuttl 9 7 8 17 -9 2 1 6 0.78 0.89 1.89 -1 22.2

Bad starts to the season seem to be a bit of a theme under Ralph. The 7pts in 9 games this season is bad and last season (2021-22) we only had 8pts in the first 9 and in his first full season here (2019-20) we also only had 8pts in the first 9 games (2020-21 season is the sole exception so far where we got an eye watering 17pts in the first 9). That 2019-20 season actually ended up potentially even worse as we only had 9 points after 13 games. That was the same season that Ings got 22 goals (1 goal off the golden boot) and we finished 11th so it’s not like having a good striker made a difference in those early games, but I guess it also shows that it is possible to turn it around should our forwards hit form (though current performances seem to suggest that is unlikely). I always thought it was a bit of a shame we didn’t finish top half that season considering we had the leagues second highest scorer. We ended up finishing below a Sean Dyche led Burnley team with Chris Wood as a top scorer and a Sheffield United team whos top scorer only got 6 league goals so the competition wasn't exactly super strong. Something to think about when assuming another striker could solve all our problems.

Overall, definitely. At our best under Ralph he blows Pellegrino (and the likes of Puel) out of the water. Our recent form however is a different matter. Pellegrino was only here for 30 games. If you compare that to our last 30 under Ralph... Manager Games Points Goals For Goals Against GD W D L Pellegrino 30 28 29 44 -15 5 13 12 Hassenhuttl 30 31 36 57 -21 8 7 15 So 3 more points, more wins but more losses and a worse goal difference. An extra point every 10 games doesn't really indicate Ralph being far better currently. Keep in mind that those were Pellegrino's first 30 games whereas Ralph has had over 100 games under his belt with us prior to these last 30. That's all kind of off topic though for this thread, I don't think any decision on his future will hinge on this one game. Maybe if we take a heavy loss and end the day in the relegation zone but I expect at least a point and if we're a bit braver in our play (which as the Home team we should be) there's no reason we can't take all 3 points.

If people really want to compare stats of mangers etc... here you go. Based on league games only since we were back in the Prem. (Note AVG GD is just the difference between Average Goals Scored and Average Goals conceded per game) Manager Games Points Goals For Goals Against GD W D L PPG GFPG GAPG AVG GD Win % Adkins 22 22 30 40 -10 5 7 10 1 1.37 1.82 -0.45 22.7 Pochettino 54 75 73 66 7 19 18 17 1.39 1.36 1.23 0.13 35.1 Koeman 76 123 113 74 39 36 15 25 1.62 1.49 0.98 0.51 47.3 Puel 38 46 41 48 -7 12 10 16 1.22 1.08 1.27 -0.19 31.5 Pellegrino 30 28 29 44 -15 5 13 12 0.94 0.97 1.47 -0.5 16.6 Hughes 22 17 20 38 -18 3 8 11 0.78 0.91 1.73 -0.82 13.6 Hassenhuttl 144 165 173 230 -57 44 33 60 1.15 1.21 1.6 -0.39 30.5 If you want to compare Ralphs performance year-on-year Season Games Points Goals For Goals Against GD W D L PPG GFPG GAPG AVG GD Win % 2018-19 23 30 32 36 -4 8 6 9 1.31 1.4 1.57 -0.17 34.7 2019-20 38 52 51 60 -9 15 7 16 1.37 1.35 1.58 -0.23 39.4 2020-21 38 43 47 68 -21 12 7 19 1.14 1.24 1.79 -0.55 31.5 2021-22 38 40 43 67 -24 9 13 16 1.06 1.14 1.77 -0.63 23.6 2022-23 7 7 7 11 -4 2 1 4 1 1 1.58 -0.58 28.5 And a quick comparison between his first 1 1/2 seasons and the last 2 and a bit. Season(s) Games Points Goals For Goals Against GD W D L PPG GFPG GAPG AVG GD Win % All 144 165 173 230 -57 44 33 60 1.15 1.21 1.6 -0.39 30.5 2018-20 61 82 83 95 -12 23 13 25 1.35 1.37 1.56 -0.19 37.7 2020-23 83 90 97 146 -49 23 21 39 1.09 1.17 1.76 -0.59 27.7 He started off well, taking over what I believe was an under performing team from 2 rather inept managers in Pellegrino and Hughes and getting them firing at quite a high level. The longer time has gone on and the more time he's had to bring in new players and implement his playbook and automations the further we have slipped. The last 2 seasons as a whole have been pretty poor and the hope was that the new coaches and signings would help turn it around. 7 games probably isn't enough of a sample to judge whether it's working but early signs aren't the most promising. While we have not been in a serious relegation fight yet under Ralph the signs are clearly showing that we are heading that way.

I liked the look of Marco Rose, think he would have fit in well here and was available over the summer. Unfortunately has gone to RB Leipzig only 10 days ago so a missed opportunity.

Well under Gao (and even before him) it was very much a case of balancing the books with outgoings having to match incomings which we did ok with (could even call it quite successful in the years where our recruitment was on point). Sports Republic seem to very much be of the mindset that you need to speculate to accumulate - a big expenditure up front with the aim to grow the assets for sale at a higher price later. I'm sure they think of it as investing rather than straight up spending money if that makes sense. We won't really know if it's a success for a year or two once some of these players are sold on for a profit which would then presumably be re-invested again. As long as the successes outweigh the flops we should be fine, though there is the matter of the loan to be repaid which is a bit of an unknown factor currently.

Great result, thoroughly deserved as I thought we were the better team for the majority of the match. Everything seems to be clicking at the moment from management, to tactics to motivation and individual player performances. It's going to be hard to maintain that over the season which is where we've come unstuck in the past but hopefully lessons have been learned this time and we can avoid the sort of bad runs that have plagued the last two seasons and follow this up with some wins against the 'lesser' teams. Adams was my Man of the Match for all the problems he was causing them which took a lot of pressure off us the other end as well I think, though there's plenty of others who i'd have no problem getting it either! Lavia was superb before having to come off and I don't think i'd replace ABK with anyone else in the league on his current form - lad is immense. We also finally got another win where Stu Armstrong didn't make an appearance which is nice!

Well first off, that's a great result, especially to come from behind again though I wish it didn't take us going behind to burst into life! This was the first time this season we actually looked like a solid top level team imo. We set up well and handled the Leicester pressure first half but we lacked composure on the ball as it seemed every time we got it we gave it back to them. In particular thought Ely, Aribo and Armstrong were all poor in getting the ball up field and JWP was practically invisible for the first half. Second half started with more of the same but funnily the Leicester goal is what really changed things, with them suddenly having something to hold on to and us needing to chase the game flipped completely and I thought we were clearly the best team from then on out. Big credit to Che for the goals and overall effort (we'd be mad to sell him even before todays heroics) though i'm slightly worried that we seem to be so reliant on KWP as an outlet to get us into the final third as he seemed to be the catalyst for most of our best moves. New guys all continue to look good (though I thought Aribo had his worst performance for us so far). Special mentions to Lavia who continues to look at home in the Prem and especially Bella-Kotchap who so far looks to be a very solid addition at the back. Tidy finish from Mara as well even though it was offside but don't want to start bigging him up too quickly as the form of new players (especially young ones) can fluctuate greatly and don't want expectations to get too high to avoid the inevitable backlash later on. Credit also to Ralph, think he did well with the overall tactics and subs but still needs to find the best balance between defense and attack as while we looked more solid defensively today we were a bit stifled going forward in the first half and it shouldn't take going behind to force us to go forward and create goal scoring chances. A big improvement though and things starting to move in the right direction. Let's hope we keep it up and try and get something out of the next couple of games because with that first win under our belts and some points on the board I think we can be a bit more brave in these next few games against 'bigger' teams.

Think he got a lot of unwarranted stick last week, in the first half he was pretty much the only player I saw that was advancing the ball up pitch for us. Played the pass that would have put through Armstrong on goal before he was taken out and also played a cross field pass to the wing that led to our other good chance for Armstrong that was blocked in the box. There was at least one other time before that as well. All of this was basically ignored and then a poor cross and shot later that half made everyone pile on him as normal. He was admittedly pretty anonymous the second half until he was subbed but he's nowhere near as bad as people make out. As for todays line-up, you can't say Ralph's not going for it. Hopefully the players are more comfortable in this formation and can carry on the momentum from the end of the last game. Be interesting to see how Mara does. Showed great promise in his cameo last week but sounded like that even surprised Ralph and he hadn't seen that sort of form in training. Hopefully he can keep it going!

Wouldn't be shocked by this. In fact I predicted something similar about a month back when the Winks rumours appeared again.

Simple answer, yes it's a combination of all these things. His preferred formation with fullbacks pushing forward and a high press from the midfield leaves easily exploitable gaps that end up regularly leaving the other team one-on-one with the CB's. That's ok if you have VVD back there, not so much if you have Bednarek. Also less of a problem if you're getting plenty of goals up the other end to cover for this but as time has gone on other teams seem to have cottoned on to our tactics and we seem to be pushed out to the wings more where it's difficult for us to produce chances as we don't have a dedicated target man up front for crosses. Any alternative tactics attempted in the 3 1/2 seasons Ralph has been here have also been inconsistent at best. We're able to get some individual good results but never anything effective over a longer period. Add in our horrible record against set pieces as well and I genuinely think Ralph doesn't really know how to coach a defense properly - I think the press had been so successful before for him that he never had to divert from it and now that he's had to try he's been a bit lost. You'd think he'd had long enough to show some improvement but it just doesn't seem to be happening. Perhaps the likes of Bazunu, ABK and Lavia will help (GK in particular has been a particularly weak area for us ever since we returned to the Prem) and I suppose we'll find out soon if we move back to that preferred 4-2-2-2 formation. My worry is that with the focus still being on the press rather than creating a solid backline that we'll still leave lots of gaps or be caught on the counter a lot (not to mention the set piece weakness could still very much be present). Will just have to wait and see how it goes I suppose.

Well the back 5 has been a complete shambles and moving to a back 4 again basically means we're using the same tactics that have given us the worst defensive record in the league since Ralph took over. I don't have faith in the coaching to improve that defensive record so hopefully the likes of Bazunu, Bella-Kotchap and Lavia really are able to make a difference immediately in a formation the players actually seem to like and understand. On the plus side you'd hope Perraud would be back and judging by his reaction after being subbed yesterday Bednarek may find himself on the bench quite a bit more from now on.

I think if we're only talking league games it was actually 1 in 16 for Pellegrino (29 Oct 17 - 31 Jan 18, 1W-8D-7L, 11pts) compared to our current form bridging the last 2 seasons - 1 in 14 (5 mar 22 - 13 Aug 22, 1W-3D-10L, 6pts). For more comparison, our worst run ever in the Prem era was 8pts over 17 games (16 Jan 21 - 18 May 21, 2W-2D-13L) a run also overseen by Ralph. Ralph also holds Prem era records for a Southampton boss for biggest home loss (9-0 – Leicester City Oct 19), biggest away loss (9-0 – Man Utd Feb 21), worst losing streak (6 losses – 16 Jan 21-14 Feb 21) and most amount of goals conceded in a season (68 – 2020/21 season, also gets second place with 67 goals in 2021/22). He only manages second place for worst Goal Difference (-24 last year) as Dave Jones has him beat on -27 in the 1998/99 season. When people talk about not judging him based on just this season or the end of last season I think they forget just how historically bad the 2020/21 season was under him and that for those of us that did remember it we treated last season as his second chance where he managed to get even less points and goals than that year. The questioning of his tactics, formations and team selections is nothing new as there are plenty of instances as far back as March 21 if you go and look that far back on the forum in this very thread. As nice as the comeback draw was today it's also worth noting the comparison to last years result in these 2 games - Last season we got 6pts with a +2 GD, this season it's 1pt with a -3 GD so we're currently already behind compared to last year as well. On the plus side if you only compare game-to-game we are on the same points as this time last year after 2 games. We didn't actually win any of our first 7 league games so if the club are going to show the same patience this year then Ralph can afford to not win any of the next 5 games.

While i'm not a fan of the 5 at the back we have won with it before and at least Leeds don't have the offensive firepower Spurs have so perhaps Djenepo won't leave us as exposed this time. Worrying that Perraud doesn't even make the bench (presumably not match fit) yet Lyanco does being he apparently didn't train all week. Aribo, Armstrong and Mara look to be the offensive options off the bench though i'd like to have seen Redmond as an option as well. It's strange to consider only our second game of the season as 'must win' but on paper this is our easiest game out of the first 6 or so and so is somewhere we really need to pick up some points. A single result here either way won't define our season but could have a big impact on Ralphs immediate future especially if any of the rumours about player discontent are true. I honestly can't predict a result as we are so wildly inconsistent it could be anything depending on how switched on we are and how the opponents react. If we were to lose however that would take our current losing streak in the league to 6 games in total (covering this season and end of last). We've only ever lost 6 in a row once in the premier league era - also under Ralph in the 2020-21 season. Not sure he survives something like that again...

Well Elyounoussi, Redmond, Walcott and Djenepo are all in the last years of their contracts so - unless we want to extend - it makes sense that they would all be up for sale as this would be our last real chance to get any return for them (might also explain why we won't get any offers if they can be picked up for free next summer or at least dirt cheap in January). Romeu and Valery are in the same boat so could potentially also move on if we didn't want to extend. As for Stephens and Bednarek - moving them on would make some sense if we are already tracking an experienced replacement as we already have Salisu, ABK, Lyanco and potentially Valery at CB (though I wouldn't count him as an out and out CB personally). Likewise the arrival of Lavia may have made Diallo somewhat expendable as he hasn't really kicked on since we signed him a few years back. Can't help but think getting this sort of information out in the public domain (i.e. leaking it to the Athletic ourselves) would have been more useful at the start of the window rather than waiting until the start of the season if we did want to shift some of them. The small squad thing was identified by the club itself as a weakness after the awful 2020-21 season (a season which a lot of fans already seem to have blacked out completely it seems as most of the focus now seems to be on last season only). To go back on that and suggest we would be OK without that sort of depth, especially now that 5 subs are allowed is madness really.

Well we didn't hit a home run replacing Ings with Armstrong. We also haven't replaced Broja with anyone yet (assuming Mara is the Long replacement). Good forwards are also notoriously expensive so replacing our highest scoring forward of last season if we only get £15m for him as well as having to replace Broja and reinforce other areas despite having already spent £45m+ this window seems a difficult prospect for a club of our relatively limited finances (and seemingly no interest from teams for our other players bar JWP and KWP). I still don't see a good reason for selling him unless he's refused a new contract and actively wants a move (which there's been nothing to suggest is the case so far). He's our highest scoring forward, works well in a 2-up front formation and if we really want to improve on him as a starter would still make a good option to come off the bench (in fact he is the only player to come off the bench and score in both of the last 2 seasons). It smacks of Ralph losing faith in him and deciding he's expendable despite him being stats wise clearly the best of our forward options. Being that he himself may only be a handful of bad results away from being sacked i'm not sure i'd trust him to make such a risky decision.

Is there a particular need to wait that long to switch? So far the only players moved on from last year are a GK and 2 forwards (Forster, Long, Broja) and Armstrong and Adams have both had enough experience in a 4-2-2-2. We could easily put out a team with knowledge of the formation should we wish. Wouldn't it be better to get the newer players better acquainted with it in a competitive environment as well? I get that Spurs away is not a great time to do it (and along with our fullback situation made the 5-3-2 there a logical choice) but you'd like to think a more attacking formation would be better suited for our next home game against Leeds. Perhaps he doesn't trust 4 at the back with KWP being the only healthy and decent quality fullback currently (possible injury from Spurs notwithstanding) but if that's the case then why didn't we prioritize the fullback cover before the start of the season knowing that both Tino and Perraud would be missing/unfit? We seem to have done some good business bringing in some high potential targets but have missed out on strengthening some key areas before the start of the season which may cause us to drop crucial points (with the exception of Goalkeeper potentially). We may still get the signings we need but even then you have to be a bit concerned if the manager doesn't believe he can get players up to speed with his tactics very quickly.

After being 4-1 down at 63 mins and with 5 subs now available would have been the perfect time to rest him if he/the coaching/medical staff thought he'd picked up a knock. Of course we waited until the 92nd minute to sub him off though.

I'm assuming you'd count Broja's good spell last season as his 6 goals in 16 games (matches 8-23) where our results were W6, D6, L4. Want to know how Adams compared last season? 7 goals in a 17 game stretch (matches 10-26) results of W7, D6, L4. If you're counting Broja as a 'top striker' based on current output then you have to count Adams in that bracket as well. Regardless their good spells actually coincided with each other which is what got us the points we needed to stay up. Considering we only won 9 league games all season and the only one that didn't come in that spell was our last victory against Arsenal, not having either of them there probably would have seen us relegated. Of course Broja is already gone and with Adams potentially going you can understand the concern. Or I suppose we could sell him and rely on our recruitment team to get a better striker in (and a replacement for Broja's goals as well), done well replacing Ings goals with Armstrong haven't they.

Our second highest league scorer the past 2 seasons behind Ings and JWP (and JWP was only ahead because he is our penalty taker). For a team in our position that has been low in the table and has been going backwards in terms of points, goals scored and goals conceded, the idea of selling our highest scoring striker (having also lost our second highest scoring forward in Broja) is pretty suicidal (see how it worked out for Burnley selling Chris Wood last season for a recent example of how this turns out). You can hope we can bring in a better striker all you want but the fact we've seemingly spent the whole window so far chasing around Delap and Broja with seemingly no movement on either doesn't fill me with hope (and getting Broja would only cover his missing goals not Adams as well).

I'm assuming you mean same eleven in back-to-back games. He did it 5 times last season with the most recent example being keeping the same team that beat Arsenal 1-0 at home (our last win) which then preceded to lose 2-0 away to Burnley. The previous year he only did it 3 times, though for one of those it was 3 games in a row the starting eleven was left unchanged.

Well i'm assuming Perraud is still coming back to full fitness which explains Djenepo starting. Valery has also had some success as part of a back 3 so can see why he might have been picked. Does look like service up to Armstrong / Aribo could be a problem but maybe the strategy is to keep it tight at the start and then bring on more attacking players as the game goes on (more possible with 5 subs now I suppose). Win, lose or draw though a single match will not necessarily be indicative of our season as a whole or an indicator of Ralphs position so we should try not to go OTT with our praise/criticism regardless of the result. Be interesting to see how Lavia and Bazunu do against some stiff competition though.

Having just watched the press conference it was more of a general statement of not wanting to discuss possible incomings or outgoings as a response to the KWP question (which was repeated when asked about the possibilities of signing Werner). Think he just knows we like to keep our transfer dealings quiet rather than alluding to anything actively going on. Admittedly some sort of statement that there are players we know we want to keep would have been nice though. Wasn't much more to the conference really though was interesting that he put our end of season collapse more down to mental fatigue than physical.

Broja - League: 6 FA Cup: 1 EFL Cup: 2 Total: 9 Adams - League: 7 FA Cup: 0 EFL Cup: 1 Total: 8 Armstrong - League: 2 FA Cup: 0 EFL Cup: 0 Total: 2 Adams + Armstrong = 8 + 2 = 10 10 > 9 So no he clearly didn't score more than both combined. I'd say he was basically on par with Che in terms of shooting stats but Adams had the better stats in assists, passing and defensive stats (all are available on the Premier League site to compare btw). I do agree with your original point though in that he didn't lack quality or goals last season especially when compared to our other strikers. Don't think he did enough to be worth £30m but obviously potential is a big factor in that valuation.