Monk Posted 12 August, 2012 Share Posted 12 August, 2012 Would much rather see Saints return to their old pre-season preparations when the club would play all fixtures away. Then to host a 'significant' European giant on the Saturday a week before the season kicks off. The club use to attract a solid crowd when we hosted the likes of Bayern, Panathinikos, Anderlecht etc. Surely it’s much more financially viable having one large game at the end of pre-season rather than the poor attendances at the Wolves, ML Trophy and Udinese fixtures? I just don’t understand the logistics of our current pre-season programmes? (with the exception of the Olympics) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thedelldays Posted 12 August, 2012 Share Posted 12 August, 2012 I'm sure the club understands the logistics of pre season Nigel has said it was tougher this year for a reason Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Monk Posted 12 August, 2012 Author Share Posted 12 August, 2012 ok, the financial* logistics that tie in with NA's pre season plans. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matthew Le God Posted 12 August, 2012 Share Posted 12 August, 2012 The club use to attract a solid crowd when we hosted the likes of Bayern That was on 26th January 2004, not pre-season. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Saint-Armstrong Posted 12 August, 2012 Share Posted 12 August, 2012 Playing against better, and stronger opposition at home? (something we rarely faced) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Monk Posted 12 August, 2012 Author Share Posted 12 August, 2012 That was on 26th January 2004, not pre-season. look at the attendance and chill out. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Monk Posted 12 August, 2012 Author Share Posted 12 August, 2012 Playing against better, and stronger opposition at home? (something we rarely faced) Makes no sense, what so ever. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
VectisSaint Posted 12 August, 2012 Share Posted 12 August, 2012 The point of pre-season fixtures is to prepare the team, not to get the crowds in. I'm sure there is no plan to lose money on these matches, but it really doesn't matter about attendances (or even results) its about conditioning the team for the season ahead. Not sure the club have really achieved this either, but difficult to assess until we start playing competitive games. Very surprised they played last evening, surprised anyone turned up, much more exciting watching Mo and Usain at the Lympics. Huge numbers of empty seats at Villa Park today suggest that even committed football supporters were otherwise occupied with a once in a lifetime event rather than meaningless pre-season fixtures. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Turkish Posted 12 August, 2012 Share Posted 12 August, 2012 Its the price. I'm buggered if I'm going to pay £20 a time to see little more than a training game. If it had been a fiver I'd have gone to them all. With the Libeherr cup the club were expecting people to shell out over £100 on meaningless games after a lot of people had just spent £600 on season tickets. They are taking the p*ss. Only a superfan with no life would pay £20 to see a pre season friendly which is live on terrestrial TV FFS. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matthew Le God Posted 12 August, 2012 Share Posted 12 August, 2012 Playing against better, and stronger opposition at home? (something we rarely faced) Makes no sense, what so ever. Why does that make "no sense"? Saints wanted to be tested in the pre-season against strong opposition, it gives them an idea how strong Premier League sides would test them and which Saints players can rise to what will be needed. Playing friendlies against poor opposition all pre-season doesn't tell you alot. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Turkish Posted 12 August, 2012 Share Posted 12 August, 2012 Why does that make "no sense"? Saints wanted to be tested in the pre-season against strong opposition, it gives them an idea how strong Premier League sides would test them and which Saints players can rise to what will be needed. Playing friendlies against poor opposition all pre-season doesn't tell you alot. So in the two games against strong opposition which have given us an idea how strong premier league sides would test us, two defeats, no goals for and five against suggest we are miles away, yes? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Monk Posted 12 August, 2012 Author Share Posted 12 August, 2012 Why does that make "no sense"? Saints wanted to be tested in the pre-season against strong opposition, it gives them an idea how strong Premier League sides would test them and which Saints players can rise to what will be needed. Playing friendlies against poor opposition all pre-season doesn't tell you alot. Wolves and Bristol City are the likes of teams we will play to test us but play them away. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thedelldays Posted 12 August, 2012 Share Posted 12 August, 2012 Wolves and Bristol City are the likes of teams we will play to test us but play them away. You do realise we have been promoted to the premier league? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Monk Posted 12 August, 2012 Author Share Posted 12 August, 2012 You do realise we have been promoted to the premier league? When? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matthew Le God Posted 12 August, 2012 Share Posted 12 August, 2012 Wolves and Bristol City are the likes of teams we will play to test us but play them away. How does playing Wolves and Bristol give an indication of what it will be like against good Premier League sides? They are both in the Championship. Playing the Dutch Champions, Belgium Champions, 9th best team in France and 3rd best team in Italy are tests. They help Adkins work out how to play against Premier League sides and where he may need to strengthen. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Turkish Posted 12 August, 2012 Share Posted 12 August, 2012 How does playing Wolves and Bristol give an indication of what it will be like against good Premier League sides? They are both in the Championship. Playing the Dutch Champions, Belgium Champions, 9th best team in France and 3rd best team in Italy are tests. They help Adkins work out how to play against Premier League sides and where he may need to strengthen. Would you not agree that based on those tests, weve come up badly short? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Monk Posted 12 August, 2012 Author Share Posted 12 August, 2012 Wow, this forum does struggle. Lets put this in basic terms. If we are going to host a home fixture in pre-season then I personally think, financially its only worth doing if it is a larger/attractive club. I think the standard of teams we picked to play this summer have been spot on and worth while. I just think the dates, times and prices of certain fixtures make any sense(granted it depends on the other clubs summer programme). I think our pre-season should return to old ways. Something LIKE this: Small tour/camp abroad - Fitness priority A - Bristol City A - Wolves A - Le Harve/Evain/ H - Ajax A - Hearts H - Juventus/Lyon/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matthew Le God Posted 12 August, 2012 Share Posted 12 August, 2012 (edited) How does playing Wolves and Bristol give an indication of what it will be like against good Premier League sides? They are both in the Championship. Playing the Dutch Champions, Belgium Champions, 9th best team in France and 3rd best team in Italy are tests. They help Adkins work out how to play against Premier League sides and where he may need to strengthen. Would you not agree that based on those tests, weve come up badly short? Not really. We beat... - the 9th best team in France - a recently relegated English Premier League team - a Swiss second division team We drew with... - Arsenal reserves - Bristol City We lost... - narrowly against the Dutch Champions - narrowly to the Belgian Champions over 45 minutes - badly against the 3rd best Italian side It highlighted some weaknesses, but that is a good thing to expose them in preseason so it can be addressed. Better to find out now than being complacent after thrashing team after team in pre-season. Edited 12 August, 2012 by Matthew Le God Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Turkish Posted 12 August, 2012 Share Posted 12 August, 2012 Not really. We beat... - the 9th best team in France - a recently relegated English Premier League team - a Swiss second division team We drew with... - the Belgian Champions over 45 minutes - Arsenal reserves - Bristol City We lost... - narrowly against the Dutch Champions - badly against the 3rd best Italian side It highlighted some weaknesses, but that is a good think to expose them in preseason so it can be addressed. Better to find out now than being complacent after thrashing team after team in pre-season. We lost to the Belgian champions over 45 minutes You said playing the Belgian champions, the Dutch champions, the 9th best team in France and the 3rd best team in Italy are tests and will help us work out where to strengthen and how to play against premier league sides. No mention of wins or draws against current championship clubs. By your own admission how do results against them show us how we will do against premier league sides? So based on the tests you outlined and our record in them of P4 W1 L3 F1 A6 show that we have come up short By some considerable margin, do they not? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matthew Le God Posted 12 August, 2012 Share Posted 12 August, 2012 You said playing the Belgian champions, the Dutch champions, the 9th best team in France and the 3rd best team in Italy are tests and will help us work out where to strengthen and how to play against premier league sides. No mention of wins or draws against current championship clubs. Yes, I did. You've even quoted me saying it! By your own admission how do results against them show us how we will do against premier league sides? So based on the tests you outlined and our record in them of P4 W1 L3 F1 A6 show that we have come up short By some considerable margin, do they not? As I said...it highlighted some weaknesses, but that is a good thing to expose them in preseason so it can be addressed. Better to find out now than being complacent after thrashing team after team in pre-season. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Turkish Posted 12 August, 2012 Share Posted 12 August, 2012 How does playing Wolves and Bristol give an indication of what it will be like against good Premier League sides? They are both in the Championship. Playing the Dutch Champions, Belgium Champions, 9th best team in France and 3rd best team in Italy are tests. They help Adkins work out how to play against Premier League sides and where he may need to strengthen. Excuse me? You said those results don't matter.However the other games are the tests. Yes, I did. You've even quoted me saying it! As I said...it highlighted some weaknesses, but that is a good thing to expose them in preseason so it can be addressed. Better to find out now than being complacent after thrashing team after team in pre-season. so our results in those "test" games show we are so way off. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matthew Le God Posted 12 August, 2012 Share Posted 12 August, 2012 Excuse me? You said those results don't matter.However the other games are the tests. Those two games didn't test Saints in the same way they were against Ajax, Anderlecht and Udinese. You've lost me as to your point? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Turkish Posted 12 August, 2012 Share Posted 12 August, 2012 Those two games didn't test Saints in the same way they were against Ajax, Anderlecht and Udinese. You've lost me as to your point? Because In post 18 you mentioned our win against Wolves and draw against Bristol City as a reason why we Haven't come up short in preseason. Yet you also say these results don't give an indication as to how we will do against Premier league sidesas they are in th championship. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SaintBobby Posted 12 August, 2012 Share Posted 12 August, 2012 I'm happy with the pre-season fixtures. Okay, Bristol City are a few grades below what we'll be facing this season (other than in Cups), but overall, the rest of the teams are a pretty fair representation of the sort of quality we'll be up against in the Premier League. Seems to me that the overall level of performance was just about satisfactory (except perhaps v. Udinese) - but results a tad disappointing (would look a lot better if we'd beaten Ajax, which we probably deserved to). I'd much prefer we played Ajax, Anderlecht, Arsenal etc, than Eastleigh, Bournemouth etc. In preparing for a Premiership season, I'd also prefer us to play at home more than away. The screw-ups have been two-fold: 1. Pricing was ridiculous - you can charge £15 for a one-off pre-season friendly, but if you have 4, surely drop it to £5. 2. We have tried out a system on the pitch which doesn't really seem to work. So, rather than us all coo-ing about how great a 4-2-3-1 looks, most people seem to think we're best suited to 4-4-2. Still, that's all part of the learning process, I suppose. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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