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Saints 3-2 Stoke - Match Thread


Lighthouse
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2 minutes ago, Pamplemousse said:

Performances have been better than that though, but yes if we don't win soon then he'll have to go. 

To be pedantic performances in parts of games have been better, quite good tbf BUT we dont sustain it and even if we do along comes the 60th minute and those subs that weaken and knock the life out of the team.  

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10 hours ago, macca155 said:

They may have won but hardly a positive vibe.

Some of the football in the 1st half was excellent, but like every other game the opposition work Saints out. Martin has to be more dynamic in his tactics.

Bendarek, Aribo, THB, Fernandes, Armstrong,  and to his credit Sulemana equipped themselves well.

The rest just put us under even more pressure than usual.

What the hell was he doing taking off Bendarek and replacing him with SAA. If ever there was a moment for Stephens.

Cornett killed every attack as he simply can't beat his man. Diaz well why just why. Les really struggled, he's only young but he isn't ready for this level of football yet.

It just feels like he needs to give them a game.

Walking football again, it just doesn't work. Stoke missed three chances in the 2nd half. The other 19 Prem teams won't miss those.

Saints will be the one everyone wants in the draw tomorrow.

 

Good post, agree with alot of this, good first half again but second half we just went quiet (worrying for the Everton game), sideways passing with no intent, Aribo good first half but didnt see him in the second, as for Cornet what a load of crap, i thought Sulemana was bad but at least he wanted to attack his player. One thing we didnt do was shoot and when we finally did we scored. Had enough of the manager, i think someone else needs to come in and have new ideas and make us a side that aleast has a go.

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11 hours ago, Lighthouse said:

Strange. Half an hour ago when I said we were playing well, everyone was laughing at me and saying the score was the only stat that mattered. Now we’ve won, suddenly it’s, "yeah but apart from the score, what was good about it?"

TBH I don’t know what the datum is for Saints any more, but I’ll take winning a cup tie and scoring three goals any season.

Try looking at the bigger picture - that performance was in no way shape or form acceptable and this is what people are calling out. If you can't or choose not to see that then you probably need to take off the red and white tinted glasses, watch games closer and observe the multitude of mistakes we make and appraise accordingly. I accept that this is not in your remit and you'll continue to seek crumbs of comfort but you're only fooling yourself.

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Last night was a nearly complete Russell Martin performance. Dominated possession without creating much. Surrendered a lead and were lucky not to lose. Looked fragile when our opponents upped their intensity. Didn't mark the edge of the box for corners. Scraped by a mid table championship side. Just.

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6 hours ago, LoyalSaintSO50 said:

Quarter finals it is you moaning bastards. Who do we want next? 

It's not who do we want next it's what do we want next and the answer is a new manager who understands football.

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Come on SR and do the obvious thing.

When you are at home and barely scrape past a struggling championship team who are not even trying surely you must realise that he needs to be removed.

Presumably you'd like to maintain the £200m or so that comes with being a prem team?

Or are you as out of your depth as he is?

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17 minutes ago, Cabrone said:

Come on SR and do the obvious thing.

When you are at home and barely scrape past a struggling championship team who are not even trying surely you must realise that he needs to be removed.

Presumably you'd like to maintain the £200m or so that comes with being a prem team?

Or are you as out of your depth as he is?

Yes. They are.

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8 hours ago, LoyalSaintSO50 said:

Quarter finals it is you moaning bastards. Who do we want next? 

Well given its gonna a PL side, I'm not sure it matters. We're not beating them. 

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That was utterly abysmal last night. So sick of this style of football. It’s not clever and it will get us relegated. We must get a new manager in now and revert to tactics employed for a century or more. So tedious to watch. Slow, boring, easily worked out. And so susceptible to match losing mistakes over 90 minutes every single game. Got away with it in the Champ. Hate this team right now. 

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In the summer, in dire need of an attacking boost, we signed a striker who last night managed to muster up 6 (SIX) touches of the ball in over an hour against a lower end Championship team. Yet people think a change of manager will solve our problems…

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4 minutes ago, saintwbu said:

In the summer, in dire need of an attacking boost, we signed a striker who last night managed to muster up 6 (SIX) touches of the ball in over an hour against a lower end Championship team. Yet people think a change of manager will solve our problems…

It was I think 3 in the first half. Despite massive amounts of possession, it reflected how few passes actually reached probably our best finisher.

Archer saw at least a few times that he had taken up positions to receive the ball. One was when AA went for goal himself.

We were getting more room with AA, as Stoke kept it more compact in the middle.

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24 minutes ago, saintwbu said:

In the summer, in dire need of an attacking boost, we signed a striker who last night managed to muster up 6 (SIX) touches of the ball in over an hour against a lower end Championship team. Yet people think a change of manager will solve our problems…

Nothing to do with tactics of management then? If you had watched him you would have seen multiple runs beyond but every time the ball got played back to full backs or centre halves. 
We could have Haaland up front but until we stop this ridiculous tactic nothing will change.

I thought just maybe last night would have seen BBD in middle to hold and link it as an outlet but again wasted wide

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That was total unadultrated garbage. I've seen quicker walking football. If that is what Martin is presenting as football he's just a con merchant. We scored three goals but nothing from the 78% possession, a corner, A centreback dispossessed for the penalty and a long shot after a winger went up the left wing and passed to Bree. That was a total of two passes. 

I've had it with Martin. He has no clue what he's doing. Imposing a passing obsession straitjacket that fails in attack and makes us porous at the back. Forward players make runs, get into the penalty area but the ball never comes instead it's being recycled backwards and sideways.

The players are better than this nonsense. The organisation is non existent. Positioning defensively is haphazard. Nobody is marked, the edge of the area at corners has been abandoned, Ipswich, Leicester for example, again last night more of the same.

This possession obsession experiment is ruining the football club. If we are going to have any chance of a revival he has to go. At our level we need a high tempo. pressing and breaking team not a bunch of strollers rotating the ball with meaningless possession. 

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Agree with a lot of your comments Derry. It is very hard for forward players to keep making runs if the ball never comes to them. ( eg Gabbiadini under late stage Puel, Pellegrino and Hughes )

Les was bad again last night. It was a hospital pass to him for the 2nd goal, so why try to control it under preasure ? Why did he only jog back when he lost it, and why was our only defensive midfield player so far up the pitch in the first place ? 

It was interesting to see Tall Paul on with two wingers, but we obviouslly  had spend no time in training practicing crossess to him ! 

Some of the summer recruitment has been shocking. I can only hope that Les can go back to Chelsea, and the Charles can come back from Wednesday.  It would be nice if the Blades want Diaz on loan as well. 

 

 

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27 minutes ago, redkeith said:

Agree with a lot of your comments Derry. It is very hard for forward players to keep making runs if the ball never comes to them. ( eg Gabbiadini under late stage Puel, Pellegrino and Hughes )

Les was bad again last night. It was a hospital pass to him for the 2nd goal, so why try to control it under preasure ? Why did he only jog back when he lost it, and why was our only defensive midfield player so far up the pitch in the first place ? 

It was interesting to see Tall Paul on with two wingers, but we obviouslly  had spend no time in training practicing crossess to him ! 

Some of the summer recruitment has been shocking. I can only hope that Les can go back to Chelsea, and the Charles can come back from Wednesday.  It would be nice if the Blades want Diaz on loan as well. 

 

 

BBD hasn't fitted in. I think we just aren't using him correctly as his record says he can score goals. Whether he can in the Premier League is still open. Personally I see him as one of a pair of strikers not a winger. If we want a winger then play one. Play a combination of Archer, Armstrong, Onuachu. BBD up front as required. 

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I actually thought big Les had an ok game with some nice touches and turns with the ball.  He gets compressed high up in midfield because we recycle the ball along the CB’s so much and it’s very easy for a loose pass to be pressed resulting in lost possession. Our two CM’s should be feeding the forwards breaking lines, but they don’t … it’s all recycle, recycle, then get it out to the wings.

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9 minutes ago, Saint Fan CaM said:

I actually thought big Les had an ok game with some nice touches and turns with the ball.  He gets compressed high up in midfield because we recycle the ball along the CB’s so much and it’s very easy for a loose pass to be pressed resulting in lost possession. Our two CM’s should be feeding the forwards breaking lines, but they don’t … it’s all recycle, recycle, then get it out to the wings.

I didn’t think he was as bad as some have posted either. A player not trusted by the manager to come on in previous games all of a sudden is put in midfield on his own.

Aribo and Fernandes spent most of the game wide leaving just Big Les in middle against 2 or 3 Stoke players and he got swamped.

He won several good headers, his passing could be better but his job is to just pass back and sideways so no wonder we looked vulnerable when he lost it giving free run at us.

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3 hours ago, Give it to Ron said:

Nothing to do with tactics of management then? If you had watched him you would have seen multiple runs beyond but every time the ball got played back to full backs or centre halves. 
We could have Haaland up front but until we stop this ridiculous tactic nothing will change.

I thought just maybe last night would have seen BBD in middle to hold and link it as an outlet but again wasted wide

Exactly right… we pass it up to one side / winger… to shuffle it back the the CM then the CBs, to then shuffle it up the other side

only the odd CB pinging the ball over the top is the variation.

fucking awful football 

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8 hours ago, coalman said:

Last night was a nearly complete Russell Martin performance. Dominated possession without creating much. Surrendered a lead and were lucky not to lose. Looked fragile when our opponents upped their intensity. Didn't mark the edge of the box for corners. Scraped by a mid table championship side. Just.

That's what I thought, textbook, felt like last season.  Mid table championship Russ's comfort zone I suppose.

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6 hours ago, derry said:

That was total unadultrated garbage. I've seen quicker walking football. If that is what Martin is presenting as football he's just a con merchant. We scored three goals but nothing from the 78% possession, a corner, A centreback dispossessed for the penalty and a long shot after a winger went up the left wing and passed to Bree. That was a total of two passes. 

I've had it with Martin. He has no clue what he's doing. Imposing a passing obsession straitjacket that fails in attack and makes us porous at the back. Forward players make runs, get into the penalty area but the ball never comes instead it's being recycled backwards and sideways.

The players are better than this nonsense. The organisation is non existent. Positioning defensively is haphazard. Nobody is marked, the edge of the area at corners has been abandoned, Ipswich, Leicester for example, again last night more of the same.

This possession obsession experiment is ruining the football club. If we are going to have any chance of a revival he has to go. At our level we need a high tempo. pressing and breaking team not a bunch of strollers rotating the ball with meaningless possession. 

And the longer we persist with this the harder it will be to change.

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8 hours ago, DT said:

That was utterly abysmal last night. So sick of this style of football. It’s not clever and it will get us relegated. We must get a new manager in now and revert to tactics employed for a century or more. So tedious to watch. Slow, boring, easily worked out. And so susceptible to match losing mistakes over 90 minutes every single game. Got away with it in the Champ. Hate this team right now. 

Agree with all this except the last sentence. I genuinely think there is talent in the squad and that they really care. They're just having the life taken out of them by the manager's bonkers tactics.

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4 hours ago, Give it to Ron said:

I didn’t think he was as bad as some have posted either. A player not trusted by the manager to come on in previous games all of a sudden is put in midfield on his own.

Aribo and Fernandes spent most of the game wide leaving just Big Les in middle against 2 or 3 Stoke players and he got swamped.

He won several good headers, his passing could be better but his job is to just pass back and sideways so no wonder we looked vulnerable when he lost it giving free run at us.

he lost it because bednerak gave him a hospital pass,that aside he has the speed and turning circle of an oil tanker

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10 hours ago, saintant said:

Yeah, wonder when the penny will finally drop for RM.

If only there were some statistic he could use to aggregate how much of a problem it is... maybe goals conceded? 19 in 9 games PL only, or 25 in 12 if you include the EFL Cup. It's getting beyond ridiculous.

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21 hours ago, derry said:

This possession obsession experiment is ruining the football club. If we are going to have any chance of a revival he has to go. At our level we need a high tempo. pressing and breaking team not a bunch of strollers rotating the ball with meaningless possession. 

Beautifully put. Completely ignores the total incompetent team we became last team we did all that in this league and how the possession based obsession got us back to this league of course but hear bloody hear! 

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23 minutes ago, Fabrice29 said:

Beautifully put. Completely ignores the total incompetent team we became last team we did all that in this league and how the possession based obsession got us back to this league of course but hear bloody hear! 

We squeaked back up. It was obvious to most that the style of football which was relatively successful in he championship would be disastrous in the premier league. We thought he'd seen the light when he had a style change enforced on him by bringing McCarthy in, but alas, no, the  RM dogma continues to the detriment of results and performance.

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18 hours ago, AlexLaw76 said:

A Nathan Jones signing has inspired our only wins this season

 

And wait for Tall Paul to propel us up the table to safety.
 

Perhaps history will be kinder to Nathan on reflection 

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2 hours ago, Fabrice29 said:

Beautifully put. Completely ignores the total incompetent team we became last team we did all that in this league and how the possession based obsession got us back to this league of course but hear bloody hear! 

I sometimes suspect that you really believe that.

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4 minutes ago, Badger said:

And wait for Tall Paul to propel us up the table to safety.
 

Perhaps history will be kinder to Nathan on reflection 

I doubt we'll see the best of either of them in RM's system. Not to mention the bit parts they've had as opportunities. Both decent purchases though.

Nathan was out of his depth. Perhaps time away finding out the training and development plans of elite clubs, then applying those to his approach on a club our size would have worked. He said he was data driven, so then he could have seen the improvements across the squad.

Even then, I remember Stu coming on, and having to turn and ask what was expected of him in a game that had already seen a few system changes.

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6 hours ago, Toussaint said:

We squeaked back up. It was obvious to most that the style of football which was relatively successful in he championship would be disastrous in the premier league. We thought he'd seen the light when he had a style change enforced on him by bringing McCarthy in, but alas, no, the  RM dogma continues to the detriment of results and performance.

I think this is a pretty fair assesment. I actually don't mind posession based styles, but the way we do it is very risk vs reward. If the risk was worth it last year, it is nowhere near that now. What are we creating/gaining by playing high risk passes in the prem? Next to nothing. We are too slow, and not good enough on (and off) the ball to create chances this way. It only kinda works in a defensive way when successful this season, as it keeps the other team off the ball... so pretty pointless, really.

I also thought Martin would be more pragmatic and less rigid. I did however fear the worst when he was asked in pre-season how it would be to come up against better players and managers/tactics in the prem, and he agreed that it would be better players, but did not think it would be better managers and tactics than in the Championship. No wonder he is struggeling to figure this out.

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15 hours ago, bugenhagen said:

I think this is a pretty fair assesment. I actually don't mind posession based styles, but the way we do it is very risk vs reward. If the risk was worth it last year, it is nowhere near that now. What are we creating/gaining by playing high risk passes in the prem? Next to nothing. We are too slow, and not good enough on (and off) the ball to create chances this way. It only kinda works in a defensive way when successful this season, as it keeps the other team off the ball... so pretty pointless, really.

I also thought Martin would be more pragmatic and less rigid. I did however fear the worst when he was asked in pre-season how it would be to come up against better players and managers/tactics in the prem, and he agreed that it would be better players, but did not think it would be better managers and tactics than in the Championship. No wonder he is struggling to figure this out.

I don't think he's trying to figure anything out. It's possession as an end result not tactics. The fact of the matter is neither do our opponents. We are so obsessed by this myth that we are totally predictable. The gift that keeps giving to the opposition.

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