Wolves (a) Saturday 3pm

[Toadhall Saint]

Draw at best

[Pamplemousse]

Hopefully with a win and clean sheet under our belts, we'll have a bit more confidence.

We have lost every away game and put in some stinkers but reckon we'll be OK. Entertaining score draw.

[Mr X]

wolves are a far better team than their league position suggests.  Fail to win this as I suspect we will and we are as good as down in my opinion as we need a minimum ten wins to have a chance of staying in this league. 

Of course it was good to get our first win against Everton but anyone who thinks we played well is seriously kidding themselves a combination of world class saves from Ramsgate and a narrow var decision got us the points, sometimes you have to win ugly though, the goal we scored was also the polar opposite of how Martin believes we should play!

[Pamplemousse]

22 hours ago, Football Special said:

I knew our record v Wolves was bad recently but it's even worse than I realised, bogey team that even managed to beat us with 10 men against Nathan Jones side 

Some opposition thoughts 

https://www.wolvesforum.co.uk/threads/southampton-h-9-11-build-up-match-thread.38659/

Interesting about the keeper situation, their keeper Sa can't play out from the back (echos of McCarthy) and they don't rate Johnstone at all. Looks like we dodged a bullet on that one, thank fuck we managed to get Ramsdale.

Ramsdale is a West Brom fan so he'll be up for this one

[Mr X]

This for me cements the fact that Martin is here long term wether we get relegated or not which of course is good for stability but I'm not convinced he will ever be ready for the premier league and will there be good will towards him for another championship season? https://www.bbc.com/sport/football/articles/cp3n4ywwg14o

[Football Special]

On 04/11/2024 at 19:33, LGTL said:

7.15am train was cancelled so very much looking forward to the 6.15 🥲 into Birmingham in time for Breakfast ffs.

Bit of a naff away day, albeit it’s a cracking old ground with a bit of atmosphere. Our record is shite and Wolves haven’t won a game so we all know how it ends, unfortunately. 

Fair play to you chaps, would have been me few years ago but I'd opt for the 08.15 now, split ticket works well on that line, early start , still one of the joys of an away day boarding a train at breakfast time seeing the look on normal passengers faces when you casually crack open a can of ale. 

[notnowcato]

13 hours ago, Mr X said:

 the goal we scored was also the polar opposite of how Martin believes we should play!

You mean by securing the ball on the edge of our box, allowing Fernandes to break into their half, having gained control 40 yards out he turns back, plays the ball back into our half to our defenders, who eventually switch the play to find Suga wide right who passes into AA for a first time finish…. what part of that is not how we’ve been trying to play for the past 16 months??!!

I’m sure I heard somewhere that it was 40 seconds from the ball hitting our bar to being in the back of the Everton net. That’s not some lightning counter attack or huge hoof ball into the box which may be seen as “the antithesis of what Russball is all about…” or some other nonsense that you see on here.

 

Edited 18 hours ago by notnowcato

[LiberalCommunist]

 Wolves are not a bad team. But their desperation to win this fixture might well work in our favour. If we can show a little composure and get the first goal. Then their home support might well make this even more difficult for them. I’m not brave enough to predict the win. But I reckon we will make this difficult for them.

[Zorba]

1 hour ago, notnowcato said:

You mean by securing the ball on the edge of our box, allowing Fernandes to break into their half, having gained control 40 yards out he turns back, plays the ball back into our half to our defenders, who eventually switch the play to find Suga wide right who passes into AA for a first time finish…. what part of that is not how we’ve been trying to play for the past 16 months??!!

I’m sure I heard somewhere that it was 40 seconds from the ball hitting our bar to being in the back of the Everton net. That’s not some lightning counter attack or huge hoof ball into the box which may be seen as “the antithesis of what Russball is all about…” or some other nonsense that you see on here.

 

It all starts from awful defending from the set piece.. again, and should definitely have been finished off by Tarkovsky or Beto. That would have been game over but we got lucky, thankfully.

Initially it looks like an excellent, quick counter attack. Something we don't see nearly enough of from this current team. But.. it's not. Fernandes stops the counter and puts his foot on the ball to pass backwards to Aribo. Aribo gives it back and Fernandes hits it square across the halfway line. I don't have a problem with this so far, we still have the ball, but at this point, we are all expecting aimless "recycling" around the back, then back to Ramsdale, so on an so forth, rinse and repeat. But for THB looking up and playing a great ball down the line to Suga, the goal doesn't happen. This is the type of ball we're crying out for every game.. not the over-passing/recycling we've come to expect from RM's "philosophy". Saints looked good on the attack here, we just don't get to see it enough. Let's hope we do at Wolves.

Scrappy 2-2

[SaintsBarry74]

On 04/11/2024 at 19:28, Midfield_General said:

The exact moment the penny finally dropped for me that he was never going to get any better. Watching it back, I think that's comfortably the worst miss I've ever seen at any level of football. So mind-meltingly bad that it almost defies the laws of physics. 

Let's enjoy it in full shall we.

0.48:

 

Signature Baz save attempt at 0:35.

[pimpin4rizeal]

         Ramsdale 

yuki   Thb stephens.  Kwp 

          Downwa 

       Aribo   Fernandes 

dibling.       Archer.  Armstrong 

strongest line up we can put out atm 

gets arma in whilst only losing manning .. slight personal preference for aribo  over lallana and jack over bednarek 

[notnowcato]

2 hours ago, Zorba said:

It all starts from awful defending from the set piece.. again, and should definitely have been finished off by Tarkovsky or Beto. That would have been game over but we got lucky, thankfully.

Initially it looks like an excellent, quick counter attack. Something we don't see nearly enough of from this current team. But.. it's not. Fernandes stops the counter and puts his foot on the ball to pass backwards to Aribo. Aribo gives it back and Fernandes hits it square across the halfway line. I don't have a problem with this so far, we still have the ball, but at this point, we are all expecting aimless "recycling" around the back, then back to Ramsdale, so on an so forth, rinse and repeat. But for THB looking up and playing a great ball down the line to Suga, the goal doesn't happen. This is the type of ball we're crying out for every game.. not the over-passing/recycling we've come to expect from RM's "philosophy". Saints looked good on the attack here, we just don't get to see it enough. Let's hope we do at Wolves.

Scrappy 2-2

How often is that ball or similar actually on for us to play?  No doubt it's more than we see happen but equally when we do try and force it we lose possession of the ball. We retain the ball when that type of ball to Suga is not on.   

Edited 14 hours ago by notnowcato

[Winnersaint]

4 hours ago, Zorba said:

It all starts from awful defending from the set piece.. again, and should definitely have been finished off by Tarkovsky or Beto. That would have been game over but we got lucky, thankfully.

Initially it looks like an excellent, quick counter attack. Something we don't see nearly enough of from this current team. But.. it's not. Fernandes stops the counter and puts his foot on the ball to pass backwards to Aribo. Aribo gives it back and Fernandes hits it square across the halfway line. I don't have a problem with this so far, we still have the ball, but at this point, we are all expecting aimless "recycling" around the back, then back to Ramsdale, so on an so forth, rinse and repeat. But for THB looking up and playing a great ball down the line to Suga, the goal doesn't happen. This is the type of ball we're crying out for every game.. not the over-passing/recycling we've come to expect from RM's "philosophy". Saints looked good on the attack here, we just don't get to see it enough. Let's hope we do at Wolves.

Scrappy 2-2

Carragher pointed out that Everton got out of shape with two players in the left back position who weren't left backs which allowed THB to play that pass in behind to Sugawara. From then on it was a combination of Ashley Young ball watching and Archer's great little run which took the defence goalwards and  created the space for Arma  to occupy. It was a pretty good goal actually. As far as the recycling is concerned I've heard in a number of interviews RM specifically complain that we don't find the final pass or move the ball quickly enough when we need to. So it's as much about individual player decision making as anything coached by RM and the coaching team. That decision making is influenced ability and mentality and that dictates why we seem to dick around with the ball so much as some players are simply not good enough to do it at this level. 

[Weston Super Saint]

6 hours ago, LiberalCommunist said:

 Wolves are not a bad team. But their desperation to win this fixture might well work in our favour. 

Unlike us who are ambivalent when it comes to those meaningless points things.

[coalman]

2 hours ago, Winnersaint said:

Carragher pointed out that Everton got out of shape with two players in the left back position who weren't left backs which allowed THB to play that pass in behind to Sugawara. From then on it was a combination of Ashley Young ball watching and Archer's great little run which took the defence goalwards and  created the space for Arma  to occupy. It was a pretty good goal actually. As far as the recycling is concerned I've heard in a number of interviews RM specifically complain that we don't find the final pass or move the ball quickly enough when we need to. So it's as much about individual player decision making as anything coached by RM and the coaching team. That decision making is influenced ability and mentality and that dictates why we seem to dick around with the ball so much as some players are simply not good enough to do it at this level. 

Curious to know why it's the players not being good enough rather than the manager failing to coach them properly? And if the players aren't good enough and the manager knows this then why is the manager trying to play that way?

[Football Special]

41 minutes ago, Weston Super Saint said:

Unlike us who are ambivalent when it comes to those meaningless points things.

Stop being greedy, we've had our win 

[OnceaSaintalwaysaSaint]

On 04/11/2024 at 18:28, Midfield_General said:

The exact moment the penny finally dropped for me that he was never going to get any better. Watching it back, I think that's comfortably the worst miss I've ever seen at any level of football. So mind-meltingly bad that it almost defies the laws of physics. 

Let's enjoy it in full shall we.

0.48:

 

Thanks Midfield-General. Remember being near the half way line that day and we were all convinced there must have been a foul somewhere. Only afterwards, did we realise how bad that miss was. Truly mind-numbing. In fact, it was season defining. We were doing relatively well up to that game and then it all fell apart.

Anyway, going this Saturday and looking forward to it. Difficult to get an away atmosphere going at the ground because we're all in a line but there's not going to be a better chance to beat this lot.

[Toussaint]

Saints win