Nordic Saint

We are a bogey team for Pompey (W19 D10 L9), in what is statistically the most one-sided of all the major derby games in England, Brighton (W23 D13 L8), Bournemouth (W13 D8 L7) and Palace (W42 D16 L28). We have a winning record against about half of the teams currently in the Premier League as well as the vast majority of teams outside of it. Until they moved to the Etihad, we had a winning record v Man City but they have just edged ahead. Our poor overall records v Everton (W29 D23 L48), Leeds (W27 D20 L45) and Spurs (W37 D30 L55) are still better than our record v Arsenal (W21 D26 L49). So, in terms of results, it's Arsenal, although not so much recently.

These things change. Right up until the early 90s, we were known as Liverpool's bogey team. We have played far more games against Spurs than any other team and so we have an exceptionally high number of both victories and defeats against them. In recent decades they have 'owned' us and have become our current bogey team but hopefully Ralph will change that. Conversely, Arsenal used to be our bogey team but we have become a bit of a bogey team for them in recent years. Overall, apart from the obvious teams, i.e. the ones that every team has a bad record against, like Liverpool and Man United, I agree with ericb and Green: Everton are considered to be our traditional bogey team. We have still beaten them 29 times though (not 5, eric). Contrast that with Pompey's recent record v Liverpool and Arsenal:

How exactly do you know he was doing this? Were you there? Did you see it? None of the TV cameras or reporters who were there saw anything like it and if they had, you can be sure, they'd be highlighting it. Hopefully, Austin doesn't read this forum because if he does he may have a case for taking legal action for libel against you. I don't know which club you support but stop trying to bring shame to our club by spreading rumours like this.

Although he'd been OK for Liverpool, he never kept a single clean sheet for us until the bribery scandal finally hit the headlines on the back pages of the tabloids. Then the very next game, at home v Arsenal in November, with Saints fans holding up 'Bruce is Innocent' banners and cheering him like he was a hero, he 'miraculously' kept his first Saints clean sheet and then kept another one in the following game at Palace. It was about the only time he deigned to show his Liverpool form for us. As for that FA Cup collapse v Spurs, it's a hard one to forget and ranks along with the nightmare at Tranmere as one of the worst memories for us Saints fans who were there. Another one I wish I hadn't been at was the 7-2 loss at White Hart Lane in 2000. The 6-1 defeat there in 1968, didn't seem so bad, as at the end of it we scored the final goal of the game and all sang, 'We're only warming up.' The 5-3 defeat there the season before was even better, as 10,000 of us completely took over the Park Lane End and sang ourselves hoarse for 90 minutes so took some pride from the fact that off the pitch we had taken over at White Hart Lane

He seems to be going through a similar transformation to Raheem Sterling, from being a player with obvious skill but little end product to becoming a really dangerous forward and a game winner.

You do wonder where we might have finished if Ralph had been our manager from the start of the season. There is still an FA Cup up for grabs.

Two great wins. Now let's win the next two as well. Redmond for England.

Those stats certainly indicate that Austin contributes a hell of a lot more. He is ahead in every category apart from passing the ball backwards. Anyway, rumours abound that the decision has already been made and that Gabbiadini is going to be sold. I have total faith in our manager to make the right decision and to use the money wisely to strengthen the squad.

Objects getting thrown at players is not good but one problem with this particular incident is that the plastic bottle hit Alli on the back of his head. He then put his hand to a spot on the left side of his head, which was untouched, and continued to rub that spot as if it was painful so it was reminiscent of the cheating players do when they feign injury to try to get another player sent off. A bottle being thrown at a player is bad enough in itself so an honest reaction would have been better.

He also scored the goal which got them a draw in the league this season at Fratton Park. If that is what ultimately stops Pompey getting promoted, that's another feather in his cap.

Not world class but he is certainly an underrated manager, who is particularly good at motivating underdogs in cup matches. He's done a fantastic job in his 14 years at Burton Albion, taking them up from the Northern Premier League all the way to a League Cup semi-final. Remember when he knocked us out of the League Cup to take Sheffield United through to the semi-finals? And he also took them through to the FA Cup semi-finals. Good luck to Burton in the semi-final. It would be great to see them reach the final.

It seems that everybody associated with the club is upping their game. Hesketh is a skilful player, whose progress stalled a bit over the last couple of years under the old regime but it would be great to see him back here, playing for our new manager.

The chorus of this song has to be one of the best in years for a football anthem. Our Ralph! Our Ralph! Hasenhüttl He's the best manager in the land

Sheer class today. I'd never really considered him to be a top class Premier League forward but it looks like he is finally maturing into just that. He is still only 24 and has the potential to get even better. Let's hope the injury is not too serious.

He is a top class goal scorer. Ings and Redmond really caused problems for Arsenal today. Redmond obviously had to go off injured but I was surprised Ings was subbed because, although he took a knock too, he still looked full of running. But, Ralph knew what he was doing as Long and Austin came on and conjured up the winner. Every player just looked so much better than they've looked all season. Ings was good when he first arrived but today he looked even better than Arsenal's £60 million striker, Aubameyang.

Simply brilliant: our best performance for years. What a miracle Hasenhüttl has worked already! St Mary's hasn't felt that good since May 2016, and the indications are Hasenhüttl could be even better than Koeman.

I can't see him lasting the season. He's never going to be a popular manager and, in spite of the good players they've got, they are beginning to look like they might just get dragged into the relegation battle.

Not forgetting Charlie George. Once you hear the words 'knee problems' associated with a player, it never ends well. On balance, though, perhaps it is better to have them here scoring goals for a few games than some waste of space, who never scores, playing every week. The alternative is to have a scouting and recruitment team and/or manager good enough to spot up and coming players from lower leagues both here and abroad, like Lambert and Mane.

Yes, he is the best goal scorer we've got, even if he is going to miss a lot of games through injury. The reason we got our only proven goal scorers, Austin and Ings, was because they were injury-prone. If they hadn't been, we couldn't have afforded them and other clubs would have wanted them so they wouldn't have come here anyway. It means in both cases though, as we are already discovering with Austin, that their careers are not going to last as long as those of less injury-prone players

The problem is the few good players left have to work with the dross around them. They still try but football is a team game. Unfortunately our fans tend to turn against the wrong players, the best ones, and accuse them of sulking and not trying. This negativity got further fuelled by PR 'leaks' from the club about the players they wanted to sell. It happened to Mane, Wanyama, van Dijk, Fonte and Tadic and now it's happening to Bertrand.

The club's intention was always to cash in on van Dijk, the same as all of our saleable commodities, and he knew it. The only reason the sale was delayed was because Gao wouldn't pay Kat the money for the club if she sold any more players before he took over. Meanwhile the fans were fed the usual Les Reed PR spin on it all, about how we were standing up to Liverpool and didn't want to sell him and many seemed to fall for it.

We have won 1 game out of 16. We have only won 1 home game in the last year. We have 22 games left. So, on current form, you'd expect 1 or 2 more wins. A big improvement might give us 4 or 5. It would be a massive turnaround if we managed to win 8. Under Puel, when we finished 8th, we won 7 of or last 22 games. We all believe we have the right manager for the task but the question is do we have the right players? Winning the first of those games on Sunday would show that we do.

Well, at least he's improving. He didn't score any last season. If he keeps improving at this rate, he could eventually become as prolific a goal scorer as Shane Long.

Well, that's good. The players and referee would notice you shouting and singing a lot more if you were in the middle of the Northam end, where there is currently just an empty block used for fan segregation, and the away fans would be heard less if they and the empty block were shifted over to the Itchen/Northam corner. The acoustics in the corners are the worst in the ground as the sound get directed inwards, not outwards, and is muffled.

The problem is that the home fans in the Northam/Kingsland corner won't move because they think that by being there they are having 'bantz' with the away fans in the Northam, even though there is an empty block and sometimes even two next to them and 90% of the away fans don't even notice they are there. As you say, they'd get noticed a lot more if they were in the designated home end, the Chapel, and the away fans could actually see them and hear them but because of inertia they won't move there. That is why the players have taken the initiative and asked if the away fans could be moved as they would like our most home vocal fans to be behind the goal in the Northam, where they and the referee could see them and hear them more. Anyway, it would support the players' initiative if we had a poll on here which showed that the majority of our fans are in agreement with them. So, based on the club's remit, a simple poll with 2 choices, move the away fans into a corner or leave them where they are, would be the best way to canvas opinion and very helpful for our club. Is it at all possible for anyone on here to organise that? At this stage, we really don’t need to worry about the minutiae of moving a partition in the concourse, how many yards away fans have to walk to their coaches or who sits in particular corporate boxes. The club will obviously deal with that later and anyway, in terms of obstacles to progress, they don’t seem to be particularly insuperable ones.