Nordic Saint

He was right. He really is an ITKer, This was announced just after 3pm: https://www.bigissue.com/news/big-issue-vendors-seal-transfer-southampton-fc/

They are our big new signings! Now, all we need to know is what colour paint they've chosen for the big stadium improvement and that's our January window nearly sorted. But, hang on..... right now, Les and Ralph are working very hard on recruiting an obese barman so they can announce a really big signing.The news of Gabbiadini's sale on deadline day will pale into insignificance after all that big news. Breaking news now: https://www.bigissue.com/news/big-issue-vendors-seal-transfer-southampton-fc/

Shane Long reminds me of John Sydenham. He is fast, runs in a straight line and scores a goal about every 10 games. Long would probably have made a decent left winger back in the 60s and 70s but playing him as a central striker is a bit like playing Sydenham as an old-style centre-forward would have been. Fraser Forster reminds me of Campbell Forsyth, a big, imposing looking goalkeeper but not especially quick or agile.

That is the problem. He needs a fullback to cover for him, whereas in the modern game a wing-back is expected to both defend and attack..

A lot of players can't cope with the modern role of the wing-back. Targett is a younger version of Danny Fox. He's OK at the attacking part of the role but a bit of a defensive liability as he can't tackle and is easily beaten by a fast forward.

Good performance. Feeling much more optimistic after that. It was interesting to see the players' reactions to Pellegrino's instructions in the 2nd half. Basically, they ignored them and one or two of them made a point of ignoring them. I don't know how that's going to pan out for the remainder of the season but it certainly worked today. We still need a goal scoring striker and a tall, dominant central defender.

Off the top of my head, Blackburn, Bolton, Fulham for a start and Leicester won it. Now off you pop. The small-minded, defeatist fans like you who play the "we're just ever so 'umble little Southampton, we can't hope to compete with other clubs and should be grateful for any crumbs that are dropped down to us" card are pathetic.

Even though CB Fry tries to turn a blind eye to it, the truth is out there: 2015/16 63 pts 2016/17 46 pts 2017/18 32-38 pts ?? As for his "those huge peaks we hit after January 2014" that is total ********. Most clubs our size and many smaller ones have hit much higher peaks than that. Finishing runners-up in a League Cup Final should be considered far from a 'huge peak' for a club of our size. Teams that have done that include Bradford, Cardiff, Sunderland, Wigan, Bolton, Birmingham and Tranmere. Swansea, Birmingham, Middlesbrough and Blackburn also won League Cups. In recent years, Wigan, Hull, Cardiff, Palace and Stoke have also been in FA Cup Finals and Wigan won theirs. Even little Pompey were in 2 FA Cup Finals in 3 years and won one of them. Just about every club in the top 2 divisions and even some in the third division have qualified for Europe and most performed better than we did. Fulham and Middlesbrough reached European finals. So, our 'huge peak' wasn't even as good as Wigan's, Swansea's, Blackburn's, Fulham's or Middlesbrough's and we have a much bigger fansbase and get bigger crowds than all of them. We have the 12th biggest average home gates in the country this century, in spite of our limited capacity, and social media figures indicate we have one of the 10 biggest fanbases. So top 8 finishes and losing a League Cup Final are hardly a massive overachievement. For our size, in terms of trophies won, we are historically, just about the most underachieving team in history and it looks lke we are underachieving again and still haven't won anything. How many clubs have spent more than 80 years in the top 2 divisions and never won one of them even once? Even Reading beat us to a trophy. A club of our size should have won at least 4 or 5 major tropies by now. If we'd had a 'huge peak' as good as Swansea's, for example, relegation wouldn't be quite so hard to take.

The problem is Dangermouth, as it was with the sacking of Puel, is that there is every chance Les Reed will appoint someone worse. So we'll be out of the frying pan into the fire. We wanted rid of Eric Black as first team coach and now we've got Kelvin Davis, one of the worst goalkeepers in the history of the Premier League, with no previous coaching experience, in charge of coaching, assisted by ex-Barnsley goalkeeper, Dave Watson, neither one of them with any previous experience of coaching outfield players, and not even very good at coaching goalkeeepers.

I assume you must be one as 'Sack the board' is one of the oldest chants in the game, going back more than 60 years. Fan protests agianst failing directors have been going on as long as there has been professional football, the same as the sacking of amangers.

There is really no point in sacking Pellegrino if Les Reed is going to be appointing the next manager, as each one he appoints is worse than the previous one. We need our 'Black Box' Paul Mitchell back to find the next Pochettino. Les Reed and Ross Wilson will just bring in a worse version of Pellegrino. 2015/16 63 pts 2016/17 46 pts 2017/18 33-38 pts ?? There has been a clear decline since May 2016 so you certainly can't blame it all on Pellegrino or the Gaos. Kat, Les and Ralph have been in control for all of that period. I get the impression that Kat just lets Les get on with it, as long as he makes her money, and that, in effect, Ralph's position is not mch more than an honorary president, who just seems to be brought over to make a PR statement every few months, and he isn't even very good at that. So, Les Reed must be largely responsible for our decline. Polls show the majority of fans agree he has failed badly over the last 2 years and that, after reaching 65 last year, he should have retired and let someone younger take over. I think he is doing more harm than good by hanging on. My preferred choice to replace him would be Paul Mitchell.. There is no need for A4 paper. A simple chant of Les Reed Out at the end of each defeat will suffice.

That's nothing special for Newcastle, or most other regular top flight clubs for that matter, which have nearly all had spells like that. Newcastle finished 4th, 3rd and 5th from 2002 to 2004 and 5th as recently as 2012, under Mike Ashley, and have had 10 European campaigns in the last 20 years, including the Europa League with Ashley. It doesn't stop their fans protesting when they underachieve and know that the people running the club are no longer doing a good job. Their fans are passionate about their club and don't like to see it failing.

I think he will because, unlike Walcott, nobody else wants him.

I'm not ITK but I have a hunch they'll announce the signing of Carrillo just before the Spurs game to head off planned protests, which they'll be aware of because they do monitor these messagboards.

They know they'll have to bring in someone to appease the fans or they'll face serious unrest. So, I think they'll bring in the cheapest stiker they can get with a realistic chance of scoring 1 or 2 goals more than Shane Long, which will be Carrillo, and then whoever they can get on loan for the rest of the season, with an outside chance of another dirst cheap player like Bednarek on deadline day, probably someone with a poor injury record keeping his price down. That's the minimum they can get away with and not have mass 'sack the board' protests for the rest of the season.

(1) How on earth did you manage to wreck our Academy? It looked foolproof. Now, judging from results we have one of the worst academies in the top two divisions. (2) Why did you replace successful managers and coaches with much worse ones? (3) Why didn't you retire on your 65th birthday last year and let someone younger take over? (4) Why do you think an online poll voted you "The worst manager in the history of the Premier League?" (5) Why did the FA sack you?

Gao sacks him and we get our 'Black Box' back - Paul Mitchell.

Knocked out of the FA Youth Cup 2-4 on penalties to a category 3 U18 team. Les Reed now seems to have effectively degraded the club at every level from top to bottom with poor recruitment, especially of managers and coaches but also players, whilst getting rid of anyone who was doing a good job.

We have a few quality players left but the problem is the spine of the team is weak. Goalkeeper - central defence - central midfield - central striker, and those positions are the crucial ones. If you've got nobody up front who can score goals and nobody at the back who can stop them, it doesn't matter if you have classy wing-backs.

Our defence is a shambles. Gardos and Targett aren't even good enough for U23 division 2 level. The one bright spot is Sam McQueen who looks good enough for Les Reed to sell to Liverpool one day. The U23s have now lost 2-4 to Wolves and 1-4 to Villa in successive games. Jaidi's vague instruction, shouted from the sideline, "Do something," just about sums up how poor the coaching is at the club nowadays.

#LesReed Out. Why punish the monkey when the real villain of the piece is the organ grinder? If he's left to it, he'll just get another monkey. The root cause of our problems has to be addressed.

We're not going to get him now, as Wolves will be in the Premier League next season, but I think we could get Javier Calleja. We can certainly offer much higher wages than Villarreal can.

BBC Sport: "'Clear handball from Doucoure' Watford 2-2 Southampton Kevin Kilbane Former Republic of Ireland winger on Final Score I think Doucoure has been one of the best players in the Premier League this year - but that is clear handball. He's got his hand up by his head - it's as clear a handball as you're ever likely to see - it's a disgrace, an absolute disgrace. Southampton desperately needed this win, and the officials have robbed them, it's really poor." And I bet at the end of the season those 2 points lost are the ones which see us relegated and Watford stay up.

We could have done without the half-time talk from the manager. You knew he was going to tell them to sit back and try to hang on to the lead.

2015/16 63 pts 2016/17 46 pts 2017/18 39 pts ??only if we can improve and perform as well as we did last season. With a decline as sharp as this one, you'd expect us to follow Sunderland's path downwards next season unless there are major changes in the way the club is being run. In any other business, the people responsible would have been fired by now.