The9

Pluto seems to be making a bit of a name for himself by being bothered by stuff no-one else cares about. I do hope he enjoyed his £15 Villa ticket, as last season he was so bothered by it being Cat A for the last home game.

Exactly that - plus Sunday, tv, weather, and a bunch of other part-timer excuses. The Cat A thing is a bit silly, frankly.

The problem with that Pelle offside was that Pelle went flat out when he was in enough space that he didn't have to. Left no room for even a slightly delayed pass or a linesman misjudgement. If he'd just dropped to 3/4 pace to stay onside and then gone flat out when the ball was played he'd have been ok. Usually I'd say "curve the run" but that wasn't possible in this situation as he was a couple of yards onside to begin with and wouldn't have got to the ball if he'd gone sideways. Impressive acceleration for a big man though (cos, y'know, Linford Christie wasn't tall or anything ).

It was Gaston.

I'm still hopeful they force a Tuesday for Sky, will save a bunch of faffing on Ticketmaster resale sites and a trip to Cardiff I don't need...

It's £42 cheapest ticket to watch a glorified Championship side who most Saints fans aren't particularly bothered by. We just about sold out against Villa last night charging £15 each! Tell the players it's vital, let the rest of us not be any more bothered than we are about beating the likes of Sunderland.

As for the schedulers, if they could not have the QF on the day I'm going to see Stereophonics (they will) and the SF 2nd leg on the wife's birthday (50/50 if we get there), that would be just great.

Exactly. Better to get them at home in the QF or the Final if you have to play them at all.

They play Premier League Man City (A) Sat 21 Nov 17:30 Europa League Bordeaux (H) Thu 26 Nov 20:05 Premier League Swansea (H) Sun 29 Nov 16:15 League Cup - QF Saints (A) Midweek (Tue 2 or Wed 3) Premier League Newcastle (A) Sun 6 Dec 16:00 Europa League FC Sion (A) Thu 10 Dec 18:00 Premier League West Brom (H) Sun 13 Dec 16:00 So almost certainly going to be the Wednesday, we're also the most tv-friendly game, assume Boro v Everton will be the other.

Practically the whole bloody competition used to be two legs at one point, it's an acknowledgement of that. Long and short of it is of course I'd like us to win it, but I'd be pretty happy with just getting to a final as an underdog too. A home draw against a top side NOW is more of a benefit than getting them in the semis when they'd have a home game to offset it, so basically: Best case scenario prior to QF draw: draw weakest team at home in QF, weakest remaining team in SF, someone else knocks out City/Liverpool/Everton before Final. Worse case: City/Liverpool away now, the other one in the SF. Becomes "best case" if we beat them both, but nothing like as likely. Ideally from this position: Liverpool home QF, anyone but Man City in SF, hope City lose before Final.

Ditto not including strength of opponents so far, etc.

Our relatively bad start compared to last season means we're not going to be hanging on to the top 4 coattails this season, and we'd need to go on a good run of wins to get ourselves into the top 6 discussion in the longer term. We're not as defensively strong as last season without Schneiderlin, but we look more likely to score. Unfortunately that won't get us as many points. Can't see us being higher than 7th or lower than 11th, so I'll go for 8th too. West Ham might stay above us, can't see Leicester doing so longer term, they need to create too many chances to score*. Then in the summer we can play the "why can't West Ham keep their players" game for a change. *not checked the stats...

That's one of the problems for those kind of sports, football impacts are more easily predicted, usually target the ball not the player, and as a result players can get up in the air to prevent the damage from twisting with full bodyweight through the joint at the point of impact (unless you're Jay Rodriguez which was an absolute fluke). In rugby, gridiron etc the tackles can come from anywhere, you're more likely to be at high speed as you're not slowed by controlling a ball at your feet, and they're allowed to directly hit you rather than attempting to take the ball away. Imagine how bad it would be with chop blocks legal.

I'd recommend the train, and don't underestimate that it's still a train to *Newport*. Though they do also run direct from Southampton.

Come on now, Lovren's head was definitely still with his Southampton-based hairdressers when she wished him goodbye in the May before he left, when none of the rest of us knew he was planning on leaving...

It is my interpretation, but by saying is "we know he has technical skill" he's implying there's a bunch of other stuff needed which he doesn't have.

Fight fight fight. Oh hang on... Erm, ok then.

Fair enough, like I said, haven't seen it back, was just aware that he was near the penalty spot and (theoretically) about to shoot.

He was probably ok at them before Italia '90 when he was knocking 40, but he was diabolical at them there.

The wife told me not to swear yesterday in the Northam as there was a kid a row in front. There's a different little kid 4 seats from us every single match and she's never mentioned it before. Weird. I just pointed at the Chapel and clarified that they should be in there anyway.

Quite pleased with the home draw against a team we can beat, preferable to having to play them twice in the semis - if we win it we've got a 2/3 chance of getting one of Boro/Everton/Stoke/Sheff Weds over two legs (and a tiny amount less than a 1/3 chance of getting Man City).

The segregation and size of the away support can have a big impact on number of empty seats too, certain configurations leave half a block of empty seats alongside the segregation in the Northam whether the away is sold out or not, and there are different mesh thicknesses too which cover different numbers of seats.

Partially due to more media seating as per Prem requirements, partially due to "other reconfigurations" during the summer, different segregation - and also last night because there were a pile of empty seats at the back of the Itchen for comps people/reserve players didn't take up and the boxes weren't full. I noticed there's now an area of seating set aside next to the tv cameras at the back of the Kingsland too. About another 20 seats Northam end, don't know if that's the same for all of the tv platforms. At Notts County the other week the area next to the cameras was where the squad members who were injured or suspended were sitting - maybe we should do something similar (though obviously the config of the ground means the Kingsland is a bit of a trek for them which is why they use the back of the Itchen usually).

Not sure Villa were particularly interesting in impressing anyone, they still looked rank. We were "flat" because with that team out we were doing the last season thing, making sure we didn't concede and assuming we'd make enough chances to score one. As I said earlier, Romeu was my MotM, he was working hard and linking everything, the only one trying to put pace on everything he did and lift the tempo ( until Davis came on). You can add Yoshida to your list of second choice players who DAJ, but Caulker only did himself harm last night, he just doesn't fit what we need from a CB. Very good was pushing it, he was basically Targett with one good shot - but of course that's enough for a lot of people, there's a daft bias towards goalscoring defenders. He made a far Agbonlahor look good a couple of times. He's also not "undoubtedly a better left-sided player", he's been not quite good enough in 3 different positions, but last night he scored and he didn't balls up for once, so that's to be commended. Davis was excellent when he came on. Still not sure what Wanyama was meant to do any different, we basically kept a clean sheet and he and Romeu prevented the ball getting to their strikers all but 3 times. Villa had about 15 shots according to the stats and about 12 of those were from miles out and dribbled towards Stekelenburg. Not got much to say about JWP, he's still being shoehorned in all over the place and has only really impressed shuttling from DM alongside Wanyama. Stek was excellent, especially his kicking and the two first half saves. Ayew couldn't have stayed up with the leg across him if he'd tried, it still wasn't a penalty.

I was expecting him to get sent off, if it was a foul it was also clearly a goalscoring opportunity. Then again the ref had already ballsed up giving a corner for a Gestede scissors kick with Wanyama next to him which was overturned by a nothing foul at the corner which he clearly indicated he was going to give before the corner was even taken, so he was probably trying not to draw more attention to himself having already given the pen.