The9

I noticed his shorts were not of regulation style and refused to pass it. Whatever happened to that set of blue kit anyway ? I used to quite enjoy wearing James Beattie's shorts - though possibly not as much as you and Kev liked wearing Crouch's.

We do need that pace, but I've been surprised how few teams have defended high up - that might be because we actually thrive on short passing in the middle and the tight game in the middle helps us get to that level. We actually seem to perform better when every challenge is tight as opposed to when we have the space to spread the ball wide, which often reduces our movement off the ball. It didn't help at Burnley though !

Connolly definitely was, and we don't really have a fit replacement - though De Ridder gives us something similar plus a bit of pace, his game when up front is smothered by close defending BEFORE he gets control of the ball, as opposed to out wide when he gets it under control in space and can do what he likes with it afterwards.

Lambert's missed 3 headers he'd usually have scored, Connolly has looked tired. It's a game of inches though, all three of Lambert's headers were astonishing misses. If they'd gone in we'd be 5 points better off, and we're not going to miss that many chances all of the time - though conversely we were scoring a relatively high proportion of our chances at the start of the season - as I said at the time, the main difference between us and Leeds was our finishing. The main difference between Burnley and Cardiff from a Saints perspective was that Burnley made us look bad defensively by playing well, whilst Cardiff's goals both came from Saints mistakes, one of which - the failure to attack a bouncing ball from a keeper's kick - was inexplicable.

Did you know there was a shop named after you next to Burnley's ground?

I'm amazed that five people actually agree with this... what shall I call it... I know... "bedwetting". For a start I doubt there is a Saints fan alive that constantly disagreed with every single thing all of the last 4 Chairmen did, and no one other than pretty much you has mentioned a fan on the board for about 3 years, not that having a supporter as an advisor to a football club is even a bad idea. Agreed on the general gash that is "hearsay becoming fact". Not quite the same as using empirically proven facts like the 15 minute car park fee as a basis for criticisms though - used as a general example, rather than being particularly pertinent to this argument... ...because basically, having been away for the whole issue and really not actually investing any time in the whole matter, my take on this is that Saints have the right to defend the use of their intellectual property, including the rights to use the logo and club name and any other trademarks, and Ex-Saints have the right to set us as a Charity and raise money, just as the club does through the Foundation, but not by infringing those legal ownerships. None of the other stuff is even remotely relevant.

It is evident from the first 10 matches of the season that Jack's selection of short shorts is permanent, his hair, unlike his shorts, will need to be maintained on a regular basis. Also, his dad Alan is proper baldy, so your song will date quicker than the short shorts revival, which I hasten to add is captured nicely in Pro Evolution Soccer 2012 : Also, the shorts are numbered to prevent confusion, except at Barnsley, when Connolly had Dickson's shorts on and it messed a substitution right up. And who doesn't know the "short shorts" tune from that episode of the Simpsons ?

Can't believe having actually seen their first for the first time (I was looking away in the ground when it happened) that Hooiveld didn't just put SOMETHING on it, even if it only hit him and rolled off the pitch. In context we were caught arguing about a decision - it may have been the handball that I've blanked out of my mind, but I saw Cork argue with the ref, then turned away to say something about a kid in the Cardiff end telling us to sit down (i.e. stop appealing for the pen) when we'd all been stood all match long, turned around and it was already going over Kelvin's head. Cork also got booked immediately after the goal went in. Interesting comments at the end, agree with Adkins about us making loads of late chances, but if Mackay thinks that's a good atmosphere their fans must have slept through the other matches.

I'm also not sure what Davis was doing... because I'd looked away and didn't see the thing until it was bouncing past the 6 yards line. WTF Frazer was doing on the goalline I'm not sure about, he probably could have headed it onto the bar or maybe even hooked it away, but he just... didn't. I blame his shorts. One thing you did raise that I'd forgotten, was that in the last 15 minutes when we were most successful we were whacking diagonal balls to Lambert from Richardson and mopping up around their area. An oldie but a goodie - what I couldn't figure out was why, when this was obviously working as well as the passing game, wasn't Lambert constantly moving to the far post, so that Fox could ALSO hit long balls to him when the ball was on the other side of the pitch ? It was a sign that we were doing pretty well that Cardiff's shots off target were basically all crappy free-kicks, they weren't creating anything in open play that we didn't gift them.

What it shows, is why Oxlade-Chamberlain and Walcott got signed by Arsenal and Lallana hasn't been. At the top level you need pace AND skill, which both Pennant and Wright-Phillips have a ton of. Lallana is actually quite quick off the ball when he gets going, but he's not a pacy dribbler, he tends to cut back and beat players again - that was illustrated in the last seconds at Burnley when he couldn't get away from the pursuing (fouling) defenders to win the match. There's a reason people say "you can't defend against pace" and that's why it's so important - you can harry, jockey, pull players back and double up on opponents, but you can't become faster, and quicker players will always get places sooner. Don't get me wrong though, I think he's awesome, but his straight line speed with the ball is one of his weaker points (along with heading and often scuffing shots).

You could, but comparing the end products would make you look very silly. Lallana's heading is at best average, even if his positioning to get to the crosses in the first place is excellent.

It was very similar to Burnley, we looked better last night though, Cardiff failed to stifle our movement and passing, Burnley totally had our number for the first 70 minutes.

The way Fox crosses I'd be inclined to play him left midfield with Lallana on the right. That was the Guly moaners get their wish (though he's been fine IMHO) and we don't impact on Lallana too much as he's half playing inside and comfortable on the right anyway. It would cut down on his right-footed curlers into the corner though. Either that or go with Lallana instead of Connolly who has looked tired in the last two aways. De Ridder looked lively when he came on as expected, not keen on him up top where he's battling physical defenders, have some doubts about him defensively but at home it shouldn't matter so much, so here goes: Davis Richardson Fonte Hooiveld Harding De Ridder Schneiderlin Cork Fox Lallana Lambert Leaves a bench of : Bart, Martin, Guly, Hammond, Connolly. My concern is that Fox doesn't like to pass it short and will need time to add this to his impressive crossing, and De Ridder isn't defensive enough. As far as Morgan / Hammond go, much of a muchness there based on the last couple of games.

As has been said above, it was very like Burnley - except that we played a fair bit better at Cardiff, though the insistence on playing tippy-tappy in front of the back line has finally cost us - I suppose after 9 league games that's a reasonable failure rate compared to success. Not sure why Guly's getting so slated, he puts in the odd loose pass but in the last two games Hammond, Cork, Lambert, Connolly and Fox have all done the same. He also won a few vital headers at early corners, though he didn't do himself any favours falling over with that late chance. Nice to see him last the 90 minutes though, is that his first full game this season ? Basically Burnley were better than Cardiff who left everything to Miller (including winning a swathe of free-kicks for not being fouled), and if we'd been able to finish in either of them we'd be 5 points clear at the top. I already said everything there was to say about the imbecilic use of the short goal kick to an always-marked centre midfielder on the edge of our own box on Saturday. When we decided to whack it at Lambert instead, it was again an infinitely more useful and safer tactic, gaining possession high up in the opposing half on more than half the occasions we used it. No professional football team in the world is going to fall for the tactic of sticking the full backs on the half way line, the centre backs wide of the box and leaving the bloke we obviously want to pass it to, the only player moving towards the kicker, unmarked. When it comes down to it though, we failed to head a big hoof and gave the ball away in the final third for the second - we can't expect to win if we make defensive mistakes and don't take easy, clear-cut chances, no matter how well we continue to carve out openings late on. EDIT: LOL at the similarities with the post above. FWIW I thought the stadium was really REALLY nice, well laid out, quick service when I went to get served and when there was singing it was massively magnified. However, the tannoy announcer, who also does Wales games, is frankly a good example of why Wales shouldn't have any input into "match day entertainment", and announcing the number of minutes left in Welsh first is precisely the kind of welsh language act bo11ocks that led me to leave the place in the first place.

It's cack, Short Shorts is where it's at. Unless you're Jose Fonte.

The answer is no, I was putting this together at the same time... http://www.saintsweb.co.uk/showthread.php?32858-Jose-Fonte-beware-!

Watch out Jose, the pants police are coming to get you ! I'm assuming Fonte's insistence on wearing Nike undershorts is the reason why he can't get them to match his shorts, but as there's now a precedent (see http://ridiculousfootball.blogspot.com/) , I suspect refs won't be as lenient. He was wearing a ridiculously long pair of shorts to hide them on Saturday as it was - you could have made two pairs of Cork's short shorts from Fonte's knee-length baggies ! The last thing we want is him getting asked to leave the field to sort out his undercrackers while the game is going on...

He likes short shorts Cork likes short shorts. That is all.

Jesus, it's really difficult to try and maintain a level of legitimate criticism of some of Cortese's policies when this kind of polarising guff gives people the opportunity to lump all the objectors into one convenient pile of mentalists...

I doubt it.

The pics I have from the 2007 match in Bushey (the game we played up there despite not actually playing Watford that day) are not as good, but here's one for LOLz. I didn't actually note the score of this one, so we must have got stuffed, but it was 15th September 2007.

I also like this one : and this one. Who are ya ?!

I'm nobody, but if you're even older than me and you're in the squad, then maybe you have scored more. I was going on the balance of probability, given that I'm 38 and have played against a lot of crap defences in rubbish local leagues. Unfortunately most of the nine goals in one game at County level stuff is well in the past and I'm an injury-prone never-was now... but I have scored against Watford fans home and away before. I like this little sequence though (from 18 Oct 2008, we lost 5-4 at Fleming Park ):

Just to let you know if you want to download last season's chants from Rapidshare to use in FIFA, I have about 5 days left before the files are deleted (and the originals re currently trapped on my exploded laptop so I won't be re-uploading). Download link is here : http://www.saintsweb.co.uk/showthread.php?24213-Fifa-11&p=868604#post868604 And the rest of the FIFA 11 thread, which contained all of the documentation of which chants are on, etc, is here http://www.saintsweb.co.uk/showthread.php?24213-Fifa-11/page6 By my reckoning it'll be there until Sunday 2nd October.