Saint Albert

Noble's studs were high on Barry. Lucky not to get a yellow.

Fonte getting a few boos.

The two CBs were victimized on that goal.

******** 1-1

Beautiful finish by the new boy.

BARRRRRRRYYYYYY!!!!!

Come on Saints!!!

Their fullbacks were the direst part of a dire performance against City on Wed. Boufal and Barry should hopefully give them a hard time. Glad to see J-Rod is back, (as promised by his dad!)

For the catastrophists out there, can you see us doing 6 points worse than Boro, Hull and Sunderland over the remainder of the season? I can't.

The Mail was spouting off yesterday that we wanted Ake as a VVD replacement in the summer. Seemed confident VVD will be off to Chelsea.

West Ham are a bang average side. Hopefully Puel is preparing the team for Snodgrass playing it in to Carroll. If I remember correctly Snodgrass set up both goals against us at Hull from free kicks.

And Fonte gives away a pen...

West Ham's defenders are doing their best impersonation of training pylons in this game. Reminds me of the stuffing they took against City in the FA Cup.

The Daily Mail did an article on some of the deals that did not go through yesterday: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-4180216/Inside-story-January-transfers-didn-t-happen.html Here's what they said about Tasci: "SERDAR TASCI Spartak Moscow to Southampton The 29-year-old Germany international was due to fly to Southampton at the weekend for what seemed a straightforward loan move, even though Spartak were pushing for a permanent deal. He failed to turn up for his first scheduled flight but came over on Monday for talks with a pre-arranged deal set. However, he failed to agree terms as he looked for around £3m in wages tax free. Crystal Palace moved to hijack the deal but balked at his demands also."

If Les does attempt to explain this balls-up, I have a feeling that Les will say something along these lines: "It's tough to find reasonable replacements in January, Gardos coming back is like having a new player, look at the emergence of Stephens, and look at our bright shiny new Gabbiadini.. " Something like that.

If VVD's injury is considerably less serious than the feared 3 months, this cock-up of not bringing in CB cover during the transfer window might be excusable. Les has some explaining to do.

This Sat. It was part of a Twitter "discussion" that he had with Adam Blackmore, yesterday: @punchbag71 @bigadamsport no worries mate he is fine and back for Saturday

His dad mentioned on Twitter that he would be back for Saturday's game.

I have to agree with a lot of the posters on here...if Sakho really is a 20mil /100k p.w. option, then he won't be coming here.

That was last year's model.

Palmeri says it's done: Finally! Southampton have closed the deal for Gabbiadini from Napoli, for 17+3m€ add-ons

Hard to draw positives from that thrashing of Saints B by Arsenal B. But I will. Sims looks better every time I see him. Of all the numerous negatives, I can look no further than the wiping away of any confidence that Stephens must have felt after a heroic performance at Anfield. He needed an experienced hand besides him, instead he got Gardos on his first game back from a lengthy injury.

0-5 FT

Almost 0-6, Lewis saves from Perez.

Lovely effort from Sims. Forces a save.