Ted Bates Statue

Last time I was at an away match it was at Brentford away where it was mostly the old MCFC "we never win at home and we never win away," which I felt was a decent effort and to be fair fits us down to a tee in the Premier League. Trouble is we don't sing that now that we win or draw most of the time. Was it you who came up with Raspberry Beret song for KWP? Can't find it anywhere but thought it deserved to catch on. For those who think that the anti-Pompey sings will drop off anytime soon, think again. I doubt anyone singing about Pompey this season is paying any attention to their position in the table beyond knowing what division they play in.

Can't believe you've forgotten about our epic JPT win.

Statistically he's the best manager in Europe, and he's good with powerpoint

Let's hope we don't sack him for unspecified reasons. I take your Rohl and raise you one Glynn Snodin.

So far this season he has been the prime candidate to join Millwall and Rotherham, and this week he's linked to Sunderland and of all clubs, Swansea?! We're talking about the former Cardiff supporter Nathan Jones who surely doesn't fit the style that Swansea expect to play. Someone's having a laugh. At this point, I'm going to believe he's in the front-running for a job only after he's been photographed on a pitch holding a scarf aloft.

I can vouch for the difference that's been made. I returned to the Chapel for the first time in years yesterday next to Block 14 and it has transformed the atmosphere at that end, from an environment where previously, I felt embarrassed to be singing Oh When The Saints practically solo and promising myself to never sit there again. Before, the only noise generated was when we scored. Now, there is singing all the way through the match. There were a quite a few Pompey chants but I don't think it's got worse - make of that what you will. I'm fine with the occasional bit of one-sided banter, but there was a solid ten minute period of this in the first half which only ended with the stoppage in play for the Cardiff player about 33 minutes in. I do get the distinct impression that the bold claims of "kick their fucking heads in" are very much empty threats, so it's about as inaccurate as the "Ten More Years In League One" chant. I liked the moment where after a few minutes of singing "Aribo" to Spandau Ballet, someone in an adjacent block tried to change the subject to a Pompey song, but to no avail as everyone else continued on as they were. Singing about a team that isn't involved with the game I'm watching is really not for me, and I have to admit I'd rather learn the words to the Woolston Fucking Ferry, despite not being keen on it before, but at least it celebrates Southampton in a weird way, and I actually welcomed it getting a short outing yesterday. Don't get me wrong, most of the singing is OWTS or some variation on Saints Til I Die, COYR etc. Yes, there was a Rickie Lambert song for a brief moment but I think part of this is maybe down to the high player turnover. It's not easy getting songs going if they're off soon, or injured, or not good enough, or shipped out on loan. As I think we're a good bet for at least playoffs this season, hopefully this changes. Just let us occasional supporters know what the lyrics and the tunes are, and I would be happy to join in with any new ones next time I'm there. If you're sitting in the opposite corner near the Northam, I reckon there were maybe 200 (?) of us standing near the back of Block 14, so of course you're not going to hear us over the thousands making up the Northam end. Russell Martin won't be walking over to the Chapel giving us the fist pumps anytime soon, but compared to the rest of the rest of the stadium it makes a huge difference. Early on someone and his lad walked up the steps to join us as "They're too quiet over there", but for all I know, he might have just been referring to the very front of the block. Chapel has the reputation for being the quiet stand but I don't see the Itchen or Kingsland being much better, at least for the halves near the Chapel. One of the main reasons for bothering to watch Saints live is because I enjoy the noise. I can tolerate a calmer vibe when it's a women's match but it's literally a different crowd for those games and no big deal when it's so much cheaper. I think it's fair to expect a higher level on and off the pitch in the men's game. I think Southampton support has always been fairly average since moving to St Mary's, and exemplified by the exodus that happens from 80-83 minutes played. Adam Blackmore has been making a point of mentioning it this season and it happened again yesterday. I just can't believe the amount of early trains that need to be caught. Anyway, more singing in the non-Northam areas of the ground can only be a good thing. It's something the club should have made way more effort to encourage. At least it's happening now. Hope to be back next time against Blackburn. COYS

Just watched this build-up to the first goal again, as the short highlights don't include it. So enjoyable to watch the match, and so many instances where we simply bamboozled our way out of potentially tricky situations for the defence.

For the purposes of this thread, while watching the TV yesterday I noticed that at the first slight lull in volume, the away support suddenly piped up with "Is this a library." This happened just 8 minutes in, and lasted about twenty seconds before it got drowned out. So it's not just us who take part in false and inaccurate chanting. As an aside, we sounded reasonably good on TV, although I accept that microphone placement is the deciding factor more than anything else.

What makes the chant worse is that most real libraries are too fucking noisy these days. They get treated like internet cafes and nobody gets told to shut up anymore.

Good to see MLG-standard pedantry is alive and kicking on here

I remember when Luton got walloped with something like -30 points, they tried and failed with the previous regime argument.

Continental Cup tomorrow (League Cup) at St Mary's tomorrow with more than 10k tickets sold apparently. £5 for adults, with no ticket tax, which swayed me to go along. Just be aware of the early kick-off for an evening match at 18:30.

I guess this is what happens to a player when they can't displace a midfield consisting of a soft son-in-law, one of Girona's cast-offs, and Ibrahima Diallo.

I think you're off the mark on this one. He was a fair weather FM-playing lawyer who got into supporting us on the back of our upward trajectory under Pochettino/Koeman, and then swiftly lost interest a few weeks into the Pellegrino era. Bearing in mind what has happened over the subsequent five years, I would like to think that unlike many of us, he might have found a better use of his time. Memorably, he would get his secretary to transcribe Saints' press conferences and interviews. I wonder what she thought of it all.

That's exactly what Twitter is for. It got beyond tedious watching him get into the same old scrapes with the usual handful on here. Knowing that he's unleashing the full force of his pedantry upon millions of unsuspecting twits gives me a warm fuzzy feeling, particularly as I don't have to witness it every other day anymore.

Glad to see Guan 2.0, Bearsy and Guided Missile have all turned up at some point over the last 12 months, and I think at least one of them might have even posted something football-related. I know it's only been five minutes but I liked the account of whoever was signing off every post "And that's all I will say on the matter." I'm no Saintsweb Sleuth but I assumed it would have been someone's summer novelty account to tide them over until the season began.

It's mental to have countries investing in white elephant construction projects just to host some sportswashing competition after which they'll probably get mothballed, when London alone could host a tournament using just the existing stadia within the M25.

If anyone has a spare ticket for this and is heading to the game, let me know.

At the time you posted this I didn't know what you were on about. Let me know the lottery numbers when you get a moment.

I yearn for the day when I can confirm my meeting attendance with the words "IF THERE IS A BUFFET."

A classic Destroy and Exit there, he managed to string it out for a while but it was always going to end that way. He was ready to retire five years ago. His win percentage was even worse than Pellegrino by the time we gave him the boot. Hasenhuttl came in with an instant impact and looked like a genius in comparison. I have to give him credit for signing Danny Ings, however. I thought it was a huge mistake and held it against him until the following season.

Classic antique meme reference there. Used to be a stock sarcastic response back in the day but seems to have been almost lost from the interenet.

I'm getting vibes of "There are literally dozens of us" How did you get on today Perry? Don't leave us all in suspense 😂

The campaigner was on Colin Murray's Five Live show last night. Got the impression that it's going to be a slam dunk to change it to red and white, but I liked that he would potentially settle for 1976 Cup Final colours of blue and yellow. So I reckon it's going to be a win-win either way. It's quite interesting to hear about the Court Leet thing, but did this issue actually bother more than one person? And has anyone else suffered mockery from Portsmouth supporters about this? If for whatever reason it can't get changed, I'm sure we'll get over this sort of thing, just like we got over the annual celebrations of David Norris Day. Can any of our aviation experts on here shed any light (red and white only, please) on this?

During the mid-90s, I was put off from supporting Saints for several years after I found a match day programme, and I distinctly remember opening up the first couple of pages, and seeing the manager at the time rather pathetically proclaiming that Fergie had called us one of the best sides to have faced Man Utd that season. I'm almost certain it was Dave Merrington who made that tinpot comment, and of course we had fucking lost. We were shit, and it would have been right in the middle of a string of defeats. But those were the good times. It's such a great shame that we're never Noddy like that any more. All we can do is console ourselves by poncing and mincing about on an obscure corner of the internet, bitching about how we used to be soft as shite (but only over a specific era, spanning approximately 4 years) and shoehorning ponies into every post like a broken dalek, but with even less creativity. This season just feels so dull in comparison, as we swat aside the latest set of hapless fodder and having nothing of note to complain about. PS also, did you know I fucking hate Ralph and everything is his fault because he put a curse on the stadium when it was built???