SW11_Saint

Typical Lowe statement - putting onus on players, trying to abstain himself of any responsibility - prior to the inevitable fire sale that will happen in January... (at which point he can turn around and say he wanted to keep them but the bid from Fulham/Spurs/Stoke and the chance to play in the Premiership was just too much of an attraction...). Incidentally, why isn't the Chairman of SFC handling this media onslaught?

The thought of playing them terrifies me, but great to have a big name/game and a full house again. Come on you Saints!

With the obvious exception of Davenport (which I assume was a joke!), a great line-up. I'd give an honourable mention to Neil Ruddock too - if nothing else for his last minute pen vs. Newcastle (when he got stripped down to his jock strap by the crowd!) - and Mel Blyth. My heart says Jim Steele for his MoM performance on 1 May 1976, Dave Watson was probably one of the greatest english centre halves I've seen, Wright was an immense talent, but I have never quite forgiven him for the way he legged it to Derby, Clause was different class for so many years. Based on their impact for Saints... ...Screw it, I'll go for Claus and Jim Steele.

Nick H played there quite a bit towards the end of his career. Also got quite a lot of stick as I remember - outrageous for such a great servant to the club. From Franny, Peach, Holmes, Mills, Dennis, Statham, Bale, Bridge I'd have to go for Mark Dennis. Had everything you need in a fullback - tigerish tackling, speed, bravery, perceptive thinking. And of course he was a psycho, which made him a legend!

I can imagine most of this being true. I've always thought Redknapp was a decent manager and so he had proved (before and after his stint with us). Our setup and Mr. Lowe's, ahem, 'experiments', make it almost impossible for managers to do well here.

Yes, but they had some half decent players, a millionairre chairman and a decent young English league experienced manager. You're not comparing apples with apples; rather apples with prunes...

They might be telling him to "cut cloth accordingly" but not how to do it, or who to farm out. Why not farm out 2-3 kids and keep the fella that scored 18 goals last season, and knows this division inside out? THAT decision was Lowes undboubtedly - yet again his toxic mix of arrogance and ignorance means he will force his will, whatever the outcome. Lord help us... (yes, I'm talking to you Matt!).

Poortvliet is quite simply out of his depth. We'll scrape the odd point here and there, but more often than not we'll be on then end of consistent hammerings by average or worse teams. 95% of our supporters knew this would happen - playing kids in a cloggers league, managed by a non-league manager was always doomed. Buy, hey, what do we know - we're just the dumb schmuks who pay their wages...

A bunch of young players who are not ready for this level of football + A 3rd tier Dutch manager, with nice ideas, but hopelessly out of his depth + An FC Chairman who literally stands by unable or unwilling to taken any positive action + A egomaniac Plc. Chairman who is still inflicting insane experiments on the club (just after we all thought we'd turned the corner, with a young, bright, league experienced, track-suit manager) + Disastrous management of the club pre and post relelgation, leaving us with not a penny to rub together. = Us being well and truly ****ed. (But go on, do any of us really care? After all, we just sit by week after week and let it happen)

Another nail in our coffin. Rudderless, spiritless, destitute. Where this will end, god knows... (it'll start wtih League 1 football obviously).

If this was any other club, and any other person, I'd say it was a ludicrous suggestion. However, given it's Saints and it's Lowe, sadly it is totally believeable. That he'd keep a player who could help our cause and our youngsters out of pure spite - even when it's harming the club is... well, typical sadly. How on earth did we get back into this situation? Isn't this where Wilde should step in and talk some sense to Herr Lowe? Oh no, I forgot - he's an invertebrate...

I have no proof whatsoever, and I doubt there's any SCW involvement, but I have no doubt that JP is being "encouraged" by Lowe to play the younger players at the expense of those with proven experience like John, Perry, Skacel etc. just so that he can 'prove' to everyone that his masterplan is sound, and that he knows better than anyone else. The sad thing is, that even though the plan is clearly failing, and what most sensisble people suggested would happen is happening - i.e. the kids are being bullied out of games, getting crushing defeats and deflating their confidence - will make no difference whatsoever. Lowe will continue regardless. Sound like the insane strategy of a megalomaniac? Yes, doesn't it...

I think every pundit so far has missed the point on this one. This is not about generally scapegoating England players, or about the hatred of Chelsea. It's about Ashley Cole, and the fact that he's generally loathed. The pass-back just gave the fans the opportunity to express what they generally think of him. He does however personify what most people hate about modern Premiership footballers - and their perceived traits: greed, overblown ego, celebrity, amorality - but he is one of the worst culprits imho.

I am sure this has been done before, but I'm bored, it's Sunday and I fancy stimulating some debate... My question is this: What single event or action signalled the start of our demise, or sealed our fate in your view? (e.g. could be WGS leaving, Boardroom changes, lack of investment after the cup final, the final whistle after the Man Utd game etc.) For me it's absolutely clear - the appointment of Steve Wigley. Not that I'm heaping all the blame on him - in fact I don't hold anything against Steve at all, if anything he was just an innocent victim of circumstance. But when we appointed him, we still had ample time to turn things around, we had a run of 14 emminently winnable games (I think we one one of them), and we still had a half decent squad. If Lowe had of made a sensible appointment then, I am convinced we'd have a decent chance of being in the Premier League still. From the moment I heard that we'd appointed him (and I will always remember it as I was on a business trip in Germany and had to be convinced by a mate that it wasn't a wind up - given we'd been through this once with Stuart Gray). I sat back and though, "that's it, we're f*cked". And so it proved.

Simply put, we won't. Well, not while we have our major shareholders at loggerheads and with ego's which inhibit their ability to make decisions for the best of the club. I don't know about the make up of the Charlton shareholding, but I suspect they are able to get a broad consensus and do what is right for the club. I am not sure how actively Seymour Pearce are looking for investment for Saints, or even if they are. I do not believe it is high on the agenda for Lowe and Wilde (or rather Lowe, who's clearly the one still pulling the strings - Wilde will seemingly just do as he's told); to my knowledge they dynamic duo have not publicly commented on a proactive search for investment.

I'm not a gambling man, but I have a sneaking suspicion that Leicester will be back in the Premier League before us...

Agreed. We've had too many pathetic little small-time businessmen squabbling over who gets to 'sit in the big chair'. If only we could find someone with real business acumen, and frankly, real money (and lots of it!). The fans deserve better than the bunch of clowns we've been saddled with over the last 10 years.

1 point more than losing. Win v Barnsley and it won't be too bad a week. Lose, and it'll be fairly catastrophic...

Yes, but the point is we will have young players playing all season and many fear, as I do, that we will see many more results like this, despite the promising approach play etc. We need some of the older heads involved to add a bit of steel and nouse. Regardless of how pretty this football is to watch, it just won't work on it's own in a cloggers league. Yes, I want us to play the right way, but I also want us to survive in this division - and that may be a real struggle...

Just back from the match. A microcosm of the season ahead I fear - lots of pretty, skillfull football, without end product to match (other than Lalana's brilliant goal), and no real cutting edge. 4-1 was incredibly flattering for a very average QPR side. Big question is, can the kids add steel to the skill. I fear not, but live in hope.

And they say satire is dead...

Positives The best up-tempo, passing, football-to-feet, performance I have seen from a Saints side in about 3 years. Schneiderlin - superb Gillett, McGoldrick, Thompson when he came on, showed real promise Great to have Killer back Birmingham still have a squad made up of Premiership quality players, we'll play lesser teams than them this year, and get better reward Things to learn from Get the tactics right up front - stilll haven't found that magic formula to get the most of our front players Clearly ran out of energy, need to pace things Looked shaky at the back at times - losing Davies is something we cannot afford imo Somewhat naive at times - over passing, when simpler moves would be better All in all, I enjoyed watching them, even though gutted by the results. Can't say I've said that much over the last few years. Need to ensure we have a bit of steel to match the artistry (a la WBA last year), but if we can do that we'll survive. We're likely not going to get much further than mid-table, but this can still be a season of promise.

Actually, other way round - they were singing about Ormerod sh*gging his wife... Juvenile I agree. He was always going to score, but it just gave him the incentive to do it within 30 seconds....

According to Alan McNally on SNS "it could have been 4 or 5, but for Davis in the Southampton goal". Great, all we need another season of fans scapegoating players...

Unbelieveable - not a single thing about the Championship in the Guardian today other than a short article about Birmingham City. Not even a proper fixture list - stuck at the back with all the other cr@p. Their obsession with the premiership is getting ridiculous. NB their excuse will no doubt be that "The Season" free mag is out on Monda, but FFS, you'd think they'd at least acknowledge that something was going on today...