verlaine1979

Yeah, I've never been entirely comfortable with the frequency with which labels such as 'lazy', 'unreliable', 'arrogant', 'bad attitude' get hung around the necks of non-white players. There's too long a history of this kind of insidious (albeit in places perhaps unthinking) stereotyping for it to be allowed to pass entirely unacknowledged. Not saying it's necessarily the case here, but I believe it is unavoidably the case that you have to think doubly hard before throwing those kind of terms around if you don't want to just end up contributing to the reinforcement of an entirely pernicious history.

Pleasure

I see you're as trenchant in your analysis of football as you are stylish with your prose. Without his very well executed back-heel under pressure from a couple of defenders, there would have been no unopposed cross, and thus no tap-in. I've no doubt at all that he's a disruptive influence and lacks the requisite quality to be a sustained influence in games week in week out. However, from someone who watched the game today and can thus speak from the pedestal of, y'know, actual experience, he was one of their better players.

He was actually instrumental in setting up their second goal. Nice back-heel to feed the eventual cross that got turned in.

Bridge has been rubbish for years now. He looks nervous on the ball, and has done since at least 2009 when he joined Man City, and probably before then.

Great goal.

Passing really sloppy so far.

Courmayeur is one of the most beautiful places I've ever been - lovely.

Heh, no it was because he apparently saw 'the value in taking the brand global'. Whichever pompey fan put together the whole Paul Allen scam showed an unusual degree of literacy and imagination. Kudos.

Completely agree, has always looked a deeply limited player to me. He was embarrassingly poor on his England debut against France. Typical English lump of a striker, no touch, no skill.

Chaplow was fantastic, even without the goal he'd have been MoM. Utter bargain.

Hmmm, so we have 21 games left and B'mouth have 20 and we need to make up 2 points on them over the course of the remaining games. At the points per game rate indicated there, the differential between our rest of season totals would be more than 4 points in our favour.

Unpacking the real meanings behind the euphemistic language of football fans is a dangerous game.

Any news on whether Gael N'Lundulu made much of an impression during his trial last week? Noticed he wasn't in the development squad against Oxford, so presumably trial over.

His first touch looks extremely good from the videos.

Sure, but a club whose home-grown talent is visibly unsettled (even possibly going on strike in protest) at being refused a transfer to a club that is already arguably world class, would also portray us in a less than positive light.

So, hypothetically, you'd rather stick with a club with ambitions to become the next Barcelona, than actually join Barcelona? I wouldn't dream of knocking our ambitions, but I think we've got a long road before we become the next Bolton, let alone the next Barcelona - certainly that goal is a long way advanced beyond the careers of anyone currently in the first team, and more than likely anyone in the youth squad either (barring a sudden change in policy from the owners that sees us drop several hundred million on players in season or two). Any Saints player already 'convinced' that they are playing for the next Barcelona is, unfortunately, unlikely to be in full command of their faculties, surely?

I don't mean to appear overly picky, but weren't we world beaters for 5 weeks, and then egg beaters for two (if you count a draw against the league's other form team as 'egg beater' standard that is).

This is an utterly unrealistic proposition. I can't think of a single instance of a team's best player having a non-first team counterpart of equivalent quality just sitting on the bench. When teams lose their best player for whatever reason, they struggle to replace them and often their performance drops - this is as true of Real Madrid as it is of Southampton.

I don't think I've watched Bridge play over the last 5 years or so, and not feared for him every single time he gets the ball in a defensive position. He always looks to me like he's scared of the ball, which considering how much he's played over that time, he probably is. Whatever ability he had is gone now, and I doubt very much that a change of team will do anything to bring it back.

Or, alternatively, a squad of players playing for us because nobody else will take them. The whole idea of 'playing for the shirt' is ridiculous.

My name refers to the former rather than the latter. Always had more of an interest in poetry than post-punk.

I quite liked the usage. While not standard, the meaning was fairly obvious by implication, and had the highly desirable effect of remaking a sentiment generally expressed solely in clichés into something slightly more thought-provoking. Not every day you get to see a bit of ostranenie on a football forum.

Actually Pires wasn't that quick really, not compared to the man he replaced (Overmars) - Pires's game was mostly about close control, which isn't as easily eroded by age. He could also pass the ball brilliantly. The idea that Pires couldn't walk into a creative role in any side in League One or the Championship and instantly be among the most dangerous players in the league is ridiculous. You only have to remember how Merson and Prosinecki played for Pompey to see how genuine class tells in the lower leagues well beyond a player's top-level sell by date.

Really, you think two promotions over the next four seasons is now completely unreachable because we've lost the guidance of Alan Pardew? If so, I'd respectfully point you to the performance of Norwich last year, who if I remember rightly, did fairly well despite an early change of manager... not that I didn't like Pardew, but with a squad of this quality, I'm not going to be jumping off the Itchen Bridge any time soon, regardless of who is appointed.