John Boy Saint

If he were to go based on last season certainly wouldn’t hold it against him. If you look at the clap trap Reed spouted to us all when MoPe was appointed about the fast pressing exciting football to come, if he was sold the same lies then it’s no surprise. As for the show pony comments, Boufal has that title sewn up. On early showing last season he certainly was a player who put quickly put a smile on my face with his “that’s my ball and you’re not having it” attitude to the opposition - style of play. Went to the Huddersfield away game and he was busying himself about the pitch again, second half as Saints played towards us he was winning the ball bringing it out of midfield and looking to release it into attack, but no bugger in a Saints shirt was giving him an option or making a positive move forward if they got it, the ball was invariably being recycled back to him. With the benefit of hindsight we had a forward thinking positive ball winning player playing with a bunch of blokes drilled in defensive risk averse football possessesion football, as the second half wore on this just kept happening and you could see Mario getting increasingly piddled off with it and at those around him. As the season trudged on its hardly a surprise that his flame dulled as he was an exciting ball player in a team playing inert football. I didn’t see the semi but his couple of howlers he made that I did see, again with hindsight, if you put a Formula 1 car (not saying he is a footballing deity) in rush hour traffic it’s not going to work at its full potential and more likely to break down. A player like him having to perform below his ability is likely to be prone to making mistakes.j Hope he stays, and our game is more suited to his undoubted abilities next season.

Think when they went in LED was a new toy even for experienced stadium floodlight installers(we were one of the first to install it), and it behaved differently in its projection onto the pitch with sharper edges at the edge of the spread hence the appearance of “let’s stick another cluster in here and one over there. If the stadium had been designed with floodlight mountings on the roof like at the Olympic Stadium none of us would have noticed them in our eyes

Forum gold

"But the lure of moving back to Spain, where he spent eight years as a player before cutting his managerial teeth with Espanyol between 2009-2012, may prove too strong to resist.". I guess the opportunity to be the manager of one of the very biggest Football Clubs in the World, wouldn't even enter his head.............. its also a club where you can go "and fail" and your CV remains intact due to them being a trigger happy bunch at board level. ...........and to add to the fun, with Ronaldo claiming to be on his way, Pochettino knows of a lad with the knack to pop up in the box and stick the ball away. Blimey it must be like the Farmer just changed the Calendar to December in the Turkey shed in many a North London home.

With hindsight not that big a surprise on the part of the club, given whats gone on this year. In that the Chairman comes out in January to the media giving the manager, who as far as a vast majority of the fans in the stands were concerned had a huge question mark over his head, the vote of confidence, citing the VVD fiasco as the root of all woes. Then in the post season interview to the media, the Chairman then admitted that they didn't realise that our Premier League status was under threat until January, when most fans had seen the neon sign being wired up in the Leicester home debacle and tested on Boxing Day............many had seen the sign being delivered back when we got done in our own back yard quite feebly by Wolves second string in the League Cup. Many fans saw the Forster contract renewal as a message to stop the "brain drain" that had become the norm at Saints, yet more cynical viewers looked at the size of that contract renewal with raised eyebrows, in that we were rewarding a key player so handsomely, especially one who's distribution with his feet alone was questionable and seemingly un-curable. With that level of shortsightedness, especially with how this past season panned out, it really is no wonder that we find ourselves painted into a corner where Alex McCarthy is concerned.

I walked into a Customers in Wolverhampton yesterday, "Eh up John Boy - stayed up by the skin of yer teeth then in the end", they then introduced me to a new chap "This is John He's a Saints fan". "Oh right, Saints Fan" "we are supposed to be getting one of your ex players.........Pele or something" "Not Graziano Pelle?" says I. As one they all said "yeah thats him". "Wolves are looking to get Pelle in? What for? he's 33 and spent the last 2 years in China most of which as the 6th highest paid player in the world, and he is going to give that up for a Swansong (no disrespect) in Wolverhampton, he was getting slower when we sold him". Blimey the air soon whooshed out of their collective balloon.

Now about settling that debt from when we were nippers, I make it that you owe me 3 tubes of Smarties now, I earn more than you, I have scored more goals than you, and won more Silverware than you, I’ll let you off the one that Saints fans will still love me more than you by the end of our careers.

Wouldn’t be so sure, “last time we had a how old are you?” Ish thread on here, there was a remarkable number moany old buggers who are regulars and of an age to know who King Crimson are.

Thread title should be "Do players have far too much time on their hands" Quite a bizarre Tattoo though, given his reasoning for having one versus why he hates guns - is he going to have those words Tattooed on the other side of his leg, otherwise its a bit gangster. Penguin would have been more apt

Little snippet I heard was that he wanted out last summer, and that the club were not going to stand in his way if someone came knocking for him, but nobody did.

The FA a short while back showed how out of touch they are with the modern day when they suggested placing a cap on women players wages. When I read it, aside from thinking "really ?!!" I was more stunned that the insular minded fools actually let that thought escape from the box into the public domain.

Sparky better get on and book the Potters Heron for a press conference surprise announcement.............. :p

So if we had camped outside his house en masse and pleaded with him to stay, the fickle git would have stayed!! Do you think you can buy what he is shoveling - I reckon my Roses would come out a treat with a dollop of that to get their roots into!

Schadenfreude is probably banned in California..............probably spelt differently too!

Post of the night

Quick everybody kidnap Alex McCarthy so he can’t be sold to the bin dippers!!

Yeah that bloody Les Reed Grrrrrrrrrr!

WHAT A GOAL!!! Made in Southampton

Rather than start another Thread may as well bump this one, with the Hors d’oeuvre to the CL final, the Championship play off, kicking off at 5pm Where do folks think next seasons new away day will be, Villa Park or Craven Cottage? Think Fulham might get it in extra time.

Christ we are half cocked as a club 22:20 on a Friday night to make an announcement, it’s like a government trying to bury bad news when something else is afoot, it’s not as if it’s for the benefit of the Chinese as it’s 05:20 on Saturday morning, and if Guangzhou is anything to go by it’s bloody quiet for a city of 14:5 million people, they’re still in bed!! Still at least it’s done and dusted

There I corrected it for you we had had a game latter part of the season where we had a corner and for a moment all the players looked stood with a look of “oh who’s taking this?!” not long after we got another and they did it again. People mentioned Bertrand’s corners which last season were JWP style and damn good, there was no way Pellegrino was going to let Ryan go to a point furthest away from his defencive position. It is pretty pants that we only have one player capable of putting a ball into the box with pace and menace 9 times out of 10.

Everyone knows Tadic might have a bit more talent than JWP but since Koeman left, for someone viewed as so bloody great he has certainly left that talent somewhere safe for the last 2 seasons, plonker Puel said he would build the team round him, pipe and slippers came out, MoPe had no spine as it turns out Dusan just carries on but gets away with slacking a bit more. New Sheriff rides into town cracks the whip and rules with a rod of iron, Blimey Charlie we suddenly see a glimpse of the original Tadic. Up until just recently anyone with 2 fully operational eyes can see he’s been pretty disappointing and justifiable in copping flack off the majority of fans. Corners - Tadic v JWP = JWP Freekicks - Tadic v JWP = JWP Defending Tadic v JWP = JWP Given the choice of taker of a Penalty Tadic or JWP = JWP If you can say hand on heart say that you have 100% confidence in Tadic taking a penalty then you have truly bought the Emperors new clothes!

Well it’s pretty obvious he is a Marmite player

Good summary. Funnily enough all the knockers (an apt term for some) seem to reside on here and the sheep follow. Sat in the stadium on a match day you never hear a grumble, even from the persistent moaners, when he comes on, in fact you often heard more of a grumble when JWP was on the pitch with Tadic and JWP was subbed when Tadic was clearly the player who was doing chuff all for much of the game. Last couple of seasons he has improved and become more combative, in the European games, Milan at home in particular I noted that he was getting stuck into players with a bit more bite, and knowing what foriegn players are like for trying to hoodwink the ref, thought jeez he’s going to get booked for that or will do if he keeps that up, but the ref did nothing, I figured that having played so many European internationals every summer, and being an intelligent chap, he had worked out how to winkle the ball away without incurring attention from the ref. People say if he was any good someone would have been in for him, if you notice only headline players in teams get the attention to be sold to other teams the grafters or glue of the team very rarely get looked at. Funnily enough Bertrand, who many think is our only option at left back, could have gone last summer.........if someone had actually come in for him. So that example being used to emphasise just how rubbish JWP is pretty lame. Ah if only he didn’t come from Portsmouth and his first name was pronounced Ham-ezz!

Just popped up on Facebook, the club are all going ta-daa we’re off to China pre season look at us ain’t it great?!!! The majority of responses are “be nice to know who the manager will be”. You would think someone would go “oh this ain’t looking too clever”. Still a training camp in China in July, that’s going to find out who’s kept up with their off season fitness regime. It’s always a threat at work to be sent to China in July and August for factory inspections, the heat can be relentlessly oppressive.