John Boy Saint

I sat watching him yesterday from a good vantage point in the Chapel, when the ball was in a position to play to him he was consistently stood behind the defensive line. So Fraser in Goal, Saints players building an attack, Ipswich players defending THEN Long then the Ipswich Goal keeper he rarely checked behind him to see that he was being played on it was almost like he was more reliant on the probability of the lino cocking up but the lino had already seen a red and white striped shirt in an offside position, so putting the flag up was an easy option if in doubt. The Midfielder is probably itching to play the ball to him but can see that he is offside so waits for him to step back on side. Like I said above watching Suarez last year from the same vantage point he would know a ball was coming in and was moving in a curve just in front of the static or shuffling sideways defence, as the ball came in the defence would move backwards facing the ball but Suarez was already facing forwards and accelerating having sprung the offside trap. Shane Long has a lot of guile he is not a slow coach you would have thought after so many games for so many teams someone would have picked him up on this and trained it out of him.

Still winds me up that he gets caught offside so much, watching him yesterday he is wandering along behind the defensive line endlessly, when you watched Suarez last season against us he had a knack of running infront of the defender knowing the ball was coming over the top giving him a head start as the defender has to turn around to catch him. I also think its becoming clear that his reputation for going down cheaply in the past does him any favours with the officials.

Excellent as always...... Happy New Year to you.

Probably more of a Citroën, like Marmite you either like em or hate em, the same way so many blinkered winkles drop him from their suggested line ups in pre match threads.

is there a discount if I opt out of the photo with you?

Ooo will they be available to purchase online too? I am working in London so missing the trip to OT but it would be dead cool to have one of those in the bar for the second half.

The shops will be shutting as the game kicks off unless the Trafford Centre is a 11-5 kind of centre on a Sunday. Worth identifying somewhere along that road to the Traffird Centre and M60 as my Manc mate has pointed out they hold the traffic round OT for almost an hour after kick off so being somewhere down Wharf way or whatever it's called has less traffic as there is nothing from the other side of OT joining it for a while (hope that makes sense)

Strange observation from yesterday, Arsenal were getting the rub of the green off the ref for innocuous stuff but as soon as we went a goal up it looked like he was being a bit more generous towards us. I wouldn't say we are a dirty team by any stretch of the imagination but looking at the stats V Chelsea then Arsenal on the screens on the concourse after the game I was amazed to see in both games we committed about twice as many fouls than our illustrious opponents.

Went to a wedding a few years back and they had those throwaway cameras on each table at the reception for everyone to take photos of who was on the table etc. When they had been developed the Bride said when looking through them that she had thought it a myth when she read somewhere that the person you end up with as a life partner has facial similarities, she was amazed to see that this was true of just about every couple photographed.

8-0 has to be up there without doubt. A bit recent; Yoshida snaffling the ball pinging it out to Davis for him to ping it with the outside of his foot for Yoshida to stick it into the net off his shoulder v Everton. What a great goal.

Happy New Year

Not as long on the ground as Chelsea players who at the merest tap hit the deck and laid there like they had been taken out by a Sniper hidden in the floodlights using a high velocity rifle and Dum-Dum bullets.

Very impressive landing, be interesting to know how much of that was computer aided and how much was pure pilot and co pilot ability.

At least they try to put something different on each of these, the Martin Tyler bit was quite interesting and nice that he requested to do this game as his anniversary for commentating for 40 years. Strange to see Mourinho just milling about outside the dressing room in the corridor you never see that with other coaches.

Or has allowed himself to be bullied into feeling guilty for something which, as I said on the post match thread, in real time looked exactly what he booked him for, Lino had a view didn't give it either as he saw the same in real time Fabregas over doing the theatricals as he hit the turf. 27 different angles shown over 4 minutes on Sky and hey the ref got it wrong, even from my seat behind the goal in real time Fabregas simulated contact. So now Jose has got himself into a Fergie position and got another Premiership referee nicely tucked up in his pocket, unless the Ref actually has the balls to ignore what's gone on before next time he Refs a Chelsea game: which by apologising he has instantly become a submissive.

The man with the whistle on Thursday is Craig Pawson, see how he copes with the top heavy Arsenal players. http://www.premierleague.com/content/premierleague/en-gb/referees/profile.html/craig-pawson

Well if you hadn't put me on ignore we could have had another ding-dong..................... Ooo-errr wasted that post!

I think the Luftwaffe might have had a hand in that.

I think as we have gotten better with good play there are times where you vanish into a bubble of concentration on the game and tight games like yesterday suck even more fans into that bubble of concentration, it's not a lack of passion. You look at Arsenal always called a library but you can't argue that overall Arsenal under Wenger have played some very pretty football which as a neutral watching them has been very pleasing on the eye, as a a result Arsenal fans more than likely are in that bubble of concentration. Brother in Law is a 100% one eyed Chelsea fan and was in the Chelsea section of the ground he did find "The Saints are staying up" chant very amusing.

Especially against a piece of work like Hazard, once he was on a yellow Hazard already had him in his sights to get another and get a free reign on our right Ronald saw this and at the same time realised that Maya was playing with one arm tied behind his back. Also as a natural centre back having a visa in your passport to cross the centre line at will must be a real struggle to get your head around.

National Tramway Museum in Crich Derbyshire has a one of those old Southampton Corporation Trams running, complete with the warning about not standing through the Bargate. I think on bank holiday weekends they run a lot more Trams up and down the track for visitors. Certainly a good day out if you have a curiosity of days gone by.

All this carping on about the penalty, real time Fabregas made a meal of it, ref saw it real time, no flag from Lino real time, no 27 different angles on Sky for the ref to look at, he over egged it ref saw it as as acting booked him for what he saw real time, ref saw what I saw from behind the goal. Bale got booked on reputation, Shane Long got chuff all from Jon Moss 3 times (even with the Lino telling him it was a foul) all on reputation. still good disciplined performance from the whole team, 3 shots on goal just one on target from Chelsea that is impressive.

Not forgetting a game against dirty Leeds at the back end of the 70's where some of those nice northern chaps treated us to a few fireworks.

Just shut down Matic and their tick loses its tock.

Rat boy Anthony Taylor referee on Sunday so expect absolutely chuff all as he is developing into an "all about me" ref.