gio1saints

I watch saints with pride every time they play with honour belief courage. Couple of matches this season that was not present otherwise yeah they are not a joke to me - quite the opposite.

One two or three teams are going to win the league, the cups and all the medals. The rest are playing to be 4th loser or beaten finalist or not relegated or got £3m extra cos we gained a place on final day. Thats the most likely reality this EPL season. And It was always very likely Saints were playing for “ not getting relegated” or at best “ got a few million extra by gaining a place on some other EPL “make up the numbers “ team. There’s about 14 make up the numbers teams in EPL and they just rotate each year for the most part. Unless an Arab sovereign wealth fund buys you or a major hedge fund ( and even then FFP is a bitch) it’s now almost impossible to breakthrough. So- all those pragmatists out there - I admire your stoic acceptance of this status quo, but forgive my naive idealism in hoping and believing what RM has got going - which everyone seems to criticise - is our only shot at making Saints a superpower. Whenever I see and hear so many fans and football pundits indignant at what RM is doing it just reassures me that the powers that be don’t like it and dont want us to succeed. Change play like the rest of the losers and maybe we too can make up the numbers or get to be a “ beaten finalist” once every decade. I’m glad we are currently firmly set on not doing that. We are going for the big prize- or die trying. But at least it’s a honourable death not a lickspittle existence hanging around the lower reaches of the EPL for crumbs from the big boys. So I say, Carry On PBF Russell and ignore the critics. Even Pep has intimated and said as much. I Hope it’s a wonderful match today and sry I can’t be there with our loyal, and passionate, away fans. 😇

Just supporting saints the odd 52 years or so been to one or two matches in that time only been ejected once and never involved in any reported disorder offences as far as I know, apart from invading the pitch at Elfsborg I think it was on a preseason tour once. Think the site owner was with us on that little Scandinavian away trip matter of fact. Perhaps my naivety is not so much naive as someone who does not consider our style as “pound shop total football” and someone who recognises that in the absence of being able to helicopter in the best players in the world this attempt to persevere at getting better at this style making average players better as a team than the sum of their parts is pretty much our only route to long term success. Oh, and that much derided term “ courage” - it’s effing courageous to keep on trying in the face of the amount of shit he and team gets from our own fans. If he was chicken shit cowardly he would be long gone. Long may he stay. The longer he is here the more likely we are to break the code to winning games. That’s my view not yours and many here stm. I hope I’m right you are wrong but I accept maybe I’m just hopelessly positive. Naive even. Always will support saints whatever position whatever league though.

You think they might be? Of course they are not. You believe it’s shit tactics that’s why we are second bottom. Fine. Not going to even try argue that with you as clearly you e convinced yourself that only sacking Russell will make us avoid relegation- or worse - what is “ worse” by the way? Going into liquidation? Getting best 9-0 every week? Being uncompetitive every single match? Moving RM before “ it gets even worse” … hahahaha Our best bet is to hope that this comes good eventually second half of season and a dynasty and style is irrevocably instilled into this club. If it takes a few relegation/promotion-relegations to do it better that than we join the rat race.

Predict Tyler will be replaced by Fraser early doors. He is having to mark Madvidi in defence down there left and is already on a yellow. Sensible to let Fraser do the running ( and fouling of Madvidi who is a decent player) for that.

Unbelievably , another goal for Everton or Saints and we are out the bottom three! of course this signals an Ipswich and foxes come back…damn should have kept my mouth shut… At least the atmos ar SMS is much more upbeat than I was thinking it might be whatever the score. I really did not want to attend in case it got truly horrendous but Glad I’m here and made the effort to support the team in this big match.

And all last season btw. If he is fit he HAS to start, contract status bollix or not.

Yup I agree. Make it £4m then. Or whatever number you like. It’s a number though for sure. Whatever it is - it’s money could be spent on better players not the bloke who watches them play.

Sounds logical but only a small handful of likely candidates would consider such a deal. I think only a manager ( or actually wannabee) with already loadsa money but maybe a massive ego and or desire to build a rep as a new young manager would take that on. Frankie Lampard springs to mind. Probably a millionaire ex or even current footballer I’d imagine it might suit. Like AL perhaps. He stands out as caretaker material anyways and would be cheap. 😁. Would not expect to see style of our football change nor relegation prospects either though from any such a move. Can’t see that causing celebrations in this forum. Much the same if we brought in Carlos Foreignmanager after his successful stint in Portugal or similar. No, I’m sure there’s many making the case for Gareth or whoever as our next manager if he’s sacked but if it’s NOT Potter or Moyes I don’t think there’s a party. And I don’t think either fancy the hassle..

Long post. Turn away now if this is too much. The summary version is : sacking RM is expensive and I don’t think it will happen. Longer version: Not been mentioned, yet, but there is a significant financial reason why I don’t think he will be sacked. I’m sensing a bunch of “ staying in the EPL is worth £ xyz millions so if we have to blow £xx millions now it’s worth it “ type of thinking going on. Except blowing £xx millions has not got any guarantee of us staying in the EPL at all and the greatest betting probability at the bookies is that with RM - OR WITHOUT- we will still be relegated. But in the case of ditching him We’d not only be relegated - but in all probability both fucked financially AND relegated. How’s that? For a start it’s not just Russell but probably 7 or 8 other colleagues of his who also would likely leave or be replaced by the incoming new managers team of coaches, analysts, physios etc Paying up 2.5 years to those is going to cost multi millions. Buying a GOOD new manager will cost maybe £5-£10m. You get what you pay for. Getting a cheap one is surely not an option? If you gonna sack our existing cheap option and your track record with cheap options has been terrible are you just going to go all Groundhog Day again by putting in Nathan Jones mk2? You’d hope not…maybe there is a GOOD unemployed Manager perfect for Saints out there - But of the two most likely that spring to mind neither Moyes nor Potter are interested. If they are any good, like Zlatan once famously said -( paraphrased) - SFC really? they are not going to drop to Saints level. Next: Vincent kompany got sold by Burnley to Munich for £10.2m ~after relegating them.😂. Not saying Russell is worth £10.2m to some other team but paying up those contracts AND foregoing his sale end of season is a double hit. And seems utterly bonkers. if the likelihood is you are going down either way why would you not keep the financial cushion of at least being able to flog the gaffer like Burnley did? So the itinerary goes something like this for you Russell out guys : (1) Buy top new Manager ( not some unemployed c&nt who is unemployed for good reason) : c. £10m. Does that include his team ? If so add extra. (2) Pay Top new Manager Top New Manager wages and Top New Manager contract to his mates : this is obvs higher than what RM and outgoing team are being paid. God knows how much more but it will be more. And we are desperate so our hand is weak. (3) Pay off RM and his team - I’m totally guessing it’s £6m -£8m. Could be more. Maybe a bit less. (4) Do NOT collect £10M by selling him to Al Hillal or Inter Miami or some such in seven months time when we are relegated. Bonkers move paying someone to take your motor away when Webuyanycar will give you up to £10m for it in 7mths time… Thats costing well north of £20m - which is, incidentally what we did not appear to have to buy a real CF a few weeks ago…. And after all that cost and we still get relegated how about do it again - knock Top New Manager on the head ( at ludicrously high cost) but this time go with a really cheap option. OR Have fun with Top new Manager in the Championship but spend all season moaning because with Top New Manager we ought to be top of the league from match day one, leave out maybe we don’t have 75% of our better players anymore. At least we have Top New Manager and who knows, Top New way to win matches we can all enjoy. And Top New Manager is on easily highest wages in Championship even if we go down btw. That’s part of the deal. It’s really super messy fraught with extra costs we do not appear to have and with a slim chance of success ( defined as staying up) ~ about as slim as staying with RM and him turning it around but with much less drama. Anyways, thanks for reading. Hope you’ve now all changed your mind and all want to get behind RM team and squad and support them to victory. But I know that I am in a tiny minority here so no need to tell me how misguided I am etc. I think not only is it bad for saints ££ but I happen to believe RM can turn this baby around. 😂 That thought makes even me laugh!🤭

Good post and well stated. Your points are entirely valid and are more likely right than wrong. I guess I am offering an alternate explanation and trying to give as much benefit of the doubt as possible to the guy. Our timescales may also vary. Getting into the EPL to just survive year after year is not what I think SR are after. I think they are trying to create a football legacy even a brand - and that takes time and maybe even a bit of yo-yoing between EPL and Championship. Maybe, not for certain of course, they are looking at a longer time frame than just this season.

Maybe you are right. @SWLondon Saint. There’s a Good burden of proof on your side. But playing a lone central striker and then persisting by putting TP in, just one example of many, suggest our ( and RM’s) playing style may be more flexible these days. If I did not think RM could change the team and results in a positive way - and the team keeps losing - id want him out too. But he is trying everything that I think he ought to get results. He is not a one trick ball possession pony despite the still annoyingly large percentage of goals we concede from faffing around in our is area. Not sure anybody has noticed how many times Aaron chooses to longer pass to players NOT our two CB’s? Yuki tends not to faff around too much either. Just a few left to deprogramme and who knows we may have a winning team does not give teams X goals head start through mindless kamikazi play in our own area! 😁

Was always very likely to be the case whatever Manager. I try to look for evidence of rational thought, analysis and adjustment in play by RM and our team rather than just at the current results. Our (or his) rigid version of PB football is something of a red herring in that regard. If that’s what you are looking for that’s what you will find. There was next to no chopping and changing of team formations and players last year. This year there has been plenty. None of them have worked- in terms of 3 points- YET. But are there signs that it might? If you are a pessimist you can say that nope there are no signs of anything good coming out of this team this year under Russ so get rid. 1 point /22 says it all. If you are an optimist you can say some of our players are a revelation - Mateus and Tyler are already excellent, Aaron is a top goalkeeper. THB scoring at this level (!) and, last match apart, Yuki is a lovely player. Fuck, even Archer scored a proper goals on Saturday and TP can actually play football!! That’s why I’m not all doom and gloom. There’s hope and signs yet - and this bunch, under RM, might just pull it all together at some point and go in a run. Or Get relegated with record low points - either way, mediocrity is not for us! 😁

I think he is giving clear signs that he is more flexible than many give him credit for. Indeed far more flexible than during our Championship season. And do you know why? Because we were not getting beaten every week. The opposite. So there was little incentive or little need to change. Last season, until the last few matches, your point about his unrealistic philosophy ie extremely rigid focus on one style of play alone - held more water, but this season that is objectively NOT the case. If we do go down, and IF he stays, who better than a manager with relevant play off winning experience to get us back up?

I wish it were Wade. I could give up managing this poxy football club then! 😂

If that is your criteria for proof of inability to learn ~ results and points on the board, you are right Charlie. My point is that “ Inability to learn” and how many points we have hit after 7 games are not the same thing. Many sticks to hit RM with this season- if hit him is what you desire - but, “ inability to learn” is not one of them.

Respect your POV but I do not agree. If we only look at the results, individual errors by players and tactical fuck ups by RM in certain matches to date ~ yeah the case is pretty clear. - BUT - Not learning and making a bunch of definitively bad tactical decisions or having a brain fart whilst taking a penalty or letting flukey or offside goals are not the same thing as not learning. For example, six months ago we might have gone to Arsenal and got beat 9-0 playing a more open formation. How many times have you seen Saints start a big lone striker up front under RM???? Never under RM actually. Our tactics on Saturday actually worked for the most part. He, rightly, understood that we needed to be more solid defensively and adjusted team & formation according. Even TP got on the pitch and played alright! The possibility of a hit and run away win at the on form second best team in the country was a decent possibility. If you don’t agree that RM ~ and team - did show learning, did show tactical flexibility, did show ability to amend the supposed tactical dogma by the way he set up the team for that match - fine- but “ incapable of learning” is hopelessly off the mark wrt to RM. And there’s been evidence in more of the matches than I care to recollect that certain new things are working - Aaron is working, Tyler is working, Mateus is working, THB is working, jeez even Adam Lallana is working when he’s on pitch. Call him a slow learner if you need to but inability to learn is NOT one of his, and our players, weaknesses. The players you see that are bit by bit developing - and showing quality- on the pitch might just turn into a team one of these games and surprise you yet. All ( apart from THB) absent from last years teams. Extreme reluctance to detour from his Golden Path - yup, but inability to learn, to change it up, try new things, new players ~ and no evidence to show it either ~ that’s simply not true of Russell Martin.

I’d stick.If you want to get good at something best is to learn the hard way.Want to stay up and prosper Dragan well, you have to be good - not just a EPL survival specialist. PS which is what we used to be btw. Play these EPL teams, learn from them get battered at times by then but still heads up competing and the second half of season return fixtures use what we learned first time out from enough hard lessons to start winning games and those 3 points. There’s no fast way. First half of season is essentially back to school. The Best managers ( see How close Arteta was to losing his job back then..) somehow get continuity. Despite fan mood changing by the last result. I say they Just have to keep playing - and yeah getting battered- but have the right attitude to learn learn learn and never give up. Longer answer ( don’t read if you get bored by such stuff as this) : I want Saints to be one of those “good” teams that can play differing styles of football, all at the very highest level. Long ball or high press or PBF or full press or low block always great set pieces with the best work rate strikers who are deadly, ie they fucking score - defenders who can defend- and attack- class mf’s. But wishing for that is not going to make them appear next week EPL ready. The squad for this year is largely set give or take. Can they play better? Can they be more motivated? Ideally I’d like them to be both but I don’t sense a real issue with motivation- just play style and it’s execution plus a certain dark resignation once the first goal goes in has set in. The play styles to be unpredictable and to change as many times as is necessary as per opponent and in play/match as often as manager sees fit. So they don’t know what to expect unlike now. Back to realism though : Far as I can tell two years ago Saints were shit at EVERY style of football versus EVERY type of opponent and our version of mixing it up in-play involved swopping the Lucazade for red bull at half time. And team morale was “ all for one and all for one” it was terrible and what we have now is miles better believe it or not catastrophe theorists aside. Last year we got quite good at a certain type of football and towards the end even showed ability to mix it up somewhat tactically. This year that certain style and even the mixing it up have all been not working. The certain style of play has not been good enough- largely imo because the fuckers who were meant to score for us are all useless atm - and our defence seems to have a three goals conceded minimum written into contracts for every time we enter the field of play despite a bloody good goalie (imo). A new Manager is not going to sign five new quality starting players to join Tyler, Aaron, mateus and err THB make that 7 new oven ready decent EPL players. He’s going to have to coach-out all the bad stuff and coach-in the better stuff - all in a matter of weeks because if we are ditching the boss after seven games after what he gave us last year the new guy has got zero credit in his bank of saints fan goodwill. Sure as eggs is eggs unless we have got, say at least 7 /8 points from seven games ( relegation form still for latter part of season and from where we start from - but better than what we have atm) the fans will turn on him too. I’d give him a 60/40 against chance which means fair chance we’d need another new manager come January. That one will probably be Adam Lallana until end of season though so rest easy everyone will be happy with that lol.😂 So, getting rid of RM, aside from being effing expensive will not be the only managerial change for us this season is a fair bet. So why go to all that traumatic drama and we look like clowns charade when we can stick with the Manager and give him this season ( and maybe the next if we go down?) Eh stupid idea is it, terrible notion is it? I don’t think so. Seems sensible longer term planning to me especially if by end of year we are down but we sold Tyler for £75m to fund our championship campaign.

So, if you are right and it’s not or only partly because Russell is “ out of his depth” why the hysteria when our unproven EPL Manager and “ strong championship level” squad are essentially where every bookie and every other saints fan thought they’d be? It’s a self righteous wankathon of I told you so on here atm… But hey ho. Saints will try to get Potter then told to eff off with a smirk and end up with either an ex premier league superstar fancies being a gaffer, and/or a German Portuguese or Italian coach who is meant to be the next coming of the Lord football-wise that nobody has heard of before or the even less EPL unproven in management Adam Lallana as a caretaker. All infinitely better choices of course and all instantly “wrong” for the I told you sos on here. And all, indeed, offering far greater chances of staying up & playing good non boring not defensive but super tight high scoring football than sticking with the Antichrist RM. Guaranteed. That is if they last the 7 match probation. Just hope that the new Manager can teach our forwards which is the goal and remind them they are there to score or even shoot from, say penalties or three yards out. Hopefully new manager will get Saints to play better, proper, football( no GK to CB passing allowed) only proper goal kicks for TP to fight for every time - oh and the rule about no shots for forwards to be reversed plus the one about no long balls or crosses also. New Manager will need to get a few of those motivational posters on the home changing room wall saying “ get it in the mixer “ or the cunts cannot score from Row Z”. Id imagine a fines system in place - if we hit more than say four passes before we get into last third everyone gets fined£1000 each so we end up playing proper direct attacking football minimal touches ~ not that fancy passing it around shit like last year which obvs don’t work at EPL unless you are a “ good” club, like most of them are. Maybe one day too we would be a “ good “ club though not sure how we are ever going to get there trying to replicate 1980’s Wimbledon FC.

Don’t think the team looks as bad - given the squad - as the reaction on here suggests. No Cornet no BBD no RF no AA no Les all ineffective latterly. WTF do you lot expect? He can’t pick Haaland and De Bryune you know. Our squad is bottom three material. Our forward line in particular is championship. Stewart is going to do a hell of a lot of running today - by himself by the looks of it. Lallana is clearly unfit. Will unavailable. So Manning is playing. Surprised but wtf guys? Ever thought maybe Taylor was dropped for a reason? Should we play Edward’s or Wood in a back three? God you’d have paroxyms. I know it’s pointless giving a reasoned post at this stage because if it’s not going with the mob view here you will get abused despite being a saints fan just like you - but if RM picked the same team as away to Bournemouth he’d get slated- but he’s changed it in a few ways- and still gets slated. That means he has got no chance with some of you. Fine. Just hope you are not the loyal travelling support. FWIW I think it’s an especially cheap shot to deride his team ( OUR PLAYERS) selection ahead of playing Arse away. Sure you’ll all look clever dissing our players now when we get thrashed - but what eleven could we put out in what formation by what manager would not get beat by them? Support them that’s put out there is what we should do and yeah feel free to criticise the selection - but these convulsions of anger over our own 11 starting players is what I’d expect from Pompey fans - not saints.

Well there’s not a lot anybody can do about it if true. Except moan about it a lot. 😄. Thete is a small chance they read this forum and having recognised your analysis as accurate decide to empower you with all sporting decisions on behalf of the company. Or indeed if you are unavailable, to try sell the club to anyone else, subject to your due diligence of course. 😁

You will hate this but it’s Saturday morning…..That Ipswich goal apparently had an XG of .04 - it most certainly was very unlucky for us to concede from there. Just like the Rothwell goal we will not see one of those again this season. Having said that I do appreciate your existentialist approach to football- it’s all about the here and now. Saints history gives us something to talk about and compare to other than the very last match in the EPL though - for some of us anyway! Our saints support is not based on just the here and now or last result after all- well not for most of us! 😇

Where do you rate our squad in the EPL? I think bottom quarter is generous - bottom 3 / 4 accurate. We are arguably 3 players, at least, short of a mid table team.

If Russell was sacked Tuesday morning ( w/l or d) would it be because according to critics he’s got better players than our current position in bottom five or so? Or because of his style of football? Or because he has lost the dressing room? I personally think our current squad is not top ten material - and after 10th it’s a dogfight. I don’t think SR are going to change the style of football. If they sack RM we will end up with an RM mk 2 ~ IMO~ And I do not think he has lost the dressing room. Quite the opposite. I do not see RM getting sacked at all ~ as long as he and team show they have fight( they do - ask Jack) retain integrity ( ie don’t start flip flopping on how we play) and show signs of development and improvement ( score and pick up points) and of learning in general ( defending in general). Which they are.

Ageee. Current forwards are not converting anywhere near enough from the chances created. Bad finishing basically. Bad luck or bad players? I personally think Archer will come good but I’ve not seen anything from Cornet yet and BBD has been simply a waste of space at left wing. AA started the season nervous as fuck and has not got going at all either. If the finishing from this above was even below average we’d have had two extra goals maybe three from games played in my opinion. As it is it’s been crap. We have created sufficient goalscoring chances from our play - ino - and play that’s disparaged by many atm - but just not scored from them. Forwards not delivering basically. Chances go in then the build up play looks clever, chances missed, Martin out. 😳