Holmes_and_Watson

Bite

I tuned in just in time to see us conced a soft second goal. Some animated discussions on the Saints bench. - good to see something there rather than just Ralph pacing up and down. Subs worked well, allowing us to change the shape (not seen the first part to see how horrid 3 at the back was) I don't know if Leeds dropped back a little, but Djenepo and Adam Armstrong looked lively down that flank, with the former tiring before being subbed. Surprised not to see Perraud in the squad. Surprised not to see Redmond in there either. I get that the club are trying to move players on, but it seems like there's a rotation where one week they're dropped and the next they get game time. Not healthy for anyone concerned. I'd like to think that things will settle down towards the end of the window. But it probably won't with no one seeming to want any of them, or waiting as we seem to be to get some financial leverage in the deals. Lavia continued to impress. Bednarek looked very unhappy to be the one subbed. One of them had to be. I can see that it might be his turn in the naughty, dropped corner for the next game. As much form ,as him being one that we might get some pennies for. We look so much better in a formation that allows KWP to attack with enough bodies around him to support. Aribo, Adams (we could have really done with that holding up ability last week. What was going on there?) and then Mara with a lovely pass for the assist. From the bit I saw, we worked hard against a team with a 2-0 lead. How it got to that stage will be interesting to see/read. I can get why he thinks 3 at the back works. But I've not seen our players to be able to defend it, and give us any attacking threat. We looked comfortable with the shift. But was that because Leeds had shifted after going 2-0? Would we have been able to do that from the start? So the bit I saw was nearly all a positive Saints. looking to score goals. But if that was following an utter train wreck of 60minutes there will have to be some long hard looks at the manager. I optimistically went for a 2-0 win for us. But it was a game we needed to win, and should have. Had we not fought back from 2-0 down, and Leeds had sauntered to a win, it would have been hard to see how RH could have continued.

Going for a 2-0 Saints win, although could just be 1-0 due to both teams running out of puff in the heat. RalphBall v2 avoids high energy pressing in these conditions, allowing Saints to get a lead and keep it with their new formation.

Wasn't there a debate here, where someone held up the xG for the game saying that it wasn't that horrible? Then having to be told that Chelsea let us off the hook for large parts of the game.

Bat

I was a lost soul. But Roman oppression allowed me to find my purpose as a member of the Judean People's Front.

Changing personnel for a cup tie isn't that unusual. He gets to give squad players minutes, gives a break to others and gives players opportunities. Were the team that keen to play West ham? Did it disrupt the momentum they had? Was it that fragile that, once lost, couldn't be recaptured? Or was it something to do with personalities, like Ralph being super smug about the win? Making it clear that he could put anyone in his super tactic and get a result? Is there another reason it would upset some players? Or was it just that teams figured us out around the same time, and we failed to adapt?

Like SITS I just read this a couple of weeks ago. An easy read covering both Saints and his achievements since.

Soup

Yup. Vote Banana. 🙂

Oh yeah, it's only the height and not the goalscoring record that would make Ralph interested in Lewandowski 🙂

Pinning our hopes on Barca not being able to register Lewandowski. Ralph will replace Valery with him as the third centre half. Striker's that he'll play as a striker? None 🙂

Ink

Patrol

Missing

With Bazunu, there's the hope of improvement. With McCarthy, the knowledge that it won't 🙂

I'm sure he wanted to have a decent debut, which can bring its own pressure. He was very scowly in concentration yesterday. Panic and nerves will ease once he realises he's got a solid group in front of...ah ...hang on... emergency rewrite... panic and nerves will ease once he realises he's going to be picking the ball out of his net 3 or 4 times a game through no fault of his own anyway. 🙂

Passing thought: If Che has indicated he'd like to move on to Forest or Leeds. Or if the club is in negotiations with one of those to move him on, gaining the funds to buy another striker. Would you still play him? In the first the manager might not be pleased and feels he then has to pick players who want to be here. In the second, with a deal close and the funds needed, they might not want him injured. My instinct is to play him, but I can see some sense in that not having happened.

I'd think he will start. He wasn't at fault for the goals. Distribution a bit wayward, but not to McCarthy levels of random fans seeing their lives flash before their eyes. 🙂

Slow down, relax, take it easy... 🙂

Defence

I'm sure he's trying to do the best he can with what he has at his disposal. But we're not the only club where the manager is only part of the recruitment process, and sometimes they're not even that. I was going to say I'm quite sure he's not bloody minded enough to try dreadful tactics on purpose to show the gape between those and the players he has. But I realise the evidence for that isn't as strong as I'd like based on our run of defeats. 🙂 I'm sure he's not. I guess he's frustrated that, to his mind, his tactics are let down by his players. The new players may take time to settle into their roles and the players he had aren't of the standard he'd like. But there is a point where it's clearly not going to work and other managers are looked at who can get them to perform to a tactic that keeps us up. I hope we get a much more balanced line up against Leeds and we see the start of a turn around under him (preferably with a super Ralphball v2 creative threat).

Medicine

I think you're right. That's the impression I got from some of his press conferences, where it came over more as a club philosophy to the point that he was just going to have to lump it.

Back from a nice dinner which has cheered me up… So, positives from the game… … tumbleweed going past… Perraud came on, so that should mean that we don’t see Djenepo as an attacking full back again. Djenepo and Valery both did well in their involvement for our goal. He showed a few good in attack elsewhere in the game, as did Valery. But that’s where they are at their best. Defensively, they got easily moved out of position by Spurs who then exploited all the room they had been given time and again. KWP had a good opening spell, but Spurs reinforced that side, and that allowed Sessignon plenty of room to run into a second open flank. Salisu’s own goal was very poor, Bednarek gave his opponents plenty of room at times, and Stephens had his poor moments, such as dawdling on the ball, ruining one of our rare good moves. But all three were also having to move out of position to support all that space on either flank. Lavia also looked good, particularly early on. Technically good and composed. But Spurs overran our midfield as easily as if RalphBall v1 was in effect. He wasn’t able to put any bite in to stop that. Not that he could have done on his own anyway. It was good to see JWP involved in a more attacking way, and Romeu is technically capable further forward. But neither were able to offer that much support to the flanks or their back line. I was thinking Romeu should be the furthest back, just as he’s the best at that role. I didn’t see AA before he joined Saints. From what I have seen, he seems to like an early instinctive shot. It would make sense if the team were set up to take advantage of that, or to know to compensate for it. Perhaps RalphBallv2 is supposed to have our attacking fullback get lots of service into him? Perhaps the new midfield three are supposed to control the game, allowing Aribo to set things up for AA’s finishing? Instead, we got AA running between Spurs defenders. He’s not going to hold the ball up. He’s not going to outrun people from the half way line and he’s not going to score wonder goals from there either. I can’t imagine why he’s with us, since it’s not a good match to the way we play. I can only imagine Adams absence is due to an imminent move/ a falling out/ a massive player huff or Ralph thinking that his new tactic will turn around any second now, and being too stubborn to see that it won’t. Aribo did okay, and had a decent chance late on. When he was more attacking, the team lost even more of the limited creativity it had. With the likes of Djenepo and Valery running at players from deep we frequently gave the ball away. Saints struggled to put any decent passing moves together. Possession retention seemed poor. If RalphBall v2 needs a decent amount of time for its automatisms to kick in, then I’m not sure Ralph will have that luxury. An unexpected bonus was finding out that Southampton FC is haunted. The ghost of a failed trialist goalkeeper is possessing a succession of our keepers. It’s the only explanation why all of them are so poor at kicking it. Bazunu was agile and lively. He does seem to think that having a scowly face is going to fool people into thinking he’s a top keeper. No howlers from him, unlike some of his teammates. I do miss the physical presence of Forster in there, but that’s personal preference. When Ralphballv1 worked it was thrilling to watch. Ralph just couldn’t get us to transition from it, when it wasn’t working to find a workable compromise. Either in games or across a longer period. Today was a lot closer to the shambles at the close of last season, than when that tactic ticked. Apart from a little in the opening 15 minutes, were resoundingly second best throughout. It was always going to be a challenge to find us a new approach, or find a solution to the deficiencies in the old one. The clock is ticking. Leeds is a game we should be looking at points from