Dan Johnson

Kevin Phillips - Thought we'd have the perfect "big man/small man" combo with him alongside Beattie. Dani Osvaldo - 1 Goal Every 2 Games for Roma, 3 Goals in 4 for Italy the year we signed him. Saints, Signing Italys Current Number 9!!! looked every inch the super star when he turned up and was a peak "Cortese" signing, honestly felt like it was the start of the club competing for the top 4. Ryan Bertrand - felt like at the time it was an extremely shrewd signing and was really excited!!! I thought he looked every inch the natural successor to Ashley Cole at Chelsea, every time I saw him play. When we were finishing 5th/6th/7th I thought for those 3 seasons he was probably the best left back in the league. Mr consistent for the majority of his time with us, maybe one of our best ever value signings in my eyes. Aaron Ramsdale - Dont think we've signed a player with a bigger reputation in some time

Comical Defending aside, frustratingly that’s a better performance than against forest. There’s positives, pretty much every signing looks like a step up in quality from what we have. Suga, Ramsdale, Fernandes, Archer, Lallana. Then we have Dibling coming in. familiar old faces letting us down today, Stephens, Adam Armstrong missing, Bednarek. As soon as Dibling/Fernandes came on they offered us soo much more, getting the ball on the half turn and allowing us to beat the press, it pushed the game 10/15 yards further up the pitch. Then we can play our possession game with our CBs closer to the half way line. With Smallbone constantly having his back to the opposition goal the ball always comes back to our CBs and allows opposition to press and puts us under pressure. Games after the international break will tell us if Martin is learning the harsh and quick lessons he needs to, we need to see more of the new signings/Dibling and less of the old guard, harsh maybe, but necessary, 4/5 have already proved why they’ve struggled at this level previously. if we see the same starting 11 against Utd than we did today, fans will turn on Martin

Worth Noting that the Turkish and Belgian transfer windows don’t close tonight, 2 weeks for Turkey and a week for Belgium so we could still see the likes of Tall Paul and ABK leave even if they’re still here at 11:01 tonight

Tough Watch. switching to the 5 at the back worked for us at the end of last season, made us harder to break down, got us through the playoffs after a thumping by Leicester, however I thought today the formation smothered our work. When you play 3 centre backs, 1 CB has to step into midfield in possession or a striker has to come deep (like che used to) otherwise your midfielders are overrun, that was the case until their goal and we switched to a back 4. One of our three centre backs never stepped up, the 2 front players were so so wide and never dropped inside. So we looked cluttered and slow in possession as our only option and free man being a ball back to the CBs or along the back 3, having the 2 strikers out wide also pushed the wing backs inside and into traffic... again slowing us down in possession. We never looked like scoring until the formation change. Few players also looked a bit lost\out of their depth today, Smallbone, Armstrong. lets hope it was more down to the formation than the levels. Dibling looks a positive

According to this https://www.transfermarkt.co.uk/premier-league/einnahmenausgaben/wettbewerb/GB1 We have the 7th Highest Net spend this summer (€-51.56m) and are 11th for money out (€63.15m) We know Leicester are likely to get a large points deduction in September but there are other clubs who are sailing extremely close to the wind when it comes to profit and sustainability rules, making it look like we are under spending, when we’re not. 1 bad season could see a few clubs in real trouble over the next season or so, we have to find that balance of spending enough to stay in the premier league but not risking the clubs future. I’d like to see us get a few loans in now and I suspect we wont see much movement until the last week of the window at this stage

At £7m I think he’s an excellent buy, was expecting £15m! I think he’ll get 10-15 goals in the prem. Seems to fit the Martin mould too, was at Blackburn with Armstrong and Taylor Harwood Bellis (Rothwell too) so we know what kind of character we are buying into. i think he’s an upgrade on Che, time will tell how much of an upgrade

I remember listening on the radio round my next door neighbours, I must have been about 11? can’t remember what radio station it was but they always used to play the piano riff of Bruce Hornsby’s that’s just the way it is at the final whistle 👌 I don’t remember much but I remember it being a must win and celebrating like made when we scored

Only just came back to pre-season, exetended break due to the euros

Lis looks terrible

SAA and Dibling should be breaking into the first team this season, they both look like they're clearly at that level now

Absolutely, you know that if we did give youth a chance last season and it didn't go well, the same people complaining about losing our best youth players now, would be saying "same old saints, took the cheap option"

Allot of harsh comments on Che. In terms of effort, he always gives 100% and you cant really ask for more than that. As an outlet, with his hold up play, he was one of the best, he did the dirty stuff well. His link up play at times last season was superb, he was a big part of the way we played for the majority of the season. We all know his finishing was his downfall, the miss against Middlesbrough and the miss against wolves immediately spring to mind and ultimately that's what he was judged on, however with the rest of his all round play, if he could hit the target more often, he wouldnt have stayed with us anyway, he'd be playing for a bigger club. Good luck to him, I wish him well, he deserves more credit from us as a fan base but ultimately i'm excited to see who he could be replaced by.

Downes and Smallbone both exceptional tonight, their effort on and off the ball won us the game. id love to give Smallbone man of the match for his goal and contribution but Downes was just so so good. shout outs to McCarthy for some good saves and solid keeping. Highlighting how far Bazunu still has to come. Bednarek has been consistently reliable, easily in the top 3-4 performers this season. Armstrong gets the plaudits but so many around him doing great work. really happy with the result. scenes at the end with fans on the bit, especially those goading the West Brom fans was cringingly embarrassing

Jesus, reading through this thread you'd have think we lost 4-0, where on earth has all the negativity come from? Seems allot on here are basing their reaction on their anti RM agenda rather than basing it on the actual performance\game. Its was a good Away performance, in tough conditions. I felt we edged a tight game and I go into Friday allot more confident than before yesterdays game.

hearing this interview and his sky interview, where he talked of players in “preservation mode” and “playing for themselves” and saying “players that will run will start” in the next games I took the statement “we don’t lose 5-0 if jack plays” as more of a reference to Jack Stephens mentality and work ethic than his ability.

Its the players, Russell Martin cant take the blame for Brooks missing an open goal, Adams missing when through 1 on 1 with the keeper, countless chances we've put over the bar or wide in good positions. Not just in this game but in game after game after game...

Tough to read sometimes. All the negativity towards RM and his tactics, I think we go 2-0 BECAUSE of his tactics and it’s back to 2-2 because the players start becoming nervous and completely lose their composure. The amount of times we give the ball away isn’t because of tactics in my opinion. i agree subs can be questionable at times, and I’m not particularly keen on not sticking with the settled back 4 that saw us go on such an incredible unbeaten streak, but allot of the stick is unwarranted

double post

Found a way to win today, when the performance didn’t deserve it, which is exactly what Ipswich done against us a few weeks back, so I’m chuffed, because up until the winner, it felt like we were finding a way to bloody lose it! the result is obviously hugely more important than the performance at this stage of the season, so let’s keep the focus on the positives, 5 more wins and we’re promoted automatically in my opinion. the way we won might be the most significant thing about today, the results going our way, the last minute winner… the squad will feel the momentum swinging in our favour. freshen the squad up for Tuesday. Brooks, Stephens, aribo and Adam Armstrong all need rests.

Logged on to say the same thing 😄 got to be there to score them I suppose, king of the "Bundle" goal

I’ve felt the Charlie move was inevitable over the last few weeks, his appearances in the league have been restricted to 5-10 minute cameos and with the Rothwell signing adding more competition you had to wonder which player was likely to move on, with Charlie the most likely. £35m option is good money. Gutted it hasn’t worked out as well as we’d all hoped it would this season, it’s allot easier to swallow than it would have been last Summer, though. Amazing to think if Charlie leaves, the only players remaining and born outside of the UK will be Laros, Sulemana, Mara and Bednarek. I wonder if one of the strategies is to buy players from the home nations!?

I bloody love a last minute goal. I can not understand for the life of me, fans that are complaining about them. It’s the best way to win a game!? Surely there’s no better indication of the teams desire and determination than a last minute goal, trying till the very end. Im old enough to remember the Man Utd of the 90s, you just knew they’d always score late because they never gave up, the famous Chmspions League final commentary sticks in my head “can they score, they always score”they never gave up, “Fergie time” it was called back then. i had that same feeling watching us today, attack after attack in that second half, I just knew we’d score. 87th minute winner vs Sheff Wed 97th minute equaliser vs Norwich 94th minute winner vs Plymouth 95th minute winner vs Hull 96th minute equaliser vs Preston 93rd minute winner vs Millwall Some of the football in the second half was just immense to watch, it really was.

Yep, completely agree. 7 Pts from Leeds at home, Stoke away, Rotherham at home. Bitterly disappointed to not take the 3pts today, but I'd have taken that points return from those 3 fixtures at the beginning of the season every day of the week!

Frustrating result, should have won but 7pts out of 9 from the those last 3 games is a decent return. hope the fan who suffered a medical emergency is recovering, very distressing scenes

Hoping we come out of this game with a positive goal difference. 4-0/5-0 I hope 🤞