SFKA South Woodford

I think this article tells us more about Leibherr and Cortese, namely that they are developing a love for our club, and it's not just going to be an ego toy, or quick fascination. It reports that Markus has been studying the club and it's history and familiarising himself with past results and players and Nicola is showing that nervousness before a game that all supporters go through from time to time. I think the paragraphs down from and including the piece about the match at Charlton and Nicola's comments to their chairman also say something about them, they are ambitious and are not going to hang around forever if things are not going the way that they want them and in a manner in which they want them to, they will act to ensure that progress is made. I may be reading something into this that isn't there, but to me those few paragraphs and especially the one where Pardew says that he doesn't want us to be the Man City of league one, says that Liebherr and Cortese want more than they are currently getting and are urging Pardew to add further players to the squad at whatever cost it takes to get them. So if Pardew hasn't pulled it around sufficently come January, then I think we'll see a bit of a spree. The question is though, will it be Pardew that gets to do the spending?

Well it appears to include having a team of one paced players playing in a formation with no width, drawing as many games as possible with the odd win and a few more losses thrown in, to dance with and then if possible to succumb to relegation, whilst praising the players for doing the bare minimum and bemoaning luck! It's definetly not, so cunning that you coud pin a tail on it and call it a fox!

I think you'll find that there are some amongst our fanbase, that are tired of watching our team serve up the same old sh*te that they have done for the last 2 years, with not much sign of improvement. We have a manager who although improving the squad in some ways hasn't addressed the problem of pace which we have suffered with for so long, and who also is not getting the performances and results from what is now his team. So how long before everyone is allowed to be concerned, perhaps when we have spent £3 million on players and are struggling to get out of the conference relegation zone? I'm not saying that sacking Pardew is the answer, but someone needs to give him a kick up the arse to get him to give our under performing players a good kick to their over inflated ego's and to get him to bring in some players with pace and a resolve to prove themselves capable of playing at a higher level. At the moment our team is not feared by the opposition, for proof of that, you only have to read Trollope's comments posted earlier, teams know that they will only need one or two chances to get something out of us, as we are not strong enough to either kill off or control the game. I think we all desperately want Pardew to succeed, but what we don't want is to have to wait for either another relegation or for another relegation battle before he does, so please Mr Pardew pull your finger out of your ar*e, and give us performances and results that we can be proud of!

Le God I almost totally agree with what you say here, the exception being the reason for lumping the ball long. Yes it would be good to see Kelvin bowl the ball out and us build our attacks from the back, but as all the teams know we don't have the pace to hurt them, they push up and play a high line leaving the midfield area looking more crowded than a Mumbai commuter train, and since we don't have a Le Tiss type who can weave his way through this crowd, we have no option but to lump it forward to push the opposition back, which still does us no good as we don't have the pace to reach it. I know this sounds very negative, and i'm not advocating any slashing of wrists, but the fact that we have a lot of possession, but are not achieving the results that the level of possession should be bringing bears this out as the possession is in our half or the midfield. Pardew has a solution to this problem, and that is to make us more dangerous, making the opposition fear us more, and the easiest way to do that is to bring in players with pace. Until that is done, opposition teams will crowd the midfield and know that their chance will come in the game, and whilst we are only one goal ahead we are vunerable. Totally agree with your other points though, we have to start winning more than we are losing or drawing and to be just below the play off places at the end of this season to stand any chance of a push next season, we must have that mentality that comes with winning regularly, before we can think that we'll go up next season. The minus ten should not be a psychological factor, as once it's gone, we are not going to be suddenly magically released from some yolk of repression, we will be playing, as always for points and the first goal is the amount that gets us out of and then away from the relegation zone. Which we are no nearer achieving than we were before the season started, the only good thing that you can say about this, is that we are no further away, but that is only a small blessing.

Again points dropped! Again we can say that we were the better team and played so well we should have won, but how long is it going to be before that starts sounding like a broken record, and people realise that all these draws are what has cost us so dearly over the past few seasons? The erradication of the minus ten is not the big issue, the fact that we haven't gotten any nearer to getting out of the relegation zone is! We desperately need pace in the team, every team in our division can see that, so know that they are going to see at least the same amount of the ball as us in matches and in a lot of cases will see more with their superior pace and resulting workrate. Pardew has got to get some more pace in the squad and soon, he should do a deal with teams for loans now, with us paying a fee to make them permanent once the window reopens, in order to get full commitment from the incoming players. If this is not rectified soon, we wont be treading water any longer, we'll be sinking, as there will come a point where we aren't being unlucky to draw rather than win!

In my opinion playing Waigo out wide would be a waste, especially at the moment. The centre backs in most teams, especially those in our division are slower and therefore more vunerable to pace than fullbacks, so play Waigo where he can be most dangerous, i.e from Lamberts flicks and Lallana or Schneiderlins through balls. Yes we need pace out wide but really need dedicated wingers with it, who can also deliver a decent cross and have the trickery to beat their opposite number and the fullback. Playing Waigo out wide would not only be a waste of his attacking threat, but given that we already manage to beat the full back on occasion, only for Saga and Lambert not to have the pace to get in the box to profit from it. So Waigo may do all the hard work of getting into position to cross only to find that he then has to check for Saga and Lambert to catch up. Waigo has to play down the centre to create more space for Lambert, once he's free of having the centre backs playing right on top of him all game, we'll start to see Lambert striking more of the type of goals he became known for last season.

Totally agree with that. You only had to see the difference on Saturday between the three corners in succession taken by Mills 'which actually looked dangerous and led to panic in Yeovils penalty area' and the one straight after taken by Lallana 'which just floated with no pace straight into their keepers hands' to know who should be taking our corners. On the subject of Papa, we now know that Pardew is looking to bring in some more pace from his comments on Monday evening. Perhaps we could do a deal with Colchester for Lisbie, just like the one that Boro have done with Preston for St Ledger. He looked the best player on the pitch the other week at St Mary's and although playing as an attacker, his pace allowed him to get back break up our attacks and then get forward again while they were in possession, with better service from his team he would have punished us, as he almost did when he hit the bar with the one half chance that they did create for him. I'm sure that he'd create the space that Lambert needs for us to get the best out of him, and he also has the strength to hold the ball when it's lumped up to him, so Lambert wouldn't always have to play with his back to goal, as he does at present.

Ajax have done something similar in the Amsterdam Arena. When I was walking through on Saturday, I was hoping to see further progress made on it from the day of the Colchester game, but was saddened to see that someone had already attempted to deface it with a spray can, and written on it with a marker. Why do people feel the need to destroy and deface, rather than build, create or just admire?

Whenever one walks into the gym in Basingstoke wearing a scumpey rag, I always have to say 'You skate b'stard' I went to scumpey last Saturday and was unfortunate enough to be on the first train through Fratton to Portsmouth Harbour after their game, so saw tons of the b'satrds. On the way home an hour later I was singing the 'Your sister is your mother' song and said you skate b'stard several times when I saw one of them on the station. Never disliked them that much, until they tortured me by playing Peter ******** Kay over and over again at krap nott arf, in the relegation season. I will never forgive them for that pain. On the subject of sh*te music at football matches, which ar*e at Saints was responsible for playing that c*nt Morrisey after the Colchester match the other week? Was he thinking we weren't depressed enough already!

Just to make it clear, i'm not suggesting that we should sack Pardew anytime soon, just that he might not have as much time as some think. I remember reading a comment from Pardew pre season, where he said that both his and Cortese's expectations for this season were to achieve a play off place to start with and then cortese was looking for a top two finish. So pretty high expectations, and so far I personally doubt that Mr Cortese has been that much more impressed with the teams performances than the majority of our supporters. I'd say that Pardew still has a few months to turn that around and get us to a point where we are not only the best performing team in the division, but also winning the vast majority of our matches, or I suspect Mr Cortese will take action to match the investment and level of achievement expected in kind. Make no mistake about it either, this division will be even harder to get out of next season, and will require not only a greater level of investment, but also the incentives and managerial appeal to attract those better players which will be needed for promotion. You only have to look at how much Hull struggled to attract quality players to their squad over the summer, to know that money alone is sometimes not enough. We know getting out of the Championship at the top end is going to be very hard to achieve, and will most likely take 3 or more seasons, 1 year to stabilise after promotion, a 2nd to build a team for the promotion push and a 3rd to actually gain promotion, so I doubt hanging around in League 1 will be in Mr Cortese and Mr Liebherrs 5 year plan. Especially when you consider that they actually want it to take less than those 5 years to reach the promised land. We now have a run of games that are definitely winnable, so should be expecting to be at least twelve points better off by the end of October, but hopefully more like sixteen. So, I can see why Mr Cortese is happy to wait to appoint a sporting director.

No what's pathetic is that UEFA have no back bone, they did the right thing in the first place, as he was blatantly cheating. It's unlikely that they will get another as blatant instance of cheating for some time, so they should have upheld their original decision and sent a message to the cheats, that it will no longer be tolerated. Yes, he would have been unlucky to have been the first to have been punished for it, but it needs to be stamped out and UEFA have to start somewhere, even if it's against a player who plays for an English club. Cheating will always be a part of the game, but this form of blatant cheating should be stamped out through heavy punishments of those found guilty. It seems today that cheats will be allowed to prosper by UEFA!

The other thing that is so frustrating about our crossing is that no one ever wips it in low around the back of the defence. Defenders hate having to deal with the ball when they are facing their own goal, which results in the occasional own goal, when was the last time the opposition scored an own goal against Saints? Now we have Waigo, we should be utilising his pace and getting some low crosses in behind the oppo defence, with him getting in amongst the defenders, we just might start scoring more than one goal a game!

How can you say we are very much heading in the right direction? We are getting further away from safety each week, let alone anything else. Last season we played some great football and were unlucky to lose on a number of occasions at the start of the season, then before we knew it, we were in a relegation battle, as we just couldn't win and kept drawing or losing games. Which is what is happening now, but with the points deduction we were already in the battle, and are currently giving our opposition in that battle more of a head start. Yes, in theory we have a squad which should be capable of winning that battle, but just how much of a head start can we afford to give our opposition, before we find that we have a mountain to climb and someone forgot to pack the rope. I do agree that the defence looks slightly stronger now 'Although on Saturday there were still a couple of occasions when all of them turned into statues, most notably when Lisbie went through and hit the bar' but the attack is still woeful as is the creativity from midfield. I've always thought that Lallana would eventually come good and would be the creative spark from the midfield, but am not so sure now, as he looks like a show pony, he runs around a lot but delivers little and his crossing and corner taking are utter rubbish. Padew needs to tell them that they first have to match the oppositions effort 'not emulate their style of play', and get themselves a decent lead, then they can start to play with the tricks and flicks that they seem to want to, as at the moment their effort stinks. All of the attacking players need to become more mobile, and instead of worrying about covering the opposition players, they need to make the opposition worry about them by finding space and pulling the opposition defenders and midfield out of shape. They could also do with a lesson in vision and when to release the ball, as we are far too often caught in posession, or hold the ball for too long missing opportunities to get some width. Pass and move Mr Pardew, pass and move.

Will, did you say the same about Wotte? I very much doubt it, so what's the difference between last season under Wotte and this season under Pardew? Kelvin said on more than one occasion, that Wotte had prepared the team really well, but that the team hadn't put it into practice on the pitch. If Pardew is not having an effect on the players through his words, actions or tactics, why shouldn't he take the same stick that Wotte did? What makes one under performing team different from the other? As for those asking what others would have done with the team yesterday, well I wouldn't have gotten into that position, as i'd have signed the players we needed when they were more readily available, and would have worked on strengthening the defence and our attack a lot sooner. Pardew made a rod for his own back by not acting more swiftly in the transfer market. We still have a squad which is lacking any quality in depth, if Waigo does have pace, and gets injured we'll be back in the same situation of being a one dimensional team again.

I understand your point of view, but after nine games, is it wrong of our fans to expect to see a marked improvement in the team and their play in a match? From what I witnessed yesterday we aren't improving much, that performance was only fractionally better than at Swindon!

Well, when we get into European competition, we know we'll be ok when we are drawn against Juve.

Could be that we have Mr Cortese to thank for Papa, one of the deals he has previously been involved in at Banque Heritage could have involved Fiorentina or given that he's Italian, he may have some connection with Fio. Pardew may have spoken to Nani, to get a football perspective on the deal, before giving his approval.

Would be a bonus if he can find the net regularly, but it's equally important that the threat of his pace keeps the opposition defenders deeper in their half, giving Lambert more space to play in, so we should see just how deadly he really is.

Still happening, I think you'll find we still kick off and immediatly hit the ball out to the right wing, usually straight out of play!

Yes they can, several posters have said that we need a pacy striker. We are allowing teams to play a high line against us as we do not have the pace to push them back. We urgently need someone who will change this, and as a result create a bit more space for Lambert to work in, where we will see his full potential. At present when our wide players do manage to beat their full back, Lambert is starting from a deep position where his lack of pace doesn't allow him to attack the cross. Resulting in the wide players having to check and the opposition being able to get back in numbers, snuffing out the threat. From what i've read on here and seen with his displays against Swindon and Brentford, Mellis isn't exactly many peoples cup of tea, if we are going to play an unproven kid from another team in our side, he should be a hell of a lot better than any of the kids we have on our books, he isn't, and he doesn't appear to be more than a luxury at the moment. So Mr Pardew looks to have given us a dud in Mellis. Trotman does look good, but the worry with him is that he's only here until Christmas, when the period that will now be crucial for Saints is going to be after Christmas, with the current status of the team as we will not have enough points by then to have a comfortable second half of the season. We need at least one more centre back, preferably two, given our injury history over the last five or six seasons. Finally, I am, I do not want Wotton anywhere near a football pitch while wearing a Saints kit, sign someone else as cover for Hammond or have Gillet on the bench instead of him.

We need two pacy strikers, one of whom has already managed to hit the back of the net regularly, and one who is an up and coming player to be understudy. Then we need to get at least one more centre back, but two would be nice. Whitbread and Saejis will do very nicely and give us some real competitiveness at the back. I know Whitbread is looking for a higher level, but he may come here if he was paid enough and knew that with the right players added alongside him we would be promotion contenders. Saejis as we know would be a good squad addition, and would be more than adequate when called upon. And to finish with, a couple more midfielders wouldn't go a miss, a pacy winger with a dangerous cross 'Rose of Northampton looked pretty good in this role against us' and an experienced midfielder who can tackle and make some decent passes to his team mates rather than the opposition players. That would give us a good squad to get us to the upper reaches of the league, by the turn of year and then push on for a play off place or to build a solid base to mount a challenge for promotion next season.

Agree with that, and was fully prepared to give it my all, until I saw that the players reaction to going behind in the game was to serve up the exact same sh*te that they had last season and either play statues or give their impressions of headless chickens. That totally drained me 'and I would think many others' of any passion and will to chant, and replaced it with frustration and anger. The team were pathetic and no amount of positive chanting was going to improve their performance. To be fair though, for the last 5 to 10 minutes when they actually started to show a little bit of fight, our support 'including me' did get behind them and roar them on, the fight starts with them, and if they show some, the fans will roar them on. So for those saying the support was a disgrace, I give you the team and their performance on the evening, as the real disgrace to Southampton football club that night.

Well Swindon had a well over six foot right back with pace playing for them the other night. So if Danny Wilson can manage to find one, Pardew should be able to do the same.

Totaly agree with that Lordswood, Pardew must have been trying to prove a point. He didn't seem even to try to talk to the players and give them directions more than a couple of times, looked happy to just stand there and watch. Either that or he was too frightened or upset to say anything to them. That was an absolutely shocking display and one that disgusted every fan I spoke to on the way home from the match, the team were absolute crap with only Kelvin coming out with any credit, so I cannot understand how Pardew is saying that there were some good performances out there last night. That was a totally inept and unacceptable display, which the management need to get to grips with and eradicate.

A word of caution for any who like me, are travelling by train tonight and wanting to get home via the Reading/Basingstoke line rather than through London. There are only two trains back to Reading after the game with connections to Basingstoke, which leave Swindon less than ten minutes apart, around 10.20. The first only gives a three minute connecting time for 23.07 service to Basingstoke and the second will mean waiting at Reading for twenty odd minutes for the 23.34 train. The word of caution is that all of the trains running on the Reading to Basingstoke line at that time of night only have two carriages, so with the level of support we are taking for the game, it will be very tight in those carriages and will be best to get there sharpish. Otherwise taxi's back to Basingstoke will be expensive, usually £30 some odd quid, for a 15 mile twenty five minute journey. See you all there, hope the atmosphere will be electric in our ends.