Saint_clark

Not Stephens FFS, surely the last game has reminded everyone why he shouldn't even be an option off the bench.

Maybe we should put him up front, he started as an outfield player after all. It's hilarious that he's never looked more confident in going for the ball than when he's in the opposition box. What's the lesson, "you aren't as good as Real Madrid"? I think they might have known that already.

Kevin Danso centreback for Spurs going third in the league tonight. Him and Van Der Ven were immense. Another player slated by Saints fans way too early due to poor performances with no consideration given to him being a young player playing out of position in a new country for the first time.

Right...because they are better at taking the chances they create than we are. You're making out that Saints are the only side engaging in the stats side of the game and that's why we're struggling - news flash, the majority of professional teams in the world use these stats to analyse their players and team performances now.

Similarly, Che Adams up front in this team would make all the difference.

Agreed, gone are the days when the manager is in charge of everything. If the sports science department says a player is fit and the player doesn't say otherwise, the manager will go by what they say. Football clubs don't invest heavily in those departments just for them to be ignored.

There's no faith being put in anything. It's just another way of tracking certain stats. Our XG tells us that we are creating a lot of chances and some of them very good, but our finishing is poor - something we have all said anyway.

I used 90% as an example because that's what you hear people saying, even though as you said it's nonsense. XG has shown us that.

What is the way you'd verbalise an historical 90% (or any other percentage) conversion rate of a specific type of chance then?

They must have genuinely thought Stewart would stay fit, which makes me wonder whether someone in the medical/sports science department who signed off on his fitness reliability will be given the boot.

You know when someone misses a chance and someone in the pub says "that gets scored 9 times out of 10"? That's just another way of saying an XG of 0.9.

I'm not far off it at the moment.

Somewhere in the match thread I think, I don't know mate I've been experimenting with increasing the ratio of Kraken to ginger beer, i'm starting to get some results.

I can't be bothered to post my reasonings multiple times in multiple threads. I know I'm not only in the minority but seemingly on my own here.

Other than Stephens on for Scienza, I agree. Another manager comes in to improve us, we play a different way and we create chances which the players are still missing because their finishing ability is still the same. What then? I said it earlier, at least with Still he is honest that we aren't where he wants us to be. Last season listening to Martin say "this is how we want to play and it will work eventually" was fucking infuriating.

Yep. I still think he can build something with us. I don't see any realistic options that would improve us. And I don't count Adkins as realistic because SR would turn their noses up at him.

What I will say, call it nostalgia or sentiment - I'd take Adkins back in a heartbeat. Fuck me we need some of his infectious positivity and belief around the place.

Still annoyed that we allowed ourselves to be used for one last prem payday after the way that prick acted to get his move to Liverpool.

I don't understand how manager after manager thinks Stephens can be relied on. I can't wait for him to finally leave the club so we never have to worry about him again.

Jesus Christ no. His last few jobs have ended horrendously, including taking Blackburn down to league one, and he has serious health issues.

50% of them under Will Still in the last 12 games 😉

As others have said I'm not sure he's interested in getting back into management.

They say never go back in football. Would be feel there's unfinished business maybe? I still think he'll have offers abroad in top flights though.

I'm from the school of thought that they're professionals and should be able to, but Shea getting injured kind of proves his point. And Leo isn't exactly well built, I can see him running out of steam. It's just bringing on Stephens for him that was fucking indefensible. Even if he'd brought on the young lad up top, put Fraser on the left and Armstrong back out right it would have made more sense. Stephens just ran around in circles looking confused, I'm not sure he made a single tackle or pass.

Looking at available managers and ruling out the likes of Ange who would be obviously unrealistic, the best we can hope for would be someone like Gerrard or Carrick.