The Cat

Thing is a lot of those kids weren't all from Northam, Millbrook etc. Loads from Netley, Hedge End, Bitterne there last night etc. There's a lot 15/16 year olds giving it large at Saints these days. Some even going to Eastleigh games too and acting up. There was a bit of a scrap there after the Grimsby game last weekend which some of them were involved in.

Would have been brilliant. Sure we would have attracted a few players over the summer and been guaranteed to keep those that other clubs are sniffing around. Imagine how gutted my son's mate is who plays for the U16's. He could have been off to Europe for a few games next season.

Thought we gave a good account of ourselves there. Man City have some ridiculous players in that team. Could have done with Ballard being fit and Dibling being fit enough to start, would have made a real difference. Hilarious half arsed pitch invasion from some overexcited 15 year olds after the game. A couple of stewards and security enjoyed taking some of them out.

McCarthy has tried to work on his passing but it's hard, or nigh on impossible, to coach that into someone at this stage of their career. Caballero, however, is one of the best keepers around for passing. His technique is so smooth. Go back a few years and the game didn't dictate that teams needed a keeper to necessarily be great at passing, but with the number of teams pressing high it's moved on to the extent that you can only now really get away with having a poor passer if you set up to allow them to launch it towards a target man. Thrown in to the mix the fact our CB's are quite poor at passing and we really struggle to build from the back. Having a keeper who can distribute well would massively improve us. Last night, a keeper with decent passing would have been able to hit the ball over the press to the full backs or wide midfielders, or pick out someone central sat between the lines and let them move the ball up the pitch. It's imperative we find someone who can do that. They don't have to be Ederson or Alisson quality with their feet as they are on another level, but there will be options around who are far, far better in that department than McCarthy or Forster (not that he'll be here next season anyway)

Prince of Punjab. It's in the backstreets between the cricket ground and the football stadium.

Mostly I'm looking forward to eating an incredible curry in the run down backstreet pub we found in Leicester a few years ago. Genuinely one of the best curries I've ever had. The game, less so. But it's the last one of the season so it's got to be done.

Someone told me he's fractured a leg but I haven't looked to see if that's correct or not.

All our keepers are very average. We desperately need a new first choice one rather than handing out a 2 year contract to a 35 year old who probably wouldn't get in another Premier League team.

Who's going to this? Seems like there will be decent crowd. A good chance to see an in form Saints team play at St Mary's. I'm really looking forward to the game and the prospect of watching the players close up rather than having to rely on the odd stream, match clips and second hand info from people in and around the Academy. Considering just how good Man City are likely to be, I hope that we keep some perspective if the game doesn't go our way. This is a hugely exciting crop of youngsters who have achieved a great deal this season regardless of the result tomorrow.

Fuck. That's mad.

No reason not to go for it in the last 20 minutes. We only really bothered to attack with 5 minutes to go. Might as well lose 3-1 rather than limp towards a 2-1 defeat. Too many players looked like they were playing passively. That's down to Hasenhuttl not fully motivating them, there's other teams with nothing to play for who are still putting in proper performances and battling to get results whereas we have been sleepwalking to the end of the season for too long.

That's them.

I scrolled back at half time waiting for some chumps to slate McCarthy for not saving a shot he probably barely saw. I'm sat right by it, he fucking leathered it. Some people on here are unreal.

Dave Merrington walking around to do his half time interview. Also the U18's are about to come on.

Half time songs going with a royal theme. God Save The Queen but Sex Pistols Now it's that fucking terrible Two Princes song, can't remember who sings it, I've blanked it out.

Did he succeed?

This can't be true?

Agreed. The way people talk to each other on all sides is a societal problem. It's more just shouting than any actual debate, with many not even considering alternative views to those they already hold.

You want a war against people who are, as the dictionary description has it, "well informed and up to date" and "alert to racial and social discrimination or injustice." Seems a bit unfair because, from that description, those people sound alright to me.

Joelinton has started pretty much every game all season apart from the first few matches, and even then he came on as sub. https://www.transfermarkt.co.uk/joelinton/leistungsdaten/spieler/333241

It's not all about squad cost though, and some of the figures in that graph aren't up to date because they are from latest published accounts and not all teams release them at the same time. To give a fair reflection you need to look at wages too. Considering both graphs you can see Brentford, Brighton and West Ham are over performing, while Everton and maybe Leicester are underperforming and the rest are about average. There's a link to another site in that thread which looks more up to date. It includes the top 5 European leagues. Funny to see Everton's squad cost more to assemble than Bayern Munich. https://www.football-observatory.com/IMG/sites/b5wp/2021/wp346/en/ Also Man Utd are massively shit for the money spent, but I guess that was obvious!

Would Everton fans boo the anthem if they were in a final? From that article we'd have to presume they would seeing as they also live in Liverpool.

Yeah, it's only people in Liverpool who use food banks 🙄

Good for him. I hope more people follow his example. I know some US players have come out before although, a bit like Hitzlesperger, I think it happened when they retired.