trousers

Our 2-0 victory Vs Chelsea on Boxing Day in 2019 set us up for our superb run in 2020, so have faith!

Good point. I was going to mention Theo on a thread earlier actually. I do think we miss his movement a lot. He creates space for others. Probably no coincidence our form has stayed low whilst he's been out

Egg

Maybe it'll all start to go right again if we exercise a little patience and pragmatism ?(I know, I know... The hope of patience + pragmatism on a football forum is chortle central)

And none of them had Saints performing as a top 6 side for a whole calendar year. Swings and roundabouts... #onlyfocusonthebadstuff

Fair point

Indeed. If you look back at posts around November time, you won't find anyone telling us how it was all about to come crashing down around our ears and our form was about to plummet like a stone, and yet if you read certain posts this afternoon it was always likely to happen... The words 'wise', 'event' and 'after' spring to mind...

Fair point @SKD. I think Bednarek would make a decent captain. He seems pretty vocal? I've always said we're too nice though, and that starts with the captain. I would bet we are one of the teams with the lowest number yellow cards for dissent....

No thanks

Some thoughtful and considered analysis there @Dusic 👍 I guess there's an element of chicken and egg regards performance Vs impact of poor decisions. As I think someone posted on the match thread, players are only human and you can end up in a vicious spiral of poor decisions from the match officials leading to demoralisation which leads to poor reactions and/or performances. The biggest issue to me (that we have control of) is how we often come out playing after the half time break seemingly one or two gears lower than what we finished the first half in, both physically and mentally. Maybe teams are simply getting wise to our hell-to-leather approach to the first 45 minutes in the knowledge that we'll take our foot off the gas in the 2nd half. Dunno. The thing that fustrates me most with Saints is how we can go a whole flippin' calendar year as one of the top teams in the country and then, at the flip of a coin, turn into one of the poorest teams. Never a dull moment being a Saints fan though...

Pragmatism? On the Saintsweb Forum? What on Earth were you think of man?!

You've surely been a member of the Saintsweb Forum long enough now to know the answer to that? (Unless you were being rhetorical of course... )

Indeed. It's not complicated... (Well, for some it might be...)

Sounds like we'll have to agree to disagree. Just different opinions. No worries.

So, you rule out a different result if the Wolves penalty isn't given? #mysticmeg

It only takes one piece of 'bad luck' (aka woeful officiating) not to happen for the result of one of those games to have been different

...

Why didn't Ralph's 'limited tactics' trip us up in 2020 as much as they're supposedly tripping us up now...?

Indeed. We had plenty of poor second half performances during our 'top 6 form' run in 2020, but we were able to ride out the storm more often than not. Whilst not the sole factor, the woeful officiating has definitely been the straw that broke the camel's back on numerous occasions in recent times.

It was far post, not near post

Close! Edit: offside anyway

Just because we started the 2nd half poorly doesn't mean the woeful officiating didn't make a significant difference. It did.

House!

Incorrect