trousers

Fancy starting a sweepstake on how many will bear this in mind at 14 hundred hours on Saturday when the squad is announced? I'll take 17 (being the wildly optimistic chap that I am).

Does AR-10 work for the Echo now?

They probably couldn't have 'sacked' him as technically he was found to have done nothing wrong, but pushing him to the background (aka gardening leave) would have been an option that didn't flout employment law, one would have thought. That said, and as you say, probably a lot more we don't know about (if indeed there's any truth in rumours at all)

It's a tad bonkers, isn't it? He makes a few u23 appearances and then nothing. You'd have thought VvD's recent suspension would have been the perfect opportunity to reintroduce him to the first team squad. Bit of an odd one, that's for sure.

What's not quite adding up for me is that if Black is the problem then why didn't the club play their 'get out of jail free' card a couple of months ago when the 'cash for favours' story broke? Whilst it transpires there wasn't sufficient (any?) evidence to incriminate Black, surely the situation could have been exploited/engineered such that Black ended up on gardening leave indefinitely? As I say, if the disharmony stories are true and Black is a catalyst, something doesn't quite add up.

Thanks, but got any news that we don't already know or couldn't piece together from all the other posts ourselves? Cheers

Because he keeps getting bites?

This one... Was mentioned on here a while back

Here's a ludicrous conspiracy theory... Could the players have been subconsciously (or otherwise) 'throwing' recent games as a way of bringing the issue to a head? No, thought not, completely bonkers. But... It looks like it would have worked if they had engineered it...

No contest IMO... [vine]5p7VeKEYlg9[/vine]

When I said it was "well written", I was more talking about the articulation and style rather than the content per se. There's plenty in there I don't subscribe to but I'm an admirer of well worded opinions even if I disagree with them. It's the ill thought out rants that tend to rankle

Couldn't see evidence of many votes of confidence in Koeman's ability to turn things around in this thread exactly one year ago : http://www.saintsweb.co.uk/showthread.php?55753-Norwich-V-Saints-Post-match-despair "The real season is over. Limbo until the next season unless we get into a relegation battle." "Could well be looking at a relegation scrap" "Never really looked like scoring - we don't have a top scorer and we do have too many substandard players." "#WeLimpOn...Hopefully we'll get a few more points on the board or could be looking at a late-season relegation scrap." "Something has to change or we will be right in a relegation fight very soon - Koeman's tactics and player choices defy belief" "So, is this the much-vaunted "Southampton Way?"" "Final wake up call before slipping into the coma chaps. Utter sh*te." "to all those people on here that think that we're too good to go down, WAKE UP!!" "awful, truely awful. we are in a fight to stay up. Make no mistake. With the form we are in, the manager saying we 'may' buy a striker in the window (so nothing imminent then)and his tactics. we will do well to stay up. That is realism" "I wonder if RK is set on this job. Few times now made points to Journo's about our ambition and yet again today. he did very little change pretty ovbvious shyte tactics." "I wonder about RK. was last season a one-off where the pieces fell in place for him?" "we will do well to stay up" "Won't be that disappointed when koeman's contract has run out, he plays boring football & odd tactics/substitutions too, he is an average manager who looks like he's just going through the motions & seeing out his time at saints. we need a change to rejuvenate us" "The next month will tell us the club's real intent, prepare to be disappointed." "The sooner Koeman goes the better. Abysmal tactically all season and today was probably the worst he's been" "Koeman continues to pick teams without goalscorers in them (Davis, JWP as 'attacking' players), he doesn't do anything to change the game (because he's too negative) and he consistently picks Wanyama.And it won't be any different next week. Davis will play. JWP will play. As soon as Pelle is fit he'll be back in and Long will be dropped. Wanyama will play." "Koeman has been shown up this season - he seems clueless and does not change things when the game is crying out for a change. Sleepwalking to a relegation battle." "We are in deep, deep sh*t...." "Koeman's inability to turn a game around is worrying...there are too many things going wrong at the same time. Oh well, it's been a while since we had a good relegation scrap." "Don't know why, but I something us not right behind the scenes IMHO. Too many signs of unrest. Getting very worried!" "I feel much of the criticism on here aimed at Koeman has been fair." "Blame for this result lies firmly with Koeman. Zero ambition to try and win the game...Not sure i want to see Koeman given money to spend in January." "Window opens Wanyama loses interest Mane loses commitment Koeman loses the plot!" "RK appears to be blind to the inadequacies of certain players yet continues to play them" "well we're in free fall now" "Yes, we are in a relegation scrap. Something I warned about months ago and which I was constantly derided over. Now it seems my views are mainstream." ( ) "I don't know what the answer is and I am starting to wonder if Koeman, players and training staff do either." "Koeman has the temerity to get things right and goes and changes things around. Too clever at times, just too damn clever....." "We are not qualifying for Europe and we shouldn't get relegated but it is going to be a lot closer than we would like or expected." "my concern is that Koeman is having too much say in who we buy. Right now I would not trust him with any money: his tactics are awful, he never changes things up in time and is adverse to giving the young (JWP aside) players a chance to shine." "he has too much influence on transfers and has been shown this season to be a very average manager tactically. There is little about him as a manager that fits the type we want and need. Doesn't give youngsters a chance, demands too much say in transfers and doesn't play attacking football" "Koeman seems to be having a confidence crisis as much as any of the players. When he first arrived, the football we played was so much more enjoyable that what we saw under Pochettino (far, far, far too much passing for the sake of it without creating anything); we were attacking, direct, and always looked a threat. For some reason, he seems to have gone into his shell a bit and become far more defensively minded." "I find the football under RK in general equally as dull, and wouldn't mind in the slightest if he was sacked tomorrow" "It isn't working except 4-4-2 against Arsenal which he couldn't wait to revert to losing." "Koeman does not coach closing down and winning the ball back.. Pochettino is such a superior coach....Without the ball however we are and have been ever since Koeman took over nothing short of dreadful..." "No doubt about it Koeman has seriously messed up with tactics on numerous occasions this season. No one understands why he hasn't continued with same system that worked so well against Arsenal. Just mind boggling really." And before I get jumped upon for partaking in the age old SaintsWeb Forum trick of selective quoting, all I'm highlighting here is that there were very few threads and posts around this time last year expressing confidence in Koeman's ability to turn things around, which is the only comparison I'm making. What I'm not doing is comparing the amount of "Puel Out" sentiments with any "Koeman Out" sentiments this time last year. There were indeed very few people calling for Koeman's head. I'm simply observing there were equally few people who felt that he/we would have anything close to the stonking second half of the season that we ended up having. For what its worth, I have less faith in Puel turning things around this time than I had in Koeman last season, but what I'm not about to do is rule out that it could happen again.

I would agree that there appears to be less confidence in the manager now than there was a year ago.

It's a well written piece, but slightly undermined IMO with one or two bias-confirmation / history-revising lines, such as: "The point has often been made that we were worse off last season. We hadn’t even reached the Europa League group stage, we were around about 12th in the league and we were on a similar points tally. The difference was that there was always a belief that Koeman could turn it around and he could adjust to pull us out of the rut." Yes, there were those of us then, as now, that were giving the manager the benefit of the doubt, but there were plenty who held the opposite view (again, as now). He obviously wasn't reading this forum 12 months ago...!

Tick

What, get in another manager whose team only play well for 70 minutes...?

Agree, but concerned it would stop him posting on here

Can't believe I need to explain this but here goes nothing.... To recap... An Everton fan told 'USASaints Fan' that we were the worst team he has seen at Goodison this season. My observation is that Everton were unable to breakdown "the worst team at Goodison this season" and were only able to win as a result of our poor defending in the final quarter of the game. Ergo, the way the game panned out informs the observer as much about Everton's credentials as it does ours. At no point was I suggesting that our ability to match Everton's performance for the first 70 minutes but not for the last 20 minutes is a good thing. Quite the opposite. I was simply observing that if Everton struggled to breakdown "the worst team at Goodison this season" then they will struggle more so against the other teams that have done, or will, play better than us at Goodison this season. I guess the one interweb forum crime I could validly be accused of is stating the bleedin' obvious...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/38495434 Putting the 'Community' into 'Portsmouth Community Football Club' since 2013...

Yep, I would have voted 'undecided' too if the option existed. It's still too early to know how the season will pan out. We'll have a better idea at the end of the month.

Given we were evenly matched for over three quarters of the game that says as much about them as it does us.

He already knows that, but it got 4 bites (5 if you count this one) so mission accomplished

Saturday: Lewis Cedric Yoshida Virgil Bertrand Davis Reed Hojbjerg Sims Isgrove Long Subs: Taylor, McQueen, Stephens, JWP, Clasie, Redmond, Barnes Wednesday: Forster Cedric Fonte Virgil Bertrand Romeu Davis Clasie Redmond Tadic JRod Subs: Taylor/Lewis, McQueen, Yoshida, JWP, Hojbjerg, Sims, Long

I'm struggling to understand the rationale behind a new poll a mere 3 days after the last one. Why would anyone change their opinion on the back of 2 results? (Yes, you're right... that was a rhetorical doffing hat to the fickle world of football fandom question) A poll in, say, mid-Feb would be more apt IMO. By then we'll have a better idea of whether or not Puel is capable of turning things around.