VectisSaint

Did I miss Boufal signing? Has his injury suddenly healed and he is fit to play? There are some seriously deluded people on here that claim not to be able to see that we are not OK this season. Yes we were poor last season early on with RK and also around Christmas, but being poor now does not mean all is well because all was well last season. RK got things working well eventually by going against what the Club wanted, changing style and tactics and upsetting the Board, eventually costing him his job. Does it look like CP will do the same? Does it heck as like. Our back 5 has not changed but we have lost the defensive shield that was Vic (I like Romeu but he is not Vic and at the moment seems to be struggling in this role). We have lost out creative spark, and no sign at the moment of that being replaced in the next few games at least. Its going to be a long hard season.

U23s being stuffed at Sunderland.

Is that what it was? Looked like the groundsman had gone to work after a heavy night on the falling down water. No wonder the linos had a terrible time with their decisions with all of those skewed lines in the grass.

The EFL Trophy is for Under 21s (as of June 30 2016) not u23s. 6 of the starters must be u21. It is PL2 that is for u23s. Hopefully Saints will see sense and play the same squad as for PL2 games which will allow some of our more senior youngsters (such as Stephens, Isgrove, etc) rather than try to make a different team specifically for this tournament. It is a farce that the EFL trophy and PL2 have different rules but that's how it is (AFAIK, I was caught out by the late PL2 rules change, so maybe the EFL Trophy has been changed as well, but all the bumf seems to suggest it has not been changed since it was announced). Trouble is the PL2 team have 2 games in 3 days as they play Sunderland tomorrow, so may be there will be some "rotation". Lewis, Valery, Stephens, Wood or Jones, McQueen, Reed, O'Connor, Johnson, Olomola, Hesketh, Gape.

Seems unlikely, we need to have keepers for all of our teams, sometimes the u23s and 1st team have games close together. We are 4 keepers down on the end of last season (Stek, Kelv, Gazza and Britt) and people are surprised that we have signed two to replace them. I said 2 or 3 weeks ago that we would have to sign another keeper before the window closes, must admit thought we would sign someone younger, but its a necessity and suggests that Gazza is still thought of as a future keeper for Saints rather than how it might have seemed. Guess we'll see Taylor in the matchday squad a few times, but will probably not make an appearance unless FF or McCarthy pick up an injury..

So its probably cheaper by train now. Eurostar to Paris, TGVto Milan. Nice journey, more relaxing than flying and doesn't take much longer door to door. Sadly I will be in Milan about a week before the game.

Who were these 3 successive managers who ignored him? Only Koeman "ignored" him by sending him out on loan twice. He played 48 times under Adkins and Poch and scored 8 goals, this was despite his injuries (most notably his dead leg which was still affecting him last season). He's gone now but people should stop peddling nonsense.

Appears in the training pics today, looks like he is close to be available again.

Pied

Gone to Accrington Stanley Guess something is happening as some morons have been playing with Wiki today. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simone_Zaza

He really hasn't. Apart from his wonder goal, he is/was very poor as a defender, really looked completely out of his depth. Whenever he played he looked like he didn't have much of a clue what to do and had to be "coached" by Jose or Virgil depending on who was playing alongside. Usually meant he was pushed up almost in to midfield, left us playing 3 at the back at times, even when we were "supposed" to be playing 4 at the back. Don't get me wrong, I liked him, nice guy, always seemed happy, but was not up to the standards required of the PL. He was an Erwin signing and clearly Erwin has a soft spot for him and would like him at Everton. Good luck to him.

I don't agree with the posters who say we only have 6/7m extra anyway. OK, so we have given increases to some players, but we have sold/released at least 8 players, including some top earners (Vic, Pelle, Mane, Ramirez), and only replaced them with 4, at least two of which are going to be relatively low earners (Pied and McCarthy). If our wage bill has gone up or even stayed the same as last season with those changes then there is something drastically wrong.

They have at least two options in Dublin, they have played their last two rounds at two different stadiums in the city because Oriel Park is not up to UEFA standards (Aviva and Tallaght which are both UEFA standard, Shamrock Rovers use the Tallaght for UEFA games, not just qualifiers). The chances of both Dublin stadiums being unavailable are slim. If so they could appeal to UEFA to switch the home and away games with opponents if required, and UEFA will agree. Maybe they can also use Croke.

We should be 4 or 5 up by now. Very one-sided game (I missed first 10 minutes).

Maths not your strong point then...

Hadn't seen it until last night on MOTD2. Was never a pen. Clasie did not make even the slightest contact and Shaw tripped over his own feet. I am not wearing saints tinted specs, I got mine from Specsavers. Never a pen in a hundred years. Clasie could not say much because of the new rules.

Obviously you have a bad memory then. Did anyonr actually write Koeman off after 6 games? Maybe one of the forum loons but not much else. He was being criticised when we lost 8 out of 10 but that was because he was performing badly. He turned things round by falling out with Les and showed he could do things if given free reign. Ultimately it cost him his job though wheread cp gives the impression of being a oui man.

ART is right though, but not in the way he meant. Charlie is no use to Saints while we have Puel as manager, so we might as well send him out on loan to a Champ side. Assuming Puel lasts the season we might as well at least get someone else to pay some of his wages so that we can maximise our profit. This doesn't mean Chas is no good, just that our system is no good for Chas.

Predictable. Reslly the knobheads that come up with the idea of fixtures at OT on a Friday evening should be shot. Doesn't matter if its Saints or not, Man U supporters nearly all arrive via M6 on an already busu roure on a Friday night in the Summer holidays. Madness.

https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/1636641/sarah-bowmar-dropped-by-under-armour-after-worldwide-backlash-from-video-showing-her-husband-stab-a-bear-with-a-7ft-spear-and-leaving-it-to-die/ The Sun report that the woman has now been dropped bu UA and that the fella is likely to be extradited to Canada. Truly despicable behaviour, and support of this should be dropped, though I suspect that you will find others, such as Nike also support this barbaric behaviour. Sign the petition.

No the EFL Trophy is for u21s (with 5 overage players allowed). Somewhat bizarre to have different rules, but suspect the EFL wee caught out by the PL change from u21 to u23 this season.

He scored and earned us a point, but Gemmel is right, he was absoluty dire other than that, though still well ahead of JWP. Hojbjerg on the other hand looked absolute class.

Changed the game completely when he came on, looked excellent. JWP was hopeless, his passing was awful, and as usual his tacking was abysmal, gave the ball away so many times. But he is young yet, oh wait he's older than Pierre.

No, they didn't, except Kante, Okazaki and Huth (and a couple of others who actually didn't do much). Yes they also signed Fuchs on a free (loaned the previous season), didn't turn out too badly. Perhaps Kante and Okazaki were not big names at the time but it is a myth that continues to be peddled that Leicester were not very active in the 2015 summer transfer window. They also demonstrated their ambition by appointing Ranieri. This all came on the back of course of a run of results in the second half of the previous season that was as good as anyone, so it was no great surprise to those who had watched that they did well last season, maybe not many predicted they would win the league, but the signs of ambition and progress were clearly there for anyone who wanted to see.

Neither has Walter Mazzarri He hasn't lost a game for nearly 2 years.