VectisSaint

No sign of Adam in the training pics, unless I missed him.

Turned on Points West tonight (BBC Regional News here) to see Marian Pahars picture. Seems like Latvia have a friendly at Huish tonight against Yeovil Town. Seems odd until you remember Gary Johnson was formerly manager of Latvia and apparently (never knew this) was instrumental in bringing the Little Lat to Southampton. http://www.westerngazette.co.uk/PREVIEW-Yeovil-Town-v-Latvia/story-20094437-detail/story.html

Would hope not given he is injured, but with England you never know. Chamberlain out until new year sometime.

This. Really do not think coming back would be a good idea. He could easily have stayed for one season and been part of promotion but Skate dad thought it best to move on and get the cash. One season of us having a bit of a struggle again and no doubt he would want away again to where the grass appears to be greener. Not totally sure he would get in the team anyway, does he fit our style? He is also injured and at the moment it is not clear he will totally recover. If he comes back and fits in fine, but really do not see he is what we really want and would be surprised if NC would go for him (if nothing else we are still on for further payments if he stays with the Arse). Nope, we've moved on, he's moved on. I would be happy to see Bale back (unlikely I know) or even Walcott.

I wonder if Sotonjoe will benefit from Luke's generosity. He certainly seems to have demonstrated that he is "in need".

But the way he did it he gave publicity to Children in Need, so that other people might donate as well. Of course he could have just donated silently like a lot of people do (or not donated at all like a lot of other people, me included), or he could have done a little bit to get other people involved as well. It seems like 38000 saw that what he was doing was worthwhile and so may have not only indirectly donated through Luke but also may have considered donating themselves in some other way (of course its very easy to retweet). Why do people think this is attention seeking, some "people" need to grow up, this is how charity fund raising works. Sadly, by using Twitter, a tool that attracts morons (or is it a tool that attracts tools) by the bucket load, he got some completely unwarranted stick. He should learn from this to just avoid Twitter. Luke, if you read this, well done lad for trying to do something worthwhile, ignore the morons.

Where does it say he won't be donating? Looks like he wasn't forced to remove it but removed it to stop the abusive tweets. I really don't get why people use twitter, it is just open to abuse and shows people up (not Luke) for being morons.

Doesn't sound very likely to me, specially when people talk about freeing up a squad position. What does that mean. We haven't got a full squad, and anyway Oxo is u21 so it makes no difference. Don't really believe the wages bit either frankly. Will be interesting to see how well he recovers from his injury, not likely to be playing again until well into the new year so no way we would see him here until next season anyway. Not entirely sure I would welcome him back, not too pleased at the way Skate Dad engineered the move away.

He is a legend in his own mind.

3 of the 4 times Shaw has withdrawn from the U21s he did so before getting to train with England.

I heard that when asked about this he said "Voy a seguir para dar entrevistas en español, mientras que la perilla de Glasgow utiliza el nombre estúpido MoPo en lugar de mi nombre real." How about people learn Spanish then it wouldn't matter. To be fair his Spanish in interviews are generally quite understandable even for those who are not fluent. He usually congratulates the players and a few other repeats. His interviews even in Spanish are far more meaningful/insightful than those given by many other PL/CCC managers who purport to speak English. While I recognise all (most) of the words Saggy Chops uses for instance, they do not make for a coherent reply to any questions asked.

You are right. The other team to outperform us we already beat 1-0 at their place, and the Arse have outperformed us by just 3 points, which is not much, especially as we have not played them yet. Nonetheless I fully expect the Gooners to win.

Boruc, Shaw, the rest

Isle of Wight ferries are bloody expensive

Don't disagree with much you have written, but this idea that Gaston was allowed to leave early is completely wrong. FIFA rules oblige clubs to release players 5 days before WC games. It is not an option, we had no real choice. Liverpool seem to have come to an agreement with Uruguay to delay Suarez' release and maybe we didn't see it as critical to do the same, but if the country insists then there is no choice. Uruguay play Jordan on Wednesday so as long as Gaston was named in the squad we have known for some time he would not be available yesterday, whether MP wanted him to play or not. Them's the rules. People should not read anything into Gaston's absence beyond this. Frankly I have come round to the idea that Gaston will be loaned back to Italy in January and that there may be a deal already being done to do some sort of swap.

Think it might be better to come 2nd (or even 3rd) rather than win the title. That way we can sneak up on the Champs League teams who won't realise that we have qualified or are any good. It was not considred important to win titles when we were in League One and Championship according to some on here thought it was of no consequence actually winning the divisional title. I assume this still applies in our quest to finish runners-up in the Champions League. My view is that we should have been trying to win the treble this year, but seems like the club is unambitious and only cares about the double.

Very good all-round performance, especially the first half. We were far better than against Fulham, partly because Hull were much better than Fulham (except in front of goal) and caused us more problems which we dealt with admirably. They tried to play us at our own game by pressing high up the pitch, but as soon as we scored they had to change to Plan B which gave us more opportunities. It was pleasing to see us try to extend our lead in the second half rather than sit back like we did against Fulham, when we did our best to let them back in the game. Wanyama was awful yesterday, at least 3 bad give away passes (and a 4th that he was lucky he won a free-kick) and that was before the howler that gave Hull a confidence boosting goal (to be fair Boruc was partly to blame). That was really the only down side of an outstanding performance, and we should have scored more. It would have been nice to see JRod score but his contribution nevertheless was top notch. Thought Ossie was going to get a goal as well, but Steve Davis was first in line and took his goal beautifully. Ossie looked very good when he came on, his movement and skill is top class. Adam deservedly man of the match, his performances this season have been brilliant, such a shame that the injury last season knocked him back so much after he had made a good start. At times yesterday I was reminded of past times with Channon, Ball, Williams, Keegan etc, some our play was awesome. Only other down side yesterday was the seeming communications problems in defence on a couple of occasions, when clearly Boruc called for players to leave balls, but was ignored and this cost us unnecessary corners. Thought JRod was excellent in defence by the way, his towering headed clearance was worthy of the best CBs. Once again though Fonte was the better of our CBs. Lovren s getting all of the praise this season for what he has brought to the team, but he has made Fonte look outstanding, what a pairing they now look. Was concerned before HT that Fonte was hobbling, and then Jos came out late for the subs HT warm-up, but hopefully with 2 weeks, it was only a slight niggle and should be 100% before Arsenal. Was Gaston dropped or was he unavailable? I cannot see whether he is in the Uruguay squad for their WC play off on Wednesday. MOTD mentioned several times that Suarez had been given dispensation to play for Liverpool even though technically he could have been prevented from doing so due to FIFA rules. Must admit I am coming round to the view that Gaston will be moved on sooner rather than later, maybe we are lining up a swap deal in January (for Banega?). Shame because I still think he will come good eventually, but his style does not fit with ours, c'est la vie.

He can clearly be seen in the video of training when Saints' England players were announced. Pictures 14, 17 and 38 in the training gallery.

Oh well, at least its 10 points in the Prediction League, every cloud and all that. Rubbish result. League Cup glory and pathway to the CL after winning Europa League next season. Long time since 1979.

To be accurate Gaston went off and they scored. But I don't actually think the two events were connected. Bit like Lee going off before they scored their first.

2 chances for Chung in the first 10 minutes, one pulled wide, one over the bar, second one made by Gaston. "Lee is causing some early concern in the Black Cats defence as he picks up the ball following a weaving run from Ramirez" Looks like we are letting them have some chances though, they seem to have got into the game more after our good opening.

From next season the winners of the Europa League will qualify for the Champions League the following season, so winning the COC this season could be a way (however unlikely) of achieving that aim.

I think he is clearly more talented than Mr Ripley.

His assessment for this season is probably fair. But its a bit odd to say last season this would have been a home banker, when the result was 3-3. So it looks like he may be better at predicting the future than checking on the past. Note in the Hull summary the following "they (Hull) are arguably the most organised team in the Premier League apart from Southampton". Merson seems to be almost a saints fan these days, for an ex-Skate that must be difficult. Wonder if anyone has ever compared merson's predictions with the slug-balancer, to see who is actually best.

Roma are incredible, still only 1 goal conceded with 15 minutes to go in their 10th game of the season (admittedly against bottom club Chievo)