The Kraken

I wonder the terms of the “flexible” contract are. I’m guessing guaranteed until the end of the season then make a decision, but it’s a strange way to phrase it.

Yep, you’re right. Officially they come up as “sold out” but that can’t be true. Also a large block at Itchen centre which is the same.

Are people saying to give it to him full time? Even Selles himself has said that he’s happy with it until the end of the season, which seems like the right choice to me, it’s getting too late to get anyone else decent in. As to your question, the board approached Jones in the summer didn’t they? So he’s been on their radar for some time. Selles said in his presser that he wanted the job after Ralph, so I guess he was just overlooked.

The thing that struck me was, when Selles talks, players listen and look him in the eye. Compare that to the video of Jones ranting and rambling on the training field in Spain and not one player seemed to be paying any notice to him. I say make him manager to the end of the season with the option to review.

Agreed, I made a comment on it during the game on the match thread. The white shorts and black socks work much better with the home shirt. Would be better to keep it.

Ralph seemed burnt out at the end of last season. Then, in pre-season, the club made a number of transfers that looked like Ralph had minimal input with, and they forced him to recruit a coach that they had to approve. There was also the disaster of switching to 3 CBs during pre-season, who knows where that came from. It was fairly clear that Ralph was dialling it in from then onwards, he likely knew he was a dead man walking and probably didn’t mind the idea of walking away with a decent pay off.

Sadly, b-anter doesn’t drill down further than the main page. https://web.archive.org/web/20070516060640/http://www.b-anter.co.uk/ Crouchie getting his lawyer on the case was legendary.

Who was his previous login? The geezer’s current login has been posting on here since 2006, so it’s a long game of deception going on.

If Nathan Jones had have wanted us to play on the front foot (and be aggressive) then maybe he should have said so…

I wonder if we’ll see the likes of @hotsaint and the rest of the Jones friends and family contingent continuing to post on here. Hope so.

Meh, not much wrong with that. He may be a skate cunt but I’d expect nothing less than that. Funny when it goes wrong for him, mind. Especially when Saints do the double over them, LOL.

I don’t disagree, but Selles was very engaged with Carl Martin on the sideline yesterday, so he’s not on his own. But yes, if Selles is to be the man he deserves a chance to shape his own team around him.

He was a mixed bag. He started well, had a very iffy last 15 of the first half, second half got out muscled by Sterling and got caught out a couple of times but otherwise was alright. Would much prefer KWP though, of course.

Best to have avoided this place during that time, there were far too many wallies on here who threw Franny under the bus in favour of Cortese through what was his abysmal worst behaviour.

It’s certainly getting to be very odd behaviour.

Hard to say, I’ve not seen the replay as the channel (rightly) didn’t replay it (I’ve seen Twitter has the footage but I don’t much want to see it again). He was making a genuine attempt, no doubt about that, you’re absolutely right to say that. But players have been sent off before for raising the boot so high. I’d have been gutted if he had been sent off, but I could maybe understand why, it put a player in danger. I’d have said that Koulibaly should’ve gotten a red today for his reckless challenge on Tall Paul, he made a genuine attempt for the ball but got it badly wrong. On any other day either of those could’ve been red IMO.

The worst thing would be to keep him just in a caretaker mode. It smacks of “we don’t trust you”. We are so far down the road this season that I think we must give him the job until the end of the season at least, with an extend option in the contract. Jesse Marsch was about the best we could hope for before today, and given the upgrade in performance we’ve seen,, Marsch could well be a downgrade. Players clearly like Ruben, and the first half seeemed to me to give us back an identity, I thought we were great. This season is about potential survival and everyone needs to be onboard for that, today showed that we might have stumbled upon the solution.

What did you do instead, use the force?

Going on current points per game it looks like 36 or 37 could see us stay up. That’s 18 or 19 points from 15 games. 4 wins 6 draws 5 defeats could just get it done. It’s a bloody hard ask given our form and upcoming fixtures but it’s not insurmountable.

I’m only going off the bbc interview, but his words were: “I’m here for the club, the fans, and if that’s my position until the end the season I’m happy to do it, if not then we’ll take some decisions”. The ball is in SR’s court. If we’re going with Ruben then the caretaker tag needs to go. Give him to the end of the season as de facto manager, and give the option for the full time gig. Players want to see continuity, he could well be it.

BBC interview is up. https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/64607244 Very cool customer. Sounds like he very much wanted the job after Ralph. Good. He holds himself very well, doesn’t seem like a caretaker boss. I like him. A lot. I thought appointing him might be negative from SR, the cheap and easy option, but today’s first half performance and result have changed all that. Loved the first half display, it’s everything I want Saints to be.

First half we looked like Saints at our best under Ralph. High pressure, hunt in packs, put pressure on the opposition and control play high up the field. More of that please. Even the initial 3 subs made were positive, three attacking players coming on rather than retreating to a back 5. Brave sub choices all day. JWP is high class, Lavia just so good, those two need to keep fit and on it. It looks like we, finally, just might have something to build on.

I’m still enjoying the commentator from earlier. At various points throughout the game we had Bazanu and Bazuna, at one point he was even Bazuanu. It was worse than Saintweb for getting it right.

He’s gonna keep us up, and win the FA Cup

Best game for us IMO. I felt he had a bit of a flap at his first save, ended up giving away a corner when he should’ve held it IMO. After that he was solid, and when he was beaten he had his defence to help him out.