SNSUN

This will be a test. Poor though Villa can be and good at other times, Gerrard is probably a better manager than Lampard and he has a better team at Villa than Lampard does at Everton at his disposal, so I'm expecting a tough away game for us. Villa's defence is perhaps what lets them down, so taking our chances again will be key. If injury rumours are to be believed, If we are missing KWP, we play Perraud, if we are missing Salisu then it's Stephens and Bednarek. Obviously there are other options for Moi but his recent form has been good so someone will have to step up. I thought Smallbone looked OK the other night - I'd like to see him given more opportunities as the season closes. We still haven't won 3 games in a row in the league this season (we rarely have since Koeman left) despite our excellent recent form so beating Villa would get that monkey off our backs. We have the talent too, as long as we take our chances and stop any brain farts. Villa, Newcastle, Watford, Leeds. If our recent form continues, that could well be another 4 from 4! Head says this'll be 1-1 - heart reckons we can beat Villa 3-1. I'll go with my head for this one curses. (The evil me would take a defeat here in exchange for a win on Thursday though if I was going to deal with the devil!!!)

It'll stop next week... I'm going to both the Newcastle game and the Watford game and the last time I was at SMS this season we lost to Wolves. Sorry in advance.

Ok last post and I'll use it now. At times West Ham have ripped us apart, but the longer that half went on, spurred on by GOAL OF THE ROUND from Perraud, we grew in confidence and actually started to look decent. It's far too early to dispel the pre-match worries but most of us would have taken 1-0 up at half time. I can see Ralph changing the shape at some point and going 3 CBs if West Ham continue to push us, and our bench is also freaking strong if the need comes to mix it up. We'll have to soak up a lot of pressure in the second half. IF, and it's a big if, we qualify for the next round, I will be amazed and delighted and retract all my pre-match statements!!!

Without reading the comments thus far on the line up, I can't see them being that positive! Willy is fine, Stephens is fine, but as decent a job as Valery has had to do at CB this season, he is not a frigging CB. Certainly not against a decent team in West Ham when we want to progress to the next round of the cup. If he gets MOTM then fair play and I will retract my comments but I feel like he's going to cost us a goal at some point... hopefully not worse. I can live with the midfield, JWP and Diallo is fine, Djenepo and Smallbone have a lot to prove, but Armstrong and Long in attack? That's pretty damn blunt. I'm not happy that he's taken a winning, in-form team and ripped it apart in a cup competition we should be prioritising. In both previous rounds he's done this and scraped by but personally I think this is a step too far tonight. I hope I'm wrong and we progress but this definitely smacks of us believing we can achieve bigger things in the league. Right, one post left tonight.... I'll save it until after the game when we've won 6 nil and I have to defend myself for looking like a negative tit. 😜

I'm working tonight so will be watching on an ipad mini. Elated. 🙄 Rotation is fine if done well, not like at Coventry. You can drop Fraser for Willy (if fit), Tino for Perraud, Bednarek for Stephens, Moi for, say, Redmond without a big drop in quality. Maybe even Broja for someone else if he needs a rest. It also depends on how serious West Ham take it. Oh and the game is on iPlayer and BBC Red Button.

What can I say although it was only around new years that we technically were in the relegation battle so... 😜 We also did bring in players that have helped. Tino's signing meant Perraud could bed in while KWP filled in... and we Brought in Small as Perraud's long time back up. Lyanco strengthened the squad at the back, and Broja, little did we know, was the striker we needed up front even after signing Armstrong. Also we can praise the improvement of existing players like Fraser, who is back to his 2016 best, Moi, the attacking midfielder we hoped we'd signed 3 years ago, and Che, who is starting to add goals a bit more regularly to his game. Heck even JWP keeps getting better. We are rightly where we deserve to be this season and let's hope we stay top ten. Then try to keep the squad together in the summer (sans Broja if we can't do another loan), renew some contracts, and bring in a GK, CB, AM and Str and we can try to do what West Ham are doing this season.

Caballero wasn't even on the bench against Norwich, Lewis was so even if he's back after his back tweak, I'd play Forster. Their right back area is a weakness without Coufal so I'd play Perraud to attack it and KWP on the right and, sorry Tino, bench him as an impact sub. Otherwise... same team please. This could go either way. They have a good midfield and our hands will be tied trying to keep Antonio quiet but I still think we can beat them if we take our chances and their keeper doesn't have a worldy. I'm going to say... 1-1 into extra time, Redmond off the bench to win it AET.

Anyone else nervous? We've not been at our fluid attacking best tonight. I'll take a scrappy 1-0 but all it takes is one Norwich attack... Still, this man could change things. Not sure who I'd have for MOTM though, Romeu or KWP. Romeu probably. Or Angus Gunn for them. 😶

I remember Ostenstadt scoring one on his arse too. Scrappy goal but they all count. Another drunk baby for luck.

Some excellent passing early on, one moment of danger from Norwich and then it's gone a bit scrappy. Norwich will like scrappy. We need to put one away to open this game up - a draw would be a good result for Norwich but they'd love a win - the sooner we deflate them the better. If they score first I worry we'll have to break down a team that parks the bus. I'm not bringing the nuns out so here's a drunk baby for luck. Let's see if it works.

Don’t Chelsea have first dibs anyway? Aside from the obvious points that - we can say no and why would he go somewhere he won’t play when he’s “as good as” first choice with us...

He's a good striker for where we are in the league and he's in good form. He's a hard working, unselfish player that leads the line well, has a bit of pace and definitely has an eye for a good pass. The downside is his finishing and perhaps consistency but if he was a 20 goal striker he wouldn't be with us very long. He's definitely improved since being picked for Scotland, similar to how Brereton Diaz seems to have improved at Blackburn having been picked for Chile. He's worth the money we paid for him, in the summer where a few Championship strikers were pilfered by the Premier League. (Maupay, McBurnie, Sessegnon, James, JRod, Ayew) and was overshadowed at the time by the signing of Ings. Let's hope Armstrong can come good in time.

My wife (Norwich fan) failed to rub their victory in my face earlier in the season (the fool) so I've promised her if we beat them on Friday then I won't do the same! 😈 Honestly for all the improvement Norwich have made under Smith, I still think defensively they're frail and they're still relying heavily on Pukki up front to get the goals. We have it in us to beat someone heavily soon, so why not Friday under the lights and live on Sky. Same line up unless Perraud can come back in. 3-0 Saints.

No Vardy no party. Poor transfer dealings have cost them.

15 points from 13 games? That's almost relegation form, possible but unlikely unless we lose JWP and Salisu etc to injury against Norwich OR hit the beaches early. We'll get above 50 IMO starting with 3 against Norwich.

Dare I say it the omens are good this season... we're unbeaten against Manchester clubs, we can beat the likes of Spurs, we are beating our bogey teams, we're bang in form AND our bogey team, so far the only team to do the double over us, Wolves are out of it.... ...we have a bloody good chance of winning the FA Cup this season. West Ham are stuttering. Beat them and we are 3 games away...

A second goal would settle the nerves here. God willing it sounds like we’ve deserved it...

Well that’s a turn up for the books for me as a shift worker, Newcastle on the Thursday and Watford on the Sunday now means I can attend both games. Expensive weekend then!

Weirdly after our recent form, I’d be tempted to take a draw here as they’re a bogey team but our first XI is on fire so I’d risk the win/loss. I think our midfield will dominate proceedings and our back 5 is pretty solid so it depends on whether the attackers can keep finding goals... and Adams is in form. It’ll be tight, like a 1-0 Either way. Richarlison worries me... but I think their defence is poor so 2-1 us.

They'll still rush him back before he's properly fit. At least they've got Mighty Matt Targett on the other side to keep their attacking prowess on point.

Ha! Maybe a play on the song "He's got the whole world in his arms"? "He's got tiny T-Rex arms, he's got motherf*cking tiny T-Rex arms..." SNSUN does not endorse swearing at football matches. Nor crap songs. But sometimes...

I hope it’s the penultimate game of the season and I hope that miraculously they’re still in with a shout of relegation. A Saints victory would rarely ever taste so sweet.

Livramento, Broja, Salisu, Walker-Peters, Perraud, to a point Diallo, If these are the quality of young people we aspire to bring in to our club, then I’m all for the project. I’m wary though that it only takes a few Djenepo/Adam Armstrong failures for the plan to suffer. That said our scouting seems to be decent of late so fingers crossed that doesn’t happen. We also need to bring in the odd “old head” for experience... again hopefully not like Walcott and more like Stu. If our long term plan by the new owners is to be the Leipzig of the Premier League, then that should help us with player progression. It’d be like getting first dibs on the new Sadio Mané. As for manager in two years, I wouldn’t fully rule out Ralph changing his mind if things are going well. Fergie changed his mind on retirement a couple of times iirc. That said, again, we currently seem to have the right people in charge of us to pick correctly.

One thing I’ve noticed recently is our heads not go down when we concede. Against Swansea, Coventry and Spurs we showed that being behind isn’t the end of the match and showed courage to get the wins, heck even against United we didn’t let the early goal faze us. Saints of old were too keen to capitulate when going behind. Now we seem to thrive on it. We may lose points from winning positions but we seem to gain points from losing positions these days. Players-wise, so many players are in form. Forster seems to make us more solid than McCarthy, almost as if the opposition fear him more than Alex. Salisu is simply class. Having two proper full backs in form is also important, KWP playing well with the knowledge Tino isn’t far away, and Perraud adapting to the league. Further forwards we have Romeu, Armstrong, Adams and Broja in good form, but there’s one player for me that seems to get better and better... Captain Fantastic. Actually it’s hard to pick out a poor player right now, we don’t have any (Ok, you could say Adam A but he’s hardly getting game time to play his way into form). It seems having a better squad makes players fight harder for their positions. Also so look at our possession against Spurs. We were better by miles than them. Normally we soak up pressure and try to break... against Spurs we were the dominant force. If we could just be a bit more clinical up front we will be smashing teams off the park like we did against Brentford. Will our form dip? Sure, I don’t think we will keep this up all season, and the inevitable injuries will happen, but I’m enjoying it right now. Of all our games remaining though, the one I really want us to be in our current form for is Newcastle in the rearranged game!

RIP to Minsk and condolences to his family. Sorry to hear he didn’t make the Spurs game but he leaves us with a recent upturn in form, and the takeover, and he can watch over us with, hopefully, a long term smile on his face.