saintant

Before today I'd have said no chance but we look relegation material today for sure.

This whole football club from top to bottom is one seething mass of shite and it's continually got worse since Martin Semmens, in his wisdom, decided SR were the guys to take us forward. Semmens was another charlatan full of his own self importance but completely clueless.

The choice of subs has been weird to say the least. Still has done himself no favours here and deserves the pile on. I was up for giving him time but he is now winding me up with his decision making. Blackburn should have been a guaranteed 3 points even with the illness in the club. Not sure where we go from here but we're in a deep hole.

Thanks for your research but you'll probably not be surprised that it fails to convince me. I still maintain our team would benefit greatly from having a lot more physicality all over the pitch and it's something we've lacked for a while. Having seen Brentford recently completely overpower West Ham I dread to think what they would do to our weaklings.

Go watch Brentford, Bournemouth and Palace plus Man City, Liverpool, Arsenal etc etc You list our centre backs but you need these powerhouses in midfield, on the flanks and up front. Go watch some games with teams who get the blend right and if you think we're even coming close you're wearing your red and white tinted specs.

Spors has been hopeless - good riddance if he goes. He should have presided over the rebuild of a credible squad but all we've done is sign a bunch of players who do not address the big problems which are clearly goalkeeper, centre forward, centre back and midfield enforcer.

Good start for Rohl 🙂

Unfortunately for us SR are prime examples and they came in under the mantra of data driven decision making. It's going to get worse with these charlatans running things.

The lack of any big powerful athletes in our promoted side led to the humiliation in the Premier League. We need them now to help us launch a promotion attempt (probably too late) but, if and when we go up, they'll certainly be needed unless we want more of the humiliation and embarrassing performances against the elites.

Having one of the biggest budgets means nothing if, as with us, it is in the hands of people who are clueless. Spors and SR have failed miserably to assemble a squad fit for purpose. They should have brought in a goalkeeper and a big centre forward plus, a big strong centre half with experience and a big strong midfield player. We shouldn't have signed Downs or Azaz and probably didn't need Fellows either so the money saved there could have gone towards a GK, CF and midfield destroyer. Bazunu, THB and Stephens should have been told to get their agents to sort out other clubs for them, that pays for a new centre back. The building of our squad and recruitment of players is being handled by a bunch of amateurs who don't have a clue - they just collect players with no thought as to how they are going to fit together.

Does anyone seriously have a clue how this lot operate? What on earth are they trying to achieve other than totally ruining our football club? What was their track record before the brilliant Martin Semmens decided that they were the perfect fit for us? Solak seems to stump up all the cash but what say does he have in terms of the accountability of SR members running Southampton FC? Can he sack them or force them to change their philosophy which seems to be buy low sell high - that's working well! We seem to be stuck with a bunch of no-hopers but I can't figure out how we get them out because it seems to be a closed shop where they can carry on making poor decisions and nobody bats an eyelid. It's gone on for over 3 years now. When is it going to end? Until it does we are on a downward spiral.

Seems to me we play with too many 'anchors'

You may as well get Downs to watch Erling Haaland for all the good it will do because he is both weak and clueless.

I take your point but would you trust SR/Spors to replace all these players with anyone better because I wouldn't.

3 players built like brick shit houses - one at centre forward, a midfielder and a centre back. Add a competent keeper and we might start to resemble a football side that can compete and win matches.

Newcastle showed interest in him at one stage but were wise enough to steer clear.

Well he was appointed by those geniuses Sports Republic so no surprise really. SR is the root cause of our demise and nothing will change while they are calling the shots because they are completely clueless.

Clearly SR is working in the wrong industry. Running a football club is not for them - they prove it more and more with each passing day. If they don't like losing money then it's high time they cut their losses and tried something more fitting to their combined skill set. They'd certainly be doing our fan base a massive favour.

You'd be very hard pressed to select future owners who proved worse than Sport Republic - unless you let Martin Semmens make the decision of course.

What we're missing and continue to fail to address is tall, strong, powerful players who can compete with the physical side of the game. It's no good signing all these ball playing types who are physically weak - there has to be a mixture including some big, aggressive types who can win battles and get around the pitch. Look at Bournemouth, Brentford, Palace - they lose players but always make sure they have enough of the physical athletes to provide a good balance. We'll always struggle until this is addressed.

Have you not twigged yet that our continued dive into oblivion coincided with Semmens making the stupid decision to sell the club to Sports Republic.

He did - should have hoofed it but for some reason only known to himself he decided to jump over it. I can only assume he was oblivious to any imminent danger in his own six yard box. Very strange decision.

Agree entirely.

Now go through our squad and list the big, powerful athletes that every decent side must have in abundance from Brentford to Liverpool. Look through their squads and then compare them to our physically weak players. We are still getting outfought all over the pitch and not winning our individual duels or battles. Last night was a classic example - Brentford totally overpowered West Ham and our two ex players were withdrawn at half time because they simply could not cope. We play some nice football but over 90 minutes we'll often get bullied out of games because we do not have anything like enough of the big strong players who make sure they win their individual battles.

Are you serious?