vin

There's a hilarious thread on the forum regarding the incident. Even when presented with picture evidence, video footage and the fact that West Ham aren't going to appeal some posters are still adamant that Sharp was pushed in the chest and made a meal of it. One member even posts a 'JFK' type conspiracy theory about the camera angle of the picture of Taylor's hand on Billy's throat.

Going back to the original post, I dimly remember seeing an article during the 'Clive Woodward' era about youth team players training with special glasses on that made it difficult to look down at the ball and encouraged them to keep their head up. Definitely remember seeing Lallana using it (along with Theo I think) - come to think of it it may well have a video.

He would have needed to work on his first touch to play for us ;-)

From the highlights on SaintsPlayer seems we had a very good shout for a penalty in the first half for a foul on Reeves.

Just got back - frustrating night all-in-all. We never really got going in the first half and, although we had plenty of possession, we just looked a little jaded and lacked penetration. Second half we started well and then gave away a very soft goal. Started to get back into it, missed a couple of chances, and then Hooiveld, who otherwise had an excellent game, sloppily gave the ball away and we're 2-0 down. We really gifted the win to Cardiff tonight, they really didn't do enough themselves to win it. Our finishing was poor (Rickie should have had 2). Lallana was anonymous, Guly had one of his frustrating games and Connolly just had a mare. Think we probably needed to freshen the side up by bringing in De Ridder from the start (but that's easy to say with hindsight). He was excellent once he came on, committing people, twisting and turning and keeping hold of the ball and deserved his goal at the end.

He was excellent tonight apart from that one costly error... the worst thing was that he wasn't even under any pressure - just got sloppy. Apart from that look very strong and covered the channels very well, including one excellent sliding challenge in the box.

There are 4 mins worth of highlights over on Cardiff City Player - you can use the same login details.

Thought he had a rather mixed debut. Certainly partly at fault for the second goal. Other than that thought he looked pretty composed on the ball, strong considering he was up against Miller and quite mobile. And to be fair to him making his debut in a makeshift defence isn't the best time to judge him.

Can't agree with people saying we were lucky to win. We dominated the first half but gave away two very sloppy goals - Fonte being hesitant on the first and Hoiveld allowing Miller to turn and play in a runner from midfield for the second. Under their own steam Forest did bugger all. Second half they played better and put us under pressure leading to a couple of scrambles in our box and a great save from Davis but we also created a number of chances - Fonte's header cleared off the line and Lallana denied by a good save. All in all I thought we created more chances, played the better football and deserved the win. Just got to cut out the soft goals that we've concede in the last couple of games.

Sounds as though he's got potential - trust Adkins to get the best out of him.

Left footed, quick and can pass... but doesn't seem to be the dominant centre half we need

Their fans certainly rated him a couple of years back: http://www.otib.co.uk/index.php?/topic/112166-liam-fontaine/

Regarding Clifford's comments about Huw Jennings - he's now head of youth at Fulham who, coincidentally, pipped our u18s to league last season. He must be doing something right... Oh, and if our youth coaches are that bad imagine how bad they must be at pretty much every other academy...

R IP Marcus. Thank you for being a Saint.

Steve Claridge seemed to rate him a couple of years ago: http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2007/sep/25/newsstory.brighton Sounds ideal.