derry

Elia was bailed out by Forster's save from Austin's deflection. He stayed by the right post as everyone else came out. Austin would have been offside if he had come out. No doubt he will be schooled on that situation. Fonte confirmed that the referee told him that he saw both offences. Onuha jumping in at Forster and the offside when the ball hit Onuha on the head.

No Onuha jumped into him as he was just about to catch the ball.

Several things are required of midfielders, passing, ability to drive forward and score some goals, ability to defend competently. Some of our players possess two of these, Wanyama and Schneiderlin pass well and are good defenders who sometimes can break forward and score the odd goal which makes them outstanding holding midfielders. Reed passes well, defends well and is mobile enough to be a good all round midfielder. Davis and Ward-Prowse fall into an entirely different category. They both are content to just circulate possession and rarely break forward with the intent to do anything other than pass. Neither is a good defender, they just don't go in hard, just try and jockey or nick the ball away. Davis yesterday had the opportunity to clatter Shelvey thirty yards before he eventually hit the post but just let him run, he pulled out of several tackles and just let Shelvey run past him for the goal. IMO we cannot afford to play both of them as their circulation of the ball in front of the opposition usually goes back to the defenders and the goalkeeper to launch. Defensively they are an open door. As an attacking goal threat non existent. Tadic is an enigma. The first dozen games he was brilliant. I get the feeling of brittle confidence, would he be better on the other side or in the middle? It looks like Djuricic is nearly done deal. Mainz have announced going to us but Benfica have to finalise. He could well be the missing link as an AM. Sunday we were far too slow in moving the ball and allowed Swansea to compact their defence. Reed had a good game but the other two were too comfortable passing, we needed the three midfielders to make runs off Pelle but they didn't. Possession doesn't win matches nor does pressure. Dead ball specialists, don't make me laugh, it was disgracefully wasteful.

I was in the South Stand, I left straight after the goal. Was picked up close by and had no trouble at all.

I contacted the ticket office the day after the replay and buying the ST seat online, they confirmed use season ticket.

I've seen them given but that doesn't make it right. My opinion for what it's worth, with the pace of the ball and the short distance involved could Fonte have got out of the way. The key for me he turned his head away and that was all he had time to do. Good decision as was the situation seconds before. Remind me, how many times did Poll book the player in the World Cup without sending him off ?

Get a BT 8500 phone it screens all calls. It gives a message to the caller to identify themselves and press hash. It then rings through giving you the message you then have four options, press 1 receive that number once, 2 stores the number to allow straight through next time, 3 blocks that number for ever, 4 diverts it to the answerphone. Do nothing it goes to answerphone whilst the red button disconnects the caller. All numbers on your contacts list are let straight through. Any unrecognised and unapproved number is automatically screened. £55 from Amazon for two phones.

At least one person who saw what happened. Stupid defending and ridiculous goalkeeping. Good control and a cross straight to a defender who got in a mess. The assist was from the panicking goalkeeper.

I thought he signed a new 5 year contract in 2013?

It may be that the absence of both Bertrand and Clyne with Targett at left back persuaded Koeman that putting McCarthy in against Chelsea at right back would be a bigger risk than Yoshida and going back to a four. With Bertrand back and now Schneiderlin out against Arsenal he could opt for a five with McCarthy at right back and leave Tadic out. We did pretty well against Arsenal with a back four. At least we have the options including Yoshida at right back and Fonte, Alderweireld and Gardos at centre back and Bertrand left back.

I wouldn't swear to it but I thought had to be signed by the previous Sat noon for the FA Cup, ie Sat 27th.

Who do we play on Thurs 8th Jan? I thought the next game after Sun is MU away on Sun 11th Jan.

There was an interesting still photo on the back page of the Sun today. It proved almost conclusively that Fabregas was dragging both feet together over Targett's leg rather than one foot in advance as one would see if an attempt was being made to avoid contact. Ie. Fabregas was making no effort to follow the ball and was going to ground.

It seems the wound became infected but now back training.

Direct from a club physio. The clean up was a setback. Still living your life on the internet.

One thing that did stand out in recent matches and last night and mainly when we haven't played our best back four. The midfielders are no longer running the channels and getting into the box on the burst as they together with the full backs scored plenty of goals. JWP didn't do it once and he was the ten. Passing the ball around without the hard forward runs we were doing early on in the season won't trouble defences.

Duncan, that was a very fair report.

Back to the football. Mane physically has the attributes to be a good player but when it comes to football intelligence he is sadly lacking. He has pace but doesn't know how to use it, trying to dribble inside instead of putting the ball wide and run the defender. He misses all of his goalscoring chances because he lacks awareness and what really hacks me off doesn't close down but sells himself. Last night he was lucky to stay on the pitch as he was against MU. Long was ineffective and offside too often. He also had no service or support. The build ups were laborious allowing SU to get goal side. JWP is not a forward, whose every instinct is to pass not to get at the defence. The team lacked balance because of it. It's no good putting players in positions they don't suit. It is better to put out a balanced team with some lesser players in their correct positions than try to play all the experienced players. Saturday is going to be interesting.

Tadic low on confidence takes penalty at 0-0. He didn't hit it with any pace the same as the Arsenal penalty except the keeper went early. Pelle IMO should have taken it. Clyne didn't really go through the ball and it ricocheted off to Barnes. Mane was poor, Pelle was hacked off with him snatching at the ball as Pelle lined up to hit it. I'm surprised Long came on so late. Pelle booked so won't miss Everton.JWP had a decent game. That game was there for the taking, missing penalties isn't the Southampton way. Other than Pelle, I think JWP takes them, I wonder how Clyne would do he really does strike the ball well. Bubbling confidence is now missing. Next week Long in for Mane IMO.

United were poor, therefore it was a disappointing result. The comments I feel are individual criticisms. Fonte defensively having his best season however his continually passing back to the goalkeeper has at times put the goalkeeper under pressure and not for the first time a careless back pass gifted a goal to the opposition. His default should be hit Pelle not pass back to Forster Mane doesn't look like a good footballer but a talent playing off the cuff. His decision making is dire and his awareness and willingness to back up his full back is lacking. He doesn't know how to use his pace either checking back to take a pass facing the wrong way or dribbling inside. To use his pace he needs to hit the ball well past the full back and run him and get to the bye line thereby bringing Pelle into play. Davis needs to pass forward a lot more as there is far too much backwards and sideways look what happens when he does get forward as for Pelle's goal. Whoever takes the corners and free kicks needs to do a lot better there is really no quality from the delivery whoever takes them Our possession football as a template is great but not when it gets bogged down going nowhere slowly allowing the opposition to get goal side. MU pushed up and left a lot of room behind their centre backs. Aston Villa showed how to exploit that by putting the ball over them early from the back four. We should do the same at times. Our floated long diagonal ball takes far too long to get there allowing the defender plenty of time to close down. Mayuka is hopeless. for VP's second we had six defenders in mid goal marking three whilst Bertrand marked nobody and Fellaini peeled off right and was let go and nobody at all picked up VP.

Forster, Clyne Fonte Yoshida Bertrand, Wanyama Gardos, Long Davis Tadic, Pelle.

We were left very exposed after Alderweireld went off because Mane and Mayuka just didn't defend and stayed loose allowing Arsenal to outnumber our back line and play through the midfield. It's all very well leaving Pelle up on his own but in the circumstances we might have been better to drop him in with Wanyama and Davis and leave Mayuka up front and Mane tucked in to compact two banks of four. Like I said before Targett would have been a better substitution than Mayuka who doesn't even look worth a place on the bench.

Good display, lucky Arsenal. Cork was taken out by the late Ramsey. Cazorla stood on Tadic. Long was clattered early on. Mane and especially Mayuka were totally unaware defensively and are not prepared to make the effort to defend. We missed Long and Tadic who supported our full backs but maybe the substitutions were necessary. IMO Mayuka was the wrong choice. Targett in front of Bertrand for me with ten minutes left, as soon as Alderweireld went off we opened up, Davis just doesn't tackle, he had a chance to block the cross for the goal but didn't go through the ball, just waved his foot at it. He does a lot of good link up play but I'd like a bit more guts from him when a last ditch block is needed. At least we have until Monday to try and get some fit.

We were well in the game up to the first goal. Clyne pulled out of a fifty fifty tackle allowing a break which caught us cold for the first. Davis lost the ball for break number two for the second. Tadic can't seem to get the ball in the air, hit the first man for God knows how many times and with everybody forward we were caught on the break again. surely when we are chasing the game especially against a team that pressed well who are nervous when the ball is lofted in we can play differently. I lost count of the sideways and backwards passes going nowhere even against 10/9 men especially with three strikers waiting and calling for the ball which never came. i wouldn't mind if we were keeping our shape and attacking with forward runs and movement but we weren't, we were just far too slow. Long wide right for me. Tadic on the left and some forward passes and runs from midfield. Pelle needs service and he isn't getting any of that. Mane needs to stop dribbling so often.with the ball taking lots of touches. He has bags of pace and sometimes needs to put the ball past the defender and run him. Today he had a good chance to get through early on and instead of knocking the ball wide and running the defender who was without backup he tried to dribble inside and lost the ball. He would have been round the back of the defence. He does it far too often for me.

IMO he thought he could overload a poor defence with an extra forward. The defence with three in front of them in fact played well. There is no way IMO he would play that team in the next three games. I think he needs to sometimes be a bit cruder against these packed defences. A plan C could be to get the ball up front quickly from the back and supporting Pelle quickly as a variation rather than playing it around and allowing the opponents time to pack their box.