
Graffito
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Everything posted by Graffito
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Whitey, I believe you probably have about as much of an idea of what a hipster is as I have. I could be wrong but I think they may not be hippies.
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Monk and Beattie? I needed cheering up. That's a cracker.
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It's like the Pied Piper of Hamelin. Can't you all just ignore him and he might just **** off.
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Yes we played quite well first half and were dire second half and yes there are players in the squad who have character and are winners and others whose heads drop far too easily. Van Dyke, Romeu, Davis today, and a mention for young McQueen who I have complete confidence in but too many of the others are flaky. There are others in the squad who didn't play today who don't lie down, Fonte, Bertrand, Suarez, Austin. I'd rather see them play for that reason, even if they do lose a bit of edge through fatigue.
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3 changes in the back 4, 3 mins that show you why not
Graffito replied to um pahars's topic in The Saints
Having gone out of Europe we might have expected less rotation or even a settled team but we've been badly served by a combination of the fixture schedule and Sky TV giving us 3 matches in 6 days. Won't get any easier for a while, until we exit the cups. -
Sorry don't agree with this. I'm ok with Forster except for his kicking. We are a team that wants to play possession football out from the back yet we have a goalkeeper that is clearly and demonstrably uncomfortable with the ball at his feet and more often than not cedes possession when he kicks it long. Even when we had Pelle to aim at, the ball all too often went astray or even into touch. As for Forsters other perceived weaknesses. You might expect given his height and frame that he would come for crosses a metre or two beyond his 6 yard box but he tends not to. He's quite consistent in not doing so. This will surely have been agreed and worked on with the defence and goalkeeping coach and we do have maybe the best CB pairing in the league. He seems reluctant at times to come off his line when one on one. Again seems quite consistent in not doing so so maybe it's been agreed with the coaching staff. Bar the recent loss to Tottenham, we've had a good defence this season, and last season, with Fraser in goal. It's a sound defensive unit which works as a unit. But Frasers kicking is poor. There's no way of dressing that up.
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. For goodness sake I wish you and others would stop going on and on about formations and systems. IMO people set far too much store by formations. You may remember when Pochetinno was manager, he, or one of his assistants, said, we don't play in positions we play from positions. Look at it that way and a series of numbers and positions on a screen or a sheet of paper don't mean very much but flexibility does. Our front three rotate. They do it. They're just not that effective yet. The biggest problem we've got is that Boufal and Redmond don't link with the striker. Tadic is better but he's been injured. Puel needs to sort that out and we'll score goals.
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I heard a rumour these ***** are threatening to play a bit of football these days. Is it too much to hope they have a go on Saturday? I think their poor away turnout answers that one.
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What I find inexplicable is why we dropped so deep after just 20 minutes and ceded possession which is so adept at keeping the ball. It was the single most significant change in the game which determined the eventual result, Dean's incompetence notwithstanding. Given Spurs eventual dominance, it's easy to forget that we had them rattled for 15 or 20 minutes, yet we took our foot off the gas. A really stark contrast between first and second parts of the first half. The high press was clearly the agreed tactics and it worked. Ok we couldn't have kept that up all match but then to fall back so meekly after 20 minutes? It's not like Spurs did much with all the possession they had towards the end of the first half but it enabled them to take the sting out of the situation. Perhaps we thought we could defend a one goal lead and conserve energy for the remaining two games in the 3 games in 6 days period. That doesn't seem like a plausible reason to me given that players will be rotated. Could have been a change in Spurs tactics or formation that I wouldn't have noticed but seemed like their normal game to me. Otherwise I'm mystified why we dropped off.
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He's blathering. Only bit of that rings true "If I compare, I like to do more business now in January than we did last year in Southampton."
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Agree. You get him and tweak the formation. Two defensive midfielders will help too if we have to bed in a new CB. Everton bound though.
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Wanyama, Dier, Schneiderlin for one position. More likely he replaces the aging Barry at Everton.
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Would any club be foolish enough to buy a player based on current form? The club knows this players capabilities inside out so no risk on that score. In any case I believe it's a theoretical discussion because I think he'll sign for Everton.
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It's Merson. I think he may have been further adrift. Apparently the comment was about Plymouth. On the Bournemouth question, I think I'd feel a bit different if they started beating us regularly.
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So JRod is finished is he? Puel said he expected we'd have more space in this game, and he was right. I expect Saints still to struggle to break down sides that defend deep. We have done so for the past 4 seasons. Nothing will change. All teams struggle with it, even those with much more quality on the ball than Saints. Puel said they would be prioritising forward play and finishing in preparation for this match and it looks like they did and it worked. Puel made another decisive substitution and it worked.
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It does impress, when you see the fixtures presented like that, what a significant difference points won and lost due in part to match fatigue could make to final placings. Looks very good for Chelsea with the most rest and matches nicely spaced out and with their big squad and no euro matches. For the clubs with smaller squads and less rest, Christmas could be crucial to whether or not they stay up. We always knew this but it does bring home what a lottery fixture scheduling is. We can only trust that scheduling is entirely random but for the effect of televised matches. Only plus for Saints at the bottom of the table there is the later start to the Christmas campaign. You can see right there the 3 days off they've been given.
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JRod scored the best sitter ever, against Palace a few seasons ago. Keep the faith.
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Maybe no so bizarre. Last weekend I read that with Sanchez, having been converted to a striker and with Wellbeck coming back to fitness, Wenger was concerned about keeping all of his strikers happy. The article I read in the Times actually highlighted Giroud, who Wenger was saying he wanted to extend his contract but that he needed to decide whether he could deal with the competition. Perez is another that may not get a look in. And Wenger and Puel are mates. After all, Wenger let Claude win the quarter final.
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Absolutely. I hope the players that were around last year remember what a poor performance it was and put it right on Sunday.
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Not too concerned about that. It's another nothing article. It says "if" City's defensive problems continue over Christmas then City will "consider" making an "offer". So three conditions to Van Dyke going. 1. Their defensive problems may not continue. 2. They will "consider" making an offer (they may not make one). 3. If they make an offer, Saints may well reject it, probably would imo.
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A good away point at Stoke and we'll still be last on MoTD.
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12 clean sheets in 25 matches so far this season.
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Papering over the cracks though? I don't think so. Too often this board's a pandemonium of parrots knee jerking off into cyberspace.
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There is nothing unique about Saints recruitment. I'm reading "The Nowhere Men - The Unkown Story of Football's True Talent Spotters". Here's a quote: " He (James Smith, The Dugouts' Head of Recruitment) sees Borussia Dortmund as a more realistic role model: ‘They nearly went bust about five or six years ago because they overstretched. They’ve rebuilt with a team full of young players, all with good resale values. They recruited really cleverly, from Poland, Japan, South America, and won the Bundesliga. The next step involved the Champions League, which gave them the money to invest in slightly more expensive players. It’s like a virtuous circle as long as you can keep it going. It’s a great example of how to run a football club. They also produce top, top players from their academy. That leads to self-sufficiency. You have to accept that every year you might have to sell one, and that will fund a process of evolution. So you sell a player for fifteen and you buy three for five million each. The hope is one of those will be sold for fifteen in a year or two, and so it goes on. Everton can operate a bit like that in the Premier League because it is acknowledged and accepted that we haven’t got much money." Sounds familiar. So not unique but not a myth either. It's about recruitment being embedded in an organization which has a clear strategy and the ability to implement it over time. See this where Saints come out on top (Everton second). http://www.cityam.com/240359/forget-leicester-city-southampton-and-everton-are-a-better-bet-for-future-premier-league-success-according-to-new-management-index "Integration of core football values. Club managed as a complete system. Learning is everything. Strategic coherence. Clear and effective decision making". Get past the management speak and you may recognize a club that is operating along the right lines and giving itself the best chance of succeeding over time. Incidentally, there is another article linked to the above which places Saints at the top of those clubs producing the worlds highest paid players.
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Hey lads. Anyone think that result just papered over the cracks?