CanadaSaint

That from the guy who posted this in December:

Well, I think you've succeeded.

No harm at all - that's what these things are for. FWIW I share your reservations but I'm willing to entertain the possibility that there are some significant things beyond our sight and hearing. That doesn't make me "gullible", just open-minded. And there's no harm in that, either.

Bets are on for which Dave will produce first: "What Saints don't need now is a new manager" "What Saints don't need now is instability" "What Saints don't need now is ..."

You missed the bit about trying to be open-minded, didn't you?

According to the Beeb, Pochettino's "been researching the team for weeks", so he should be sufficiently familiar with us to allow some interesting decisions.At the risk of inviting incoming misiles, let's see if S. Davis and Guly start.

I'm not being gullible, I'm trying to be open-minded. And if you have to go back 200 years to support your point, perhaps you need to try that as well. I have significant reservations about today's events but I offered a potential explanation for them - one of several. I can't see Cortese making this highly risky move unless he was privy to information or perspective that nobody on this forum has. Anyway, Napoleon didn't have the internet.

I'd suggest that we are more saleable now than at any point in our history. Whether we still are in May remains to be seen, but even if we were relegated we'd still be an attractive proposition to anyone interested in owning a leading English club. The ground, academy and parachute payments would see to that.

I can see Solent joining the Echo on the naughty step.

I'm not at all happy about the decision, the timing, or the potential impact on our fight to avoid relegation. And I'm not happy that a thoroughly decent man (who brought a very pleasing style to our play) has been shafted. However, this forum has proven time and again that it has little idea of what really goes on inside the club. For all we know, there might just be some disenchantment with Nigel among some of the key players (such as Rickie, after being left out at Chelsea) - or even a reluctance among key targets to join us. Cortese strikes me as the kind of guy who would keep his finger on the player pulse, even if the manager might view that as under-cutting his authority. Say what you like about Cortese but he's not stupid. He knows that this kind of change at this stage of the season is extremely risky, and that it would create a furore among the fan base and in the media. He wouldn't have done it unless, after very careful consideration, he was convinced that it was the right thing to do. That doesn't stop me from being p*ssed off about this, but it does stop me from going ballistic.

Even with Cortese's level of arrogance, I can't see him doing this without running it by the owners. And they're the only people capable of sacking him.

Any change now - or even at the end of the season, if we maintain the current momentum - would be mental. And we were laughing at Chelsea not many hours ago. Funny old game, eh?

Sorry but I think he's a plodding journeyman who marks space rather than his man, lacks pace at this level, telegraphs passes and is slow to recover from the resultant giveaway. He may have been fairly solid and perhaps even more in the SPL but IMO he's struggling here. It's just as well he has Cork and Schneiderlin to cover for his inadequacies so that they are far less costly than they could have been. Good team guy though.

Boy, are you ever mis-named.

I thought we played well in the first half and only went behind because of one bad giveaway and some ball watching and space-marking at the back; space has never scored a goal so I don't know why Davis, in particular, is so keen to mark it. The difference, for me, was that we got the ball into the box very quickly on two occasions in the second half, and didn't fart around when it arrived; the "strike" was almost instant on both occasions. Of course, it didn't hurt that Rickie was there for the first one. But that early ball/early strike lesson is one I really hope we'll heed from now on. Especially Puncheon.

In a similar vein, I think that performance would only have significantly increased the amount of money Chelsea would be willing to pay for Shaw. He out-performed one of the best LBs in the world tonight. By a distance.

I have no idea how much ground he covers in a game but I'd bet it's more than two other players combined (except Corky and one or two others).

Early ball, quick strike = 2 goals. Oh, that we learn from it.

Don't you just know it.

The two best things about a Saints goal? 1. It's a Saints goal. 2. Alpine and Lard disappear.

Early ball. Goal. What the f*ck is so difficult for our coaching staff to understand?

Yes, we have played quite well but the same things are killing us - no delivery, and certainly no quick delivery, in the final third. And ball-watching/marking space at the back. Davis is nothing more than a plodding journeyman with the lethal combo of poor concentration and slow reactions.

Davis is the most hideous marker of space we've got - that's all he does, mark space.

I'd like to see us use more of the variety we're capable of producing. Lambert's a far-post kind of striker, so Rodriguez should go near, with Ramirez finding the vacuum between them. Then we're set up to exploit an earlier ball - near, far or cut-back. But Punch is key. He needs to get the ball in earlier every so often. Right now, our front guys spend a lot of time trying to get out of his way, because he doesn't know where he's going next so how can they?

And then there's the Colocini situation. If he goes, Newcastle have a huge problem. If they force him to stay, which they probably will, who knows what his reaction will be on the pitch?