doddisalegend

So we swap the singers and the chapel enders around how's that make any difference the away fans now get a free ride and the Northam is silent when the players kick towards it. The truth is different people like to do different things at the football we are never going to have 30k saints fans singing OWTS in unison for 90 minutes no matter what the club does.

No way was Boufal going to be able to play another 90mins yesterday he wasn't even supposed to play 90 in the cup game the other night. He said in his after match interview he was struggling at the end of the Sunderland match.

We have a lot of players at similar level through out the squad good Pl level players with one or two who could player higher. We are more than match for any team when we play well ( which we certainly didn't yesterday). What we lack is that one attacking player with that bit extra to be able to turn games or put away that half chance on a regular basis not sure a club like us can ever afford one of those though.

We've always been the same we sing when we are winning. The early goal pretty much killed any atmosphere from the saints fans. All around crap afternoon really.

Neither long or jrod would have made a difference yesterday if you don't create anything it doesn't really matter who your attackers are On squad depth. We haven't missed Targett at all. Cedric is a miss because we cant rotate with Cuco. I think our squad is probably the best its ever been in terms of squad depth. We've rotated lots and still picked up results. Yesterday we played arguably our strongest team ( Hoj for Clasie and possibly Cedric apart) most of whom had enjoyed a rest mid week in the cup. You can point out several reasons why we lost yesterday squad depth isn't one of them.

It doesn't help that he seemed to be left 2 on 1 so often.

Costa was given the freedom of Southampton for his goal. A well struck shot but he should never have had that much time and space to pick his spot.

I think we did try to take risks and try stuff but the quality of the balls in the last third were well below par over hit, under hit just the plain wrong ball just poor quality all round. Against Chelsea's defence we needed to be spot on it instead the players chose this game to put in one of their worst performances since Man U away.

Defended like schoolboys today VVD had a poor game by his standards the rest weren't any better. Defence was all over the shop today. Plenty of possession in the middle but it was all in front of Chelsea with no cutting edge up front. The ref didn't help lm always amazed with how much gamesmanship Chelsea get away with its like refs are blind to it. In the end though Chelsea were decent and took their chances just dust ourselves down and go again. A **** way to end a weekend.

Was hoping for a spam win so we could over hall Everton when we beat Chelsea later ?

Sorry guys.. http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/37815951

A win tomorrow would take us above UTD and (possibly Everton depending on their game) and take us up to sixth only 3pts behind Chelsea.

Well you have to work with what you've got playing expansive attacking football isn't really an option for a newly promoted side with a limited team so fair play to them.

Jesus LOL

What's the point? They've had a string of managers whose only achievement is avoiding relegation by the skin of their teeth and than getting sacked a few months later. They need to get in a manager and stick with him and let him build a decent squad over a bit of time even if it means getting relegated. Short termism is doing them no favours better for them to build a longer term plan Moyes proved with Everton he can be a decent enough PL manager but no one is going turn the shower of ****e that makes up the Sunderland team into anything good with in a few months.

more quotes from that interview here http://www.espnfc.com/southampton/story/2983155/claude-puel-it-will-be-hard-for-southampton-to-repeat-success most interesting bit for me here "The team had played well under Koeman by defending deep and playing on the counter-attack. As we were going to play every three days and wouldn't be able to go up and down the pitch all game every game, I wanted to base our play on possession and control," Puel said. "It was a cultural change. In training, it worked, but in matches, with the tension, the players quickly resorted to what they knew how to do. We have a lot of technical players whose game is suited to that style, others were sceptical. I wanted to persist with it, they wanted results, so that took some handling." think Puel is going to be a very good manger for us.

Surely Osvaldo as an answer to our (alleged) striker problems...

http://www.espnfc.com/southampton/story/2983155/claude-puel-it-will-be-hard-for-southampton-to-repeat-success I know a lot of people where questioning our change of style at the beginning of the season but I think these quotes from from an interview Puel has done in France help to give some insights in to why he changed things. It would appear some of the players were as sceptical as the fans but on current evidence it looks like Puel got it spot on.

No apparently we are just the benchmark if you want to win the PL you have to be able to beat saints at home ?

Strangely that old soak Merson says the same thing http://www.skysports.com/football/news/15205/10634034/paul-mersons-predictions-chelsea-to-drop-points-man-city-to-bounce-back I'm picking a draw but if Chelsea do manage to get a win at St Mary's, you need to put them back up as contenders. weird how beating saints has now become a benchmark for a title winning team. ....

Ahh bollix out of the cup to a dodgy late game penalty at Arsenal it is then...

I think six academy boys was a step to far quality wise luckily Sunderland were truly awful and Boufal came up with a match winning moment of absolute class.

Reading between the lines sounds like Jrod didn't want to come off.

Funny last season we played a very strong side against Liverpool and got hammered, played a decent side against Sheffield Utd the season before that and lost. This time around we played probably the weakest team of the season and we won.....football eh.

Made hard work of that but through to the draw which is all that matters really.