Rebel

You can only play attacking full backs if you've got 2 midfielders who are going to sit and defend - we don't! Morgan used to be able to defend - and keep the ball - and Davis can't seem to do either. I'm not actually sure what the point of Davis is!? We are really missing Cork.

Fox, Morgan, Davis, Fonte and Yoshida were all awful tonight. Fox is consistently awful though - his lack of positional awareness is terrifying. He just cannot seem to mark his man - or occupy the space he should. He drifts into the middle and backs off attacking players which seems to cause the rest if the defence to panic. Saying that tonight he was drifting in at times ascYoshida seemed to be marking no one.

Michael Dawson on loan with an option to buy if we stay up - I could see that happening as he's not playing much at Spurs. I'd love to see us sign Butland and Zaha for the future but I just can't see it Other than that I think we're looking at Championship players who want too step up to the Premier League and might stay with us or a season if we do -,and maybe one or two unknowns from Holland or Italy. Matt Phillips for pace on the right - and because it looks like we'll lose Mayuka to the African Nations Cup for a month if not 2 at the end of January. Charlie Austin would be another good signing - he's looking too good for the Championship and is going to want out of Burnley - and they'll probably need to sell. Maybe Scott Dann or Curtis Davies to strengthen the defence. I'd love to see Douglas Franco Texeira but again not sure it will happen for us. We desperately need a left back - Erik Pieters from Holland would be top of my list but I again I can't see it happening for us. Maybe we'll seal the deal for Nicolai Boilesen instead. At the same time we need to move some of the deadwood out. De Ridder and Hooiveld back to Holland. Dickson and Seabourne back to League 1. Butterfield back to the Championship. And Do Prado back to Brazil. Maybe send Tandanari Lee out on loan as well to get some more experience of English Football back in the Championship.

So do we stick or twist in January? We spent £30 million or so in the summer in a so far failed attempt to make the step up to the premiership to bridge the gap in quality if you like. And according to the rumours there was more money on the table to spend. If things continue as they are - we are going back down - I'm pretty sure of that. So do we stick with it and spend a lot more money in January in an attempt to stay up? Bring in players like Michael Dawson in defence. Problem with that is January is a time for inflated transfer fees and inflated wages. We'll also have to overpay players to persuade them to take a risk on relegation. And it might not work anyway and leave us running at a massive loss in the Championship. That's if the players don't abandon us in the summer - and probably for less than we paid for them. Or do we twist - accept we are probably going to get relegated - and bring in players that will stay with us when we get relegated -on Championship wages - and give us a great chance of getting promoted again? Players like Curtis Davies, Scott Dann, Matt Phillips and Charlie Austin. I guess there is an outside chance those players could keep us up! Which players should we be looking to sign in January? Should we plan for relegation and aim for promotion again next season? Or should we go out all guns blazing to stay up up this season - and take the risk of financial meltdown if we do go down. Will we be able to keep hold of players like Lallana, Morgan, Yoshida and Mayuka if we do go down.

One thing Davis isn't is a ball winner. Midfield 3 of Cork and Schneiderlin to sit and hold - protecting the centre backs and full backs - with Lallana to carry the ball forward and run at the opposition for me Then Mayuka on the right to add some much needed pace out wide and Ramirez on the left with Rodriguez up front for his pace and movement

A morale boosting win over Spurs for Norwich who took the League Cup more seriously than us - let's see where their momentum takes then now!?!

I think NC - like most of us was fairly p*ss*d off we threw away the chance we had of winning the title against Reading last season - no too mention the surrender to Blackpool. Much like we failed to win the League 1 title as well the season before Perhaps his faith in Adkins and their relationship broke down after that. To be fair we crawled over the finishing line to promotion last season. I've heard rumours from people that seem to always know what's going on inside the club that we had a number of players all but signed and sealed in the summer - but Cortese delayed and they went somewhere else or stayed put. Perhaps Cortese's confidence in Adkins judgement has gone - and Adkins know's it. It certainly seems that there was some disagreement over players signed in the summer as Adkins kept talking of signings but they never seem to happen. Tandanari and Yoshida were both commercial signings - and Ramirez and Mayuka vanity signings - it seems to me. I don't think any of them were Adkin's choices. I am starting to think a parting of the ways is inevitable. Those same people also tell me that Cortese wants out.

Do you really think players like Lallana, Cork, Schneiderlin, Clyne, Mayuka, Lee, Yoshida and Ramirez will stick around if we get relegated? And if we are in the bottom 3 in January will we be able to bring in the type of player we need to stay up - it becomes a downward spiral. I can't see players like Michael Dawson or Matt Phillips joining us in that situation. Whatever happens we need to get rid of players like De Ridder, Guly, Butterfield, Dickson and Seabourne in January and bring in players that actually give us some strength in depth and might actually be capable of getting us back up. Players like Charlie Austin and Kieran Trippier perhaps.

If we get relegated this season most of our better players will leave. Lallana, Schneiderlin, Clyne, Cork, Ramirez and Mayuka would all be on their way I suspect. We could also lose Shaw and Ward-Prowse. And I'm not sure Sharp would come back as he'll probably be playing Premier League football with Notts Forest. We are going to have to rebuild the team - and the last time we had to do that we ended up in League One.

At the moment you'd struggle to see this team finish in the top half of the Championship. Right now I'm not quite sure how we got promoted. We are desperately short of a first choice goal keeper and an entire defence not to mention a midfield.

Simply not good enough!

Losing games of football - our defence making mistakes

I think it's fairly obvious we put a team out to lose tonight so that we can concentrate on Premier League survival. The big problem with that is we need a win - from wherever we can get it - and a team that is used to playing together and to a system. Momentum and that winning feeling got us promoted last season. That losing habit will get us relegated this season. Reading have got the right idea - playing their first team against Arsenal and going 4-0 up. Think how a win tonight could turn their season around. Mind you the way we are playing our first team would struggle against Leeds at Elland Road.

Mayuka has to start the next game. He completely changed the game when he came on with his confidence and his pace. His confidence spread to the others and the who,e team stepped up a gear or two. I thought we might have got the 2-2 draw before Adkins made the last 2 subs - but they took our momentum down a notch or two. Ben Reeves looked the part and should probably start the next game over Fox - but we did miss Fox's free kick delivery. Problem is he can't defend and that and the long diagonal ball is all he's got to his game. Guly just proved he's not up to this level of football - he lacks the dynamism you need at this level. Even in the per-game warm up he looked half-*rsed! Davis I'm not sure about - he can look tidy on the ball but passes backwards and sideways too much, has no pace and can't defend or tackle - and doesnt run with the ball or drive the game forward. I think Cork will give us an awful lot more in the middle of the pitch.

The Stadium was actually rocking against Fulham when we went 1-0 up and before the crazy substitutions that lost the game for us. Yes the crowd at St Mary's are brittle - it seems the hangover from 2 relegations is still with us.

Lowe - at least he did something's wright - Redknapp did absolutely everything wrong for Saints. It's not a question at all really is it!

Our defence got away with it an awful lot last season - mainly because we dominated possession of the ball in nearly every game we played. They still managed to make mistakes every game though - but at that level we didn't get punished every time. The big difference this season is we're not dominating possession - the defence our under a awful lot more pressure and they are making a lot more mistakes - and we are getting punished nearly every time they make a mistake The games we didn't dominate possession last season - like against Blackpool - we got punished - and every time we came up against an attack with pace and quality we - like against Blackpool and Reading - we got punished. Even last summer most people thought our League 1 defence wasn't up to the Championship - and not much has changed since then. And all we've added since then is a Championship right back and an Eredivise centre back from the team with that leagues worst defensive record last season. Even if we go down this season - which is now looking more likely than not - the defence will require major surgery. Our only chance is that January doesn't come too late - and that we manage to scrape out a few results before then to keep us in the fight. Whoever is in charge of transfers needs to be working on the deals for January now - so that come January 1st we have a new centre back and a new left back to slot into the team.

I'd take Hoddle over Redknapp any day.

We don't have the players to play 4-3-3 - it's as simple as that. Lambert is just not fast enough or mobile enough to lead the line playing that way. We also lack wide forwards/wingers with real pace to play that way. Not to mention the fact that out full backs just aren't up to playing that way either - both of them need protection from a midfielder in front of them. All this suggests there is some truth in the rumour we are being made to play that way from the very top down. Adkins did sound all but defeated in his post match interview. Something has to change - and it has to be the way we play - I can't see that simply changing the manager will make any difference. Whoever was ultimately responsible for signing players in the summer should also take a large chunk of the blame for not brining in the players needed to play 4-3-3 or more importantly strengthening he defence.

Our defence has no idea what they are doing.

It's defenders we need - and a defensive midfielder - not a new manager.

In another statistics table it says Morgan is joint second in the tackles made table - with 24 just one behind Mark Noble at West Ham - it's our full backs, centre backs and wide midfielders who are the problem.

That's because he's from Yorkshire

Kappa

Ramirez will probably turn out to be a great player for Saints - if we stay up and he stays more than one season. He certainly looked like it for parts of the game against Villa. I'm not assuming we spent all the money we had as there were rumours of substantial bids in for other players like Boilesen at Ajax. But it looks like we've borrowed money to spend now on transfers against our TV revenue/payments from later in the season and the security of our parachute payments ifvwe go down which suggests otherwise. So far we've spent £30 million on transfer fees - and our probably going to be paying out the best part of another £20 million in wages. Our revenue for this season - with the the premiership TV money is probably going to be around £60 million. So unless the Liebherrs are going to put some more money into the club - which they probably arent as we have borrowed money instead - it suggests we have pretty much spent all our money for this season. I guess January will tell us for sure if - as if we've got it we'll surely spend it. At the moment we don't seem to have too many problems scoring goals - but we seem to be completely unable to stop teams scoring against us. So Raimrez at £12 million will probably help us score some more goals - but we'll keep conceding more than we score unless something changes. Maybe 2 or 3 defenders - bought with the same money - who made the difference when it came to keeping a clean sheet or even just reduced the amount of goals we concede might have been a better investment. Granted buying any player is a risk - Ramirez is going to be out for a while it seems with a leg injury. But I can think of a couple of defenders we could have bought in - Douglas Franco Texeira was supposedly up for grabs at £4.5 million, Niklas Moisander went for £3 or £4 million to Ajax - and the two of them were rated as two of the best defenders in the Eredevise lady season. You could add Mateo Mussachio at newly relegated Villareal - highly rated despite his lack of height - and we'd have probably got him for a couple of million. Dann, Johnson and Davies at £6 million or whatever are all overrated as they're English. To be honest we haven't really seen enough of Gaston to know fir sure yet - but at 21 and with the flashes of potential we've seen he probably was great value compared to Johnson and Jarvis.