S-Clarke

Yeah, I've noticed that - what on earth is it about? Soucek should have scored, he wasn't offside as Bertrand was a little slow getting back and was playing him on. That's not the first person in recent weeks who could have scored either. It's a very, very high risk strategy and I'm not sure why we are doing it. It doesn't benefit us at all, doesn't allow us to attack any quicker or break...it just seems daft. A bit like our insane high line at the start of the season.

Absolutely, they should have been used to take the backlog from the hospitals. I think they were a big publicity stunt though, there was never any intention to use them on mass - it just looked good in the media. We had one lined up next to the cruise terminal in Southampton but that 'never happened'. The one in Bristol was never used, the one in Birmingham and the North East area had a splattering of patients. London the most used one, but not anywhere near how it should be. They were 'stood up' to aid with the situation we find ourselves in now (Hospitals over run etc). So why in gods name are they being 'stood down' as of Boxing Day? Absolute nonsense. Lots and lots and lots of $$$$$ spent on these by the way, they were not 'freebies'.

If you're going to post something like that back it up and come back to answer the 'WTF' posts. As you clearly have no idea about football. Otherwise you will be categorised as a non-saints supporting troll.

My belief is that will happen, they are talking about a new tier for the entire country that is 'tougher' than tier 4. Curfews have been mooted, how that goes down is anyone's guess. Riots pending? Sounds like 2021 is going to be another blast of a year and we're not even there yet.

Agreed, it's only going one way whetherr you agree with it or not. Tier 5 mooted (which will apparently include curfews) and almost certainly a 'pause' of all professional sport. Meet 2021, same as 2020.

I don't see a 'spanking', as we are relatively 'solid'. (i bet we go and prove that wrong now). But I cannot see us winning, we have a few fatigued players at the moment. But we can't change it up as we have no depth (Just people like Shane flaming Long)

We were lucky West Ham were equally as dreadful. They seemed more bothered about stopping attacks than attacking themselves.

The less said about that the better. That was absolutely diabolical. We are certainly in a slump, be interesting to see where we are at the end of Jan. I doubt it will be anywhere near the top 6.

Pretty dreadful to be honest. We shaded it, in whatever way you can shade such a dreadful game of football. Absolutely terrible to watch, No flow, no intensity, no quality. Moussa is once again a total passenger. After 2 years he now needs to be showing what he can do, he's on the brink imo.

Brighton are so shit.

edit

For me, that shout fell into the category of 'seen them given'. I don't think it was 100% stonewall, but they have been given.

it was a freak season for everyone - especially Leicester, whereby none of their squad got injured, absolutely insane and unheard of. So whilst they didn't have a big squad, they didn't have to delve into it a great deal. They were able to play that core group for 90% of the season. We have already hit injuries to our core group, long term as well.

Not massively surprising, I think they both have better squad depth than we do. We've hit a bit of a period of injuries, first time in a while tbf. I don't think there will be much between ourselves and Villa at the end of the season though. Everton/Leicester and co just better than us. It's been fun where we've been, but the reality is that where are are now is more akin to our current level imo - top 10 would be a great finish for me.

To be fair to Stephens, he played well today I thought? That block at the end was 'goal' worthy. Let's not forget he has also progressed under Ralph. We wouldn't have given Vestergaard the time of day this time last year, he's improved...and so did Stephens. He's not flawless, of course not, but he's a lot better than he was in 2019.

Easily our best RB since our Clyne days IMO.

Walker, Cancelo, Alexander-Arnold - 3 who spring to mind who are light years ahead of KWP. He's good, but not at their levels.

I like him, I've liked him in the sub appearances he's made as well. He's a much more nimble and agile midfielder than Romeu, but what you get for that is lesser strength and physical presence. Good technical, mobile player though.

That is the exact reason he leaves the subs as late as they are, they're no better than what is on the pitch....so unless you are absolutely convinced the better/more experienced players aren't going to cut it, then you stick for as long as you can. It's a shame, but there's not much more he can really do. You notice when he has quality to select on the bench, he does it much earlier.... He can't be happy with the depth he's got to play with...but what can you do.

I genuinely don't feel we have the squad to sustain it over a full season. We've managed to sustain that level of form over two seasons...with a big gap (or two) in the middle, so we were adversely affected by fitness or squad availably. Over the course of a season when you lose key men (like we are atm) then we will slip slide away. Top 10 will be result for this 'squad', talk of Europe over a full season isn't doable until we have more depth in the squad, which we don't. Decent side when all is fit, no doubts, but over a season that will never stay the same - so you have to then call on the likes of Long to not do anything, and thus the results will automatically dip. Nothing you can do about it.

Wouldn't have said it 6 months ago, but missing Vestergaard is a disaster. Not just for our defensive shape, but our attack....he is pivotal in spreading the play, we don't have anyone else who can do that. That automatically removes an enormous chunk out of our game. Could be a ropey January.

Defo take the point from that game and run, not very good. Could have been much worse, so I can't complain with the result. At the end of the day our squad is poor once you have to start delving into it. When you have to start Shane Long, who scores a goal once every decade, then you know how weak you are depth wise. I think there are better goal scorers down in the lower leagues tbh. Certainly shouldn't have offered him a 2 year.

That is possible - the 'local' teams are doing a decent job pulling the vaccines together and creating some organisation after what the government and national teams are feeding them. I've seen behind the scenes from an IT view of how it's panning out, it's chaos from the 'centre'. The government have outsourced the mass distribution of IT kit to private companies (there's a surprise), the local teams aren't told what is arriving or when and there is no info on how they are configured. When it does arrive (if it does), it's usually only containing half the tools they require....so the local teams are the ones having to think on their feet. The government's handling from a national standpoint has been shit throughout, only reason things are kind of working is because of the local front line teams.

Pochettino has his new job......PSG have just sacked Tuchel

Can't disagree with any of it, it has been absolute carnage. The Vaccine rollout is equally as shambolic. They haven't got a single thing correct. I wouldn't trust them to turn the tap on my bath.