norwaysaint

That's basically the Puel way. We got plenty of points but the football was excruciating to watch and I went from watching most matches to hardly watching any until fairly recently. That taught me that I need to enjoy the football and see some kind of team cohesion even if there are fewer points.

Very hard to see much genuine thought with all the snide comments and sniping on this one. Just wondering, as an expat, what people think is actually going to happen now, realistically. As they have ruled out a second referendum, ruled out an extension, voted against the deal, heard it confirmed that the deal won't change and nobody wants no deal. Where do YOU think this will actually go and what do you think the result wil be? Is no deal inevitable now? With every other eventuality ruled out?

Yep, just like we knew that Redmond isn't good enough and that JWP and Bednarek aren't either.

I support shipping out the players who he knows he doesn't want, while avoiding any rash January buying to refill the club with dross. He's got plenty of players already at the club that he needs a good look at first. He can do his buying in the summer, when it can be done properly.

So difficult for anyone to say much for sure. I never heard Valery mentioned here until he was in the team and now he is generally accepted as being good enough to play. JWP was slowly being written off by more and more fans, but now seems to have found a place in the team with RH's system. Slattery wasn't generally the player we were all expecting to see come through next, but that seems to be the case. Targett has also gone from being a player we should move on, to being a creditable alternative when Bertrand is out. The threads about defenders on here had Bednarek way down the list and generally not seen as worthy of selection and Redmond was seen as possibly our worst player. So I'm just going to wait to see whether Hesketh, Sims and Gallagher fit in with the team we are becoming and whether RH can find potential there or not.

Exactly this. Let's not write off players that might flourish under this manager. If Valery and Slattery can do a job, I dare say at least one of those guys can. Let's remember that most of our fans thought Bednarek wasn't good enough for the first team at the start of the season.

Ralph has a weak squad to work with, but at least it means we'll actually find out what exact kind of quality we have in players like Slattery, Sims, Gallagher, Ramsey, Valery etc. There's been so much discussion about whether the younger players can do anything at this level, hopefully we'll get some answers and either move them on or bring them through. Valery hasn't done badly.

Ricky Lambert.

They really haven't been though. The forum's been pretty divided and uncertain on Cedric for a while. There's a thread specifically about Cedric or Valery and after a couple of pages, it was pretty much even. Nobody's been hyping Cedric's contributions this season.

Anyone else get that song in their heads when they see his name? Bill-y Sharp doo doo doodoo doo doo

And a team with strikers who just couldn't score suddenly getting 6 in 2 is pretty miraculous.

You never know though, perhaps we would have won the last two matches and scored three in each if Hughes had stayed as well But seriously, it was pretty much accepted that our strikers were just no good in front of goal. We'd all see those stats of their records, they were all hopeless, and yet with this little coaching they get six in two? What the hell was the coaching before?

None of our strikers can score, remember? What on Earth were Pellegrino and Hughes doing with these players?

Seems pretty evenly balanced, but perhaps Cedric still favoured as he might show an improved attitude. If other players could look instantly sharper and more interested, why not him? Whoever is picked, I'm sure that if either of them plays badly, it was obvious we should have picked the other and someone will post something condescending about what "all the experts on here said"

Cedric has been one of our most criticised players this season, while Valery has been one who made an immediate good impression given his chance. Does Cedric deserve his place back to show that he too can perform under good management, or has Valery done enough to keep his place now?

Most people here didn't want Bednarek playing either. https://www.saintsweb.co.uk/showthread.php?60171-Put-our-CBs-in-the-order-you-think-they-belong#.XBaAwmhKjIU

None?

Is there a stream?

Have Hesketh and Sims ever really been given a chance in the team? I know there have been a couple of brief snatches of playing time, but I don't remember them actually having a clear part in the first team. McQueen seemed to get a few regular chances though, probably enough to make his claim if he was worth a regular place.

Thanks for the responses. Nice to see some proper comments about him that fill out where he fits in.

I've never seen him play, but I'm utterly confused about the Bednarek comments. He played a few matches at the end of last season and everyone seemed in agreement that he was a decent defender, the first in ages not to be roundly slated. People thought he showed the ability to do the simple things properly and was what we had been missing. Then this season started and he didn't even come close to getting picked. Everyone thought that the defenders we were playing were awful, but nobody wanted Bednarek in the team again. In fact I started a "best CBs thread" and literally nobody put him in their preferred pairing. Then he got a chance again last time out and I haven't seen any bad comments about his performance, which is a first for a defender this season. Yet come this thread again and people generally don't want him to play again. I don't get it at all. Is he okay, but nobody appreciates him, or is he **** but nobody wants to actually criticise his play on matchdays?

Get angry with the players for not trying their hardest, yes. Get angry with the players for an attitude problem that might be entirely fabricated by some bloke on the internet? Calm down and get perspective. Too many people believe every story that's fed to them on this site. Half of the stories regularly treated as fact have only ever been pure speculation.

Matt Mills doesn't really qualify for this as he played quite a few first team matches and even somehow got signed by City, before finding his place in the championship. Didn't realise he now plays in the Indian league, odd place to end up. His brother Joseph "Fish" never really played a bad game for us, but fell by the wayside as we looked to get better players for our rise. He's still only 29, but never really went on to a higher level than he played at with us.

True, but you know what I mean, I imagine. Young prospects may be a better word.

For every Walcott, Bale and Oxlade Chamberlain, there are very very many who seemed like the next big prospect, but ended up either languishing in lower leagues or out of football altogether. Not including players currently on saints books, who were the ones you really thought would be something, but weren't? For me I was certain Leandre Griffit was going to be a huge star. One bad performance against a rampant Arsenal and he was pretty much done.