Saint Fan CaM

Gotta be seriously deluded to think anyone is going to fork out £250m for the club at the moment. Be lucky to find someone to pay £100m in today’s economical climate. We’re stuck with Chairman Goa for the foreseeable I think.

Unfortunately the club finds itself on borrowed time to sort out the horrendous mid-management of the previous 4 seasons. No one can say it’s under investment, because we’ve spent on players, but they’ve been significantly poor purchases and/or badly managed. Likewise, managerial appointments have been utterly dismal...only Ralph has shown signs of knowing how to get the stadium excited, but he’s been handed a sub-Prem squad. Then there’s the issue with allowing a large contingent of away supporters take over the stand that houses our most vocal of supporters...I mean you couldn’t make that one up! But the simple fact is the club must be financially on its arse to allow this to happen. Lastly, the Premiership might as well be renamed the Sky league. I am sick to the back teeth with not being able to plan my life without missing games due to re-scheduled games. I’ve missed three home games this season now or £200 roughly...and it’s getting to the point where I can not justify losing this much money. Even if I managed to go to all home games, there is little enjoyment when there’s little hope of winning a game. I may as well pay for a streaming service and watch from the comfort of home. Don't get me wrong, I love the atmosphere of a live game played by my home team, but for the reasons above this is fast being eroded to a point where I am seriously thinking of not renewing and I had to wait 30 years to get the seat I now occupy. Oh for the days of our rise from league one to the Prem...what a team we were then with Lambert leading the line. *sigh*

We don’t do draws this season and frankly if we were to draw this, it would be almost as bad psychologically as a defeat. I think we are as poor as Norwich have been at the moment and so the winner of this game will be the team that has the best manager...i.e. the best tactician who is able to utilise his weak squad to the best advantage. Norwich have home advantage and to be fair their fans can whip up some decent noise. I’m not particularly confident our players have enough fight in them to produce a winning performance. Would love us to produce a convincing win, but with injuries and at the mercy of underperforming players (Valery, Stephens, Boufal, Djenepo, Long, Adams and lately to some extent Ings) I predict a 2-1 loss.

Dear heck, we've got some rubbish in the squad. Valery, Boufal, Long, Adam's, Obufemi - all utter turd. Djenepo...dreadful tackle and clear red - what an arse. Desperately need Redmond and Armstrong back to have a glimmer of hope of winning a game.

Dear heck, we've got some rubbish in the squad. Valery, Boufal, Long, Adam's, Obufemi - all utter turd. Djenepo...dreadful tackle and clear red - what an arse. Desperately need Redmond and Armstrong back to have a glimmer of hope of winning a game.

Another team we struggle to beat and can’t see this going any other way than a 1-2 loss. We’re going to be sucked into another messy relegation battle unless something extra can be found. Djenepo and Boufal are not showing enough to replace even Redmond, Adams still not showing enough striking quality, Hojberg (our Captain) is looking half the player he was and wants away, our defence is still flaky. Squad is paper thin in quality.

Their front two are 20% more dominant than our front two. Their midfielders are 20% more dominant than ours. Our defence would be OK if it were not for a powder puff ******* goalkeeper. I wouldn’t move JWP - put on Valery or KWP at RB and Antonio will rip us a new one. Shane Long looks like he’s been injured and I’m not sure Ings will be risked, so maybe it’s time our £15m Championship striker stepped up.

Can’t see us scoring today with that front line. Let’s hope I’m very wrong.

Agree with Derry on all points - now they’ve changed the streaming service it’s much much better with little buffering. I do find there’s more of an issue when using it at home on my iPad and Virgin cable for some reason.

I hope he comes good, but he just doesn’t seem to get into real goal scoring opportunities. Armstrong does this better. There are admittedly signs of a good footballing brain with a couple of excellent assists, so perhaps it is game time he needs, but the problem is we cannot afford to have a striker on the pitch who doesn’t score goals and win games of football.

Reckon that a significant factor is the splitting up of the Northam on a regular basis to accommodate away fans. This affects not just one match day, but over time serves to dilute the most vocal of our fans. Then there’s been a lack of identity derived from 3-4 seasons of dire football at home and uninspiring transfer windows. Lastly, there’s the socio-economic factor of a good proportion of football spectators who don’t see football as their only passion or outlet - they have an income that allows for other interests...Saturday footie is not the sole focus, so there’s less passion on display. Could be argued that Fans from generally poorer areas of the country exhibit a stronger more vocal support as they’ve still got that focussed passion because they’ve spent a higher proportion of their income, so it means more. All these factors come together to make a perfect storm. Doubt it’s curable...getting SMS to truly rock again will be a bit like trying to herd mice.

Wetsham - bogey team. Away form may help. We don’t do draws so much. 2-1 to either side.

One word to summarise the first half. Profligate.

1-2 without Redmond. I don’t think we’ve got enough mentally to resist them.

No better, no worse. Equally ineffective.

* not giving pen *

Ref and linos shocking. VAR shocking in giving the pen. Hojberg head is elsewhere already...half the player of last season. We lack talent in the final third apart from Ings and especially now Redmond is out. Long will get a contract because Obifemi and Adams are equally inept. Boufal and Djenpo could be better if only they knew when to release the ball.

No word from Crocker then? You’d expect the club to have taken the opportunity to shout about the appointment etc.

Interesting but not particularly ground breaking and another chance to roll out the 0-9 story (yawn).

I’m a Romeu fan, but I have to say his performance tends to follow the number fouls he racks up and this primarily because he’s too slow for the speed of play against the better sides. He was lucky not receive a red due to a second yellow in the Spurs game.

If Ralph does sign a new contract (& I would say the signs are good) it would be a great statement of intent and direction from the Board. It’s been said so many times but it doesn’t seem to sink in for some people...Gao will not invest, ever, because the model for the club is self-sustainability...we may as well forget him. In terms of giving Ralph a war chest...why? He has said his intention is to maintain a very slim squad where key players get to play most matches. I think Bednarek and Stephens are our choice CB’s now...Vestergaard as backup and a couple of academy players to come through. Bertrand and KWP our fullbacks with Vokins as spare. Hojberg and Romeu might stay or go, but JWP and Armstrong will remain in midfield with a youngster coming through from the academy. Redmond, Djenepo and possibly Boufal plus an academy player in midfield, Ings and Long up top with Adams and Obefemi as understudies. Not much else needed arguably and the real issue is off-loading the dross on loan. I don’t think we’ll see more than one or two new players introduced to the squad in the summer...in terms of Ralph’s philosophy there’s no need.

Don’t want Europe for another 2-3 seasons. We’re not strong enough in squad depth to survive the rigours of this and a domestic campaign. It needs Crocker and Ralph to have that amount of time at least to put the club back on track after derailing Reed orchestrated.

Nothing like a bit of renewed optimism eh Trousers?!

Thought stadium was very impressive, but too vast meaning their supporters voices sounded weak. Although a bit small, thought toilet facilities were excellent and the bar service pretty good too. Pint and a pie for £5 was not too bad. WiFi good. Screens good. Only niggle was not enough tables/shelving to rest your pint on while eating. The coach trip home was a nightmare...heavy traffic getting away from the ground and then a diversion off the motorway meant I didn’t get home until 2pm!

Burnley...horrible non-football team. We will struggle, but if we score first and maintain pressure we might get a result. For once I’m going Saints win 2-1. But it could quite easily be the reverse of this if Ralph doesn’t adapt his tactics to their style.