Smirking_Saint

Id rather Che than Broja tbh

Im going to go ahead and put you down as a poor troll kiddo Nobody is this dim surely

Ralphs ears have just pricked up

We’ve got 11 points from our last 20 games and have lost by 9 goals twice Id comfortably say he now needs to be held accountable To preface this Ive been pretty consistently pro Ralph, but I jist don’t have the faith in him any more.. this squad isn’t that bad.. but when I watch us set up with a 532 and see how much of a mess it is in the transition then I lose faith, I don’t think he can take us further but I hope he makes me eat my words

What do you want me to say ? Do you want me to blow smoke up his ass and call for him on the team sheet every week ? Im not the sort that would ever boo him or not support him on the pitch but I do wince when I see his name on the team sheet and our reliance on players of his ability is a large part of why we find ourselves where we are This is a forum, where we discuss Saints, and Im sorry but he isn’t good enough, and Im sure he doesn’t care what I think either as he collects his salary

Stephens is crap and should have been moved on ages ago, if he didn’t show half of his passion then he’d of recieved even more abuse from the fanbase unfortunately

It’s still a fair point, 4th choice CM and even Aribo/Stu/Ely can play there at a push Pushing for Garner seems odd considering; - He’ll likely be swapping one bench for another - We need other positions at a priority abd 14m represents roughly 25% of our spend to date

Why would you weaken a strong midfield pairing to play another 2 players out of position ?

Apart from being a constant nuisance, and having involvement in both goals you are spot on.........

Was terrible against Spurs, was better yesterday, a decided average defensive player at best... but he is definitely better going forward this year. I don't rate him, I think overall we need better cover, but credit where credit is due he has been ok and if we have to deploy him against Leicester then I'm not going to lose too much sleep

Don't manage any football clubs mate, you can probably delete the FM download too

That I can agree on tbf

Without going over it again, players take more responsibility in what they need to do defensively in a 2 rather than in a 3 3 atb is simply harder to play than a 2 at high level, the experiment is shot, it doesn't give us any extra security and clearly numbs our attacking intent, hopefully Ralphs little tinkering in this area died after 70 minutes yesterday

I don't think he is good enough, but he isn't anywhere near as bad as is being made out, he is a third best CB now behind ABK and Salisu (If ABK continues to show what he showed yesterday) His issues are highlighted by our tactical ineptitude at times, for instance he looked good in that first stage of the season last year and in long stretches of previous seasons, only being shown up when we started to be stretched and there was a lack of defensive cover (late season last year) and now again in whatever system Ralph has been trying to play He is much more of a proactive defender than the likes of Stephens, Valery and Lyanco... which is why he is one of our more saleable assets.. can we improve on him ? Certainly... Does he deserve the grief he gets ? Absolutely not

It could also be that he is moaning about playing 532 when it clearly isn't working, we just don't know But no, he really isn't as bad as we make out, play with any form of structure and he looks fine... worth noting that absolutely none of our defensive players, bar maybe Lavia, came out of the 532/352 experiment with any merit whatsoever

Ex He has left, available on a free now

It also means you can get away with not taking responsibility in key positions and basically causes a ton of confusion as you pretty much 'assume' that someone is covering for you Ive rarely seen 3 atb work effectively outside of teams that play it with the same line up (and vocal players) consistently... its just shite

Do you know who else is going to want game time before the world cup ? JOHN BROOKS ON A FREE

I'm not sure whether "genuinely exciting" is a huge stretch or indicative of how awful our transfer dealings have been over the last couple of years

In fairness to him I think 3 atb makes all our CBs look terrible He isn’t as bad as the hate he gets

The team structure was SO much better when we went into a 4222 yesterday, so Im really puzzled why Ralph made the 'difficult to learn' remarks during the fans forum. It ensures responsibility is taken on the pitch, the majority are used to it and we looked dangerous. Leicester look in disarray but they are still dangerous, and Vardy will likely get his yearly goal against us --------- Bazuno----------------------- KWP - ABK - Salisu - Perraud (djenepo) -----Lavia -- JWP ---------- S Armstrong ------Aribo---- -------Che ----Mara------- Im really hoping Ralph learns from how yesterday ended and goes with this, special mention as well to Adam Armstrong that looked excellent yesterday and could certainly be a strong option from the bench

4222 works best, thats how we have played our best football and even showed yesterday that we were at our most dangerous in that tactical set up. We played 3 in the middle in our 352 games, and we were still being over run, more players in a certain position doesn't necessarily mean more confidence in that area, we had 3 CBs and 3 CMs in our first 160 odd minutes of the season and looked structurally awful Go back to the 4222, play our best eleven, accept that ROMEU might be dropped, or Lavia might be dropped and go from there..... Im not convinced Mara is an out and out striker either, Che was a handful yesterday, I'd like to see him continue there

Ive always felt that there is a good player in Iheanacho, good athleticism, good technically I wouldn't be completely against it at all, if we can get the best out of him then it's a good deal

Agree, 532 doesn’t suit our better players at all, plus all the tactical nuances

I can’t see how he survives this long term really, especially because we have a difficult August Ultimately Id take stuff like this with a pinch of salt but there’s too much coincidental bits of news a corroborating rumours coming out of the club, also explains the downbeat and defensive ‘vibe’ around the forum yesterday Id go one more and say its not just Ralph at risk here though, wouldn’t surprise me at all of Semmens’ neck is on the line too The only thing that baffles me is why we’ve let him go through a pre season and likely have a say in some of the players coming in