Smirking_Saint

I don't have a huge problem with the fact that his has no plan B Most tactical set ups these days, and this is very much the case for us, have to be coached so as that the players act automatically to certain situations and this is something that our 'press' is set up to do. Our tactical rigidity has always been both the cause of our success and failure at times (Previously I found this very much to be the reason that we were effective away but not at home) The issue I have with Ralph right now is how stubborn he is with this rigidity. Going back to my previous point, where the fans were scapegoated into being the 'issue' for our home form, the actual reasoning was our insistence to attempt to play our open gagenpress even against opposition that decided that set up to play defensive, obstructive football and counter on the wings.... still we persisted with our gameplan. He also, is quite poor at his in game management, often applying substitutions and tactical tweaks either too late or not at all, unfortunately we don't have the reinforcements that say Ole does at Utd, that can change games despite Ole's lack of tactical nous. We need a manager able to effectively think on his feet when required, and Ralph, unfortunately does not. Our lack of reinforcements, especially through our injury ravaged period, is of course not solely Ralphs fault, one can obviously question the decisions to send out certain players on loan. Another issue I have is again.... his tactical rigidity despite the fact that the players he had available were just not up to the task of carrying out his gameplan (and unfortunately, a gameplan such as ours needs players with the correct tactical and technical ability) he isn't the only manager of this failing of course, Klopp again is another that has failed to adequately adapt his tactics to the playing staff available. Do I think we should part ways with Ralph ? Not at all, I think from a coaching perspective he is as good a coach as we have had since Poch, but I think it is right that he is questioned and it is only right that he takes the bulk of responsibility for a season that has faltered. Perhaps we need to bring in an assistant able to think better on his feet, and bounce ideas to Ralph when required, Im still not convinced about what are extended managerial staff actually bring to the table. We do lack leaders, and probably have done since Fonte/VVD, this is something that I've been banging on about on twitter for months. Plenty of posts on here about the issue so I don't have to embellish further, but to be frank, a lack of characters on the pitch doesn't help our mental fragility. Reinforcements, yes, Ralph is working with an arm tied behind his back, I get that, a lot of the issues we have encountered have been out of his control, however, I still think he needs to accept the bulk of the responsibility for; Yet another 9-0 loss, a disastrous collapse in form, players abject and unmotivated performances In conclusion, his tenure has been a rollercoaster of high highs and low lows, but he is going to need to find a level of consistency if he is going to be here for the long term, part of that is on Ralph, and part will be down to reinforcement. I don't agree with us parting ways yet, partly because I'm not sure who we will be able to attract that has the ability to do a better job in the long term. But I do think he deserves the bulk of the critique going his way. Sorry for the long winded waffle guys

Forster KWP Salisu Jannik Bertie JWP Diallo Djenepo Armstrong Che Tella We don't need another change of system at the back, and certainly not to one that will encourage them to take less responsibility, Bednarek unfortunately deserves to sit one out and lets see what Salisu has to offer, I am a fan of Jan, but his recent issues (own goals etc) have seen him drop his form a bit Forster gives me more confidence than Macca, who had a poor showing even with the poor defence in front of him vs City Like another poster said, 3 of the 4 midfielders pick themselves, so the only other option is Djenepo vs Redmond and frankly Redders hasn't shown any improvement whatsoever.... He has the ability, but shows no forward intentions at all Che, again, picks himself, and I fancy Tella to give a championship defence a lot of problems with his pace and trickery Could we rest players ? Yes Should we ? I don't think so, of course league form has us all looking downwards but frankly if we don't pick up another 3/4 points in our run in we deserve the drop, I almost fear a loss to Bournemouth as more calamitous to our already mudded mental state then the benefits of resting our main players We...should.... should... beat Bournemouth, but I am genuinely worried tbh.... One things for sure, if Ralph cannot get these lads fired up and motivated after that shit show on Saturday then I think a lot of the recent criticism of his tenure are justified

I find it difficult to not question Ralph after that, of course, I don’t want him to leave and feel if anyone is the man to turn things around then it is he.. but last night was nothing short of capitulation The sending off, the officiating and the depleted squad certainly did not help but we ended up on the wrong side of a morale sapping mauling and you have to question where the pride and damage limitation was

https://twitter.com/alex_crook/status/1356747872260263936?s=21 Effectively Crook has stated that he has been told since the De Grossa exclusivity period has ended there are a number of parties interested in looking at Saints Could very well just be a shot in the dark soundbite but obviously could add a hint of hope that our current ownership situation may be on borrowed time

Neither of those players have had major injuries to both their knees though have they Ings also suffers with reasonably consistent niggles here and there (atleast 1 or 2 injury enforced absences a season) So no... its not an unfair criticism to highlight his likely lack of longevity

So what is up with Salisu now ? He has been on the bench a few times... but now it is long term ?

It all feels very very much weighted in Ings favour, and Im not sure I’m overly comfortable with that A 20m or even 30m release fee is absolute peanuts if Ings goes on to have another barnstorming end to the season, which almost negates tying him down in the first place... I would imagine even the likes of Leeds/ West Ham / Villa would be able to find that if they were looking to become much more clinical as an attacking outfit Add to that the fact we’ve offered a likely 3/4 year deal at inflated wages (as reported), the flipside is if he has a reoccurrence of his injuries (not unlikely unfortunately) then we are saddled with an unuseable asset with a large financial anchor around his neck There is no denying Ings is an exceptional player for us.. but he has realistically had 1 1/2 good seasons so far as well as a period of injury on a few occasions... so Im not sure it makes solid financial sense to abide by these terms

I see MLG is as pedantic as ever Give me wind up trolls all day long over that 🙄 jankewitz looks excellent from what Ive seen and read so far.. its just a slight shame that he plays in a position that we remain relatively well stocked in despite the injuries/suspensions as I expect we would have seen more of him

ACL reconstructions don’t really swell when they re tear, so we aren’t going to know either way until tomorrow Ings would have recognised the feeling though, and likely someone would of heard it, its quite a pop Im optimistic he’ll be ok ive torn 3 of the fuckers 😂

The way I see VAR is that for years and years and years we moaned about getting decision correct. As Saints fans we all personally bemoaned the big 6's grasp on the majority of decisions. We have a system now that provides us with that, but we are moaning about that now ? The offside stuff needs to be worked on but ultimately its getting decisions correct I think, more so than a linesman with the naked eye. IMO it needs to continue, but does need tweaking. There needs to be better communication between the team and the fan, and I do think they miss a trick by not letting the ref verify it on the screen, at worst it adds a bit of legitimacy to the calls. Perhaps we need to just see all calls checked on the monitor, no minute checking by an offside super computer, but a verification by the on field referee that can see a couple of angles and lasting all of 1 or 2 minutes ?

Apologies....for some reason it kept my tags from earlier... so yeah... ignore the Sims bit

I think both fullbacks are the priority for us in January, if truth be told, or at least a RB that can cover both.... I suppose Cedric can do that but he always looks even more disastrous on the left as he does on the right (ignoring his recent form to be fair to him) I would suggest though, despite the upturn in form we do need a new CB, one of our main reasons for success, certainly on the road is Ralphs tactical consistency, this allows us to play and press against teams that are more open against us, and it works. It is also why we do not play so well at home, often struggling against teams that play direct towards any area of our backline and bypassing the press. In order to make this work we probably need either a CB OR mobile DM that is effective in the air, and so can be deployed against these sorts of teams allowing us to continue with Ralphs preferred tactics.

Exactly in agreement with Dusic and Lighthouse here, unfortunately if we wasn't blessed with pace and didn't come out of the academy I would imagine the intrigue around him would be much less, he has always been one of those players that gets better when he doesn't play Despite the Spurs game, of which i think it was more of a case that their poor fullbacks weren't ready to be closed down at pace, he hasn't really shown any improvement over the years He is quick and he works hard, but technically he is lacking. The fact that its only Championship clubs interested sort of backs my point really We have better options in the squad now

He's literally had a number of chances, and never delivered

The signing of Danso has definitely upped it from a 5 to a 7 out of ten. We are beginning to make the squad leaner too which will only be of a massive benefit in the long run. Further outgoings in Moi, Lemina and perhaps one or two others would see us be further streamlined and much more ready come January or next year. The return of what looks like a reinvigorated Boufal is certainly exciting. Adams looks good, ings looks lean and hungry, Ralph has seemingly installed a new steel into JWP that wasn’t noticeable before Compared to previous years I’m really excited for this season

Its not really at the expense of our club though is it, and being a stepping stone, for a club with our budget and size relative to the rest of the premiership is probably an excellent tactic that has arguably proved to our advantage over the years I agree we need to get stronger, and make sure we only deal with clubs on our terms especially with players that are attempting to hold us to ransom, hopefully we seem like we are doing that with Lemina and Austin. Ultimately we will never be able to sign players like VVD if we were too bullish. And I would suggest, if it wasn't for poor recruitment in both the management and player markets we should have performed much better over the last 2-4 years with not only players of VVD's quality and then the incoming funds to replace what we have.

Why wouldn't you ? Use to tell the lads to **** off out of the office if they had a cold, why risk making the rest of the office ill just to let them stay there doing a half assed job

People that do not know how to use lanes properly on the motorway People that don't say thanks when you open doors for them, move out of their way etc People with ****e bar etiquette People that don't get out of the way when people are driving faster behind them, generally seems more prevalent when speed restrictions are in place.

How does someone with such a basic grasp of footballing tactics manage to fraud your way into an FM ‘scouting’ position ?

Officially you cannot sign anyone before 1st of July anyway, and I would imagine most players that have ‘signed’ elsewhere would have had something negotiated to ensure they recieve their loyalty bonuses. I’m not panicking yet, its pretty obvious to me that we have far too much deadwood floating around that we need to remove before we can have a concrete view of what our finances will allow I’m hoping a week or so into July should see some decent movement

Agreed Certainly he isn’t worth 20m in my opinion, unfortunately cannot stay off of the physio’s table and when he does he just doesn’t seem like he suits the system

Surely the Ings fee was negotiated and prepared for last year, considering that it was reported as compulsory. It seemed as if it was a case of a ‘loan’ to beat the clock But if we are saying we’ve spent 34m ‘this year’ I would suggest our scouting department is no better than its been for the past few years, 20m for Ings is daylight robbery and from what Ive seen, read of Djenepo I can’t see him being a regular starter. Maybe it’s an FFP issue, (which could only be wage based due to our transfer incomings and TV rights over the last 3 years) in which case there is a reset at the start of July, so all being rosy in your world we’ll be fine ? Alternatively we could have been taken on by a chinese chancer more concerned with milking what is left after Katerina had her share and doing the minimum to keep us in the prem ?

Are we really this skint ?

Sims has had plenty of chances, he isn’t good enough

Its probably as Sims is an overrated one trick pony that relies on pace and with a Palace team content to sit as deep as possible it renders his one dimension toothless