Saint Pete

Surely he should have hooked Jander well before half time if he was playing like he was pissed?! It's fantastic we came back, but this was a once in a lifetime occurrence, we should never have been 3 down to this Leicester side, and he should have acted sooner with Jander's bizarre performance.

The goalscorers make this all the more extraordinary... Stephens, Manning, Charles?!!! 🤣

I want to hear stories of Saints fans leaving at half time LOL!! 😜

Wow!!

It's not really a surprise that Stewart is not starting as I'm sure we don't want a repeat of earlier in the season when Still got carried away and started him 3 games in a week, resulting in another long spell out. But would have expected Larin to start after his goal, unless there are also fitness concerns with him.

He was loaned out last January as it was clear he couldn't do a job in the Prem for us (no argument from me on that). But once we were back in the Championship, I don't see why we would have been trying to sell him then as it's pretty clear he is quite well suited to this level, isn't it? He's far from a perfect striker which is why he hasn't succeeded yet in the Prem. But he has a very decent record at this level no matter how people try to dress it up. So, no idea if your assumption that he was for sale all summer is correct but if it was its yet more evidence that those in charge of the club don't know what they are doing. Maybe Damion Downs was meant to be the SR replacement for Armstrong, but they didn't manage to achieve a sale in the summer! 🤣 Wouldn't surprise me at this point.

I can see what you are saying about being longshots for the play-offs and how that may have played into SR's thinking in selling Armstrong and placing more reliance/risk on Stewart keeping fit, you may well be right. But for me this attitude typefies the malaise that we are in as a club and the half-arsed approach SR take to decision making. It's how we have ended up with a 32 year old manager with little or no experience. "He'll do because he is in the club already, cheap and the players seem to like him. He might be a star in the making so why get an established manager with a track record?" And now with our strikers: "Well, we're probably not gonna go up anyway so let's bank some cash for our top scorer and rely on a guy who hasn't scored all season and another who has been injured for most of the last 3 seasons". It essentially translates to "We're giving up" doesn't it? And if the proper permanent replacement for Armstrong is not coming until summer, surely we could have kept Armstrong on until then? If he could have continued scoring at same kind of rate and ended season with say 18-20 goals, I don't personally think it would have impacted his price tag much as more clubs are likely to be in the market is summer window than January.

I hope he does recover from his injury problems and have a good career of course. But the point of my post above is its a very foolish strategy to rely on him to replace the goals of our top scorer (as another poster suggested may be the case) given his career record to date.

No part of our strategy (if there is one) should be relying on anything from Stewart as we all know another spell on the sidelines is just around the corner for him. Sad to say as he has some potential as a player, but it's just reality based on his record to date. Any goals we get from Stewart should have been viewed as a bonus. So once the inevitable happens, we WILL need Larin to be better than Armstrong to make letting him go the right decision.

What makes you think Scienza and Jander would make it in the Prem then? I like Azaz, stylish player always looking to create something. Like most creative players, he will be frustrating at times because some days it won't come off (Dusan Tadic is a good comparison). If I have a criticism of him, it's that he looks like a player who thrives on confidence, so I'm not sure he is one you want in the trenches when you are 2 goals down at half time. But he does have very good end product and instincts around the penalty area, much better than Scienza's in that respect in my opinion. And a player from midfield who can be a regular scorer is a very valuable commodity, especially when you've just sold your top scorer and replaced with a striker who hasn't scored this season!

Good player with a decent scoring record at this level, so we will miss him given that we don't have any others who can score regularly. I would have preferred to see him play more often in the wide positions rather than as a single central striker, but that wasn't his fault, more due to managers and club not signing other decent central strikers.

The guy who hasn't scored all season? You confident of that?! 😂

Well, the Canadian looks like he might have been a feasible replacement for Downs (not a high bar, potential big man option off the bench) but a replacement for Armstrong our top scoring striker? Wow, hard to see as anything but another nail in the coffin of our ambition.

Like Cameron Archer?

Yes, I think the sensible thing with Armstrong is to sell in the summer if he wants to go. Selling now only makes sense if we are very confident of signing someone who can do at least as good a job in this window and I don't think that's the case. We can't sign another Downs type in his place or we will sail very close to relegation. In theory it should be a little easier to find an adequate replacement who can do a good job in this league in the summer.