Saint Pete

-------------------- Forster ----------------------- ------- Fonte ------- VvD -------- Bertrand ----- Cedric ------------------------------------ Targett ---------- Wanyama ------ Clasie --------------- ---------------------- Davis ----------------------- --------- Mane ------------------- Pelle ----------- Subs: Stek, Yoshida, JWP, Romeu, Tadic, Long, Austin If Davis still not fit, would start with Tadic instead.

Well, on the positive side, we've got a strong looking bench!

Tadic is frustrating at times, but I don't see how you can say he has contributed less than Long. He has regularly created chances and goals since he joined Saints and even in Saturday's game when he didn't play well overall, he still produced one of the only moments of real quality from us in the match with his perfect early ball in to Pelle in the first half - which should have been buried by Pelle. Generally, when he is on song, so are we, so he is much more of a key player than Long.

Yoshida selection possibly to compensate for how small we are in midfield to help with defending set pieces?

Yes, agree with that on what I've seen so far - seems to find it hard to impose himself once the other team get on top. Early days for him though and needs a few more games in his legs before we see the real player I think.

Maybe so, but is it not a concern that we can't hold on to the ball even against a side with so little ammunition? Unfortunately, most sides we play for the rest of the season will be much better and if we play so poorly for half the game, we will get punished - just like against Leicester.

Better opposition would have taken advantage - there's no way we should have allowed them so much time and space.

A win is a win, BUT... That 2nd half performance was terrible, much worse than the Leicester game in my opinion. Difference was Bournemouth didn't have Mahrez and Vardy to take advantage of it. Koeman should be tearing them a new one after that, because if we keep producing that, we will lose a lot of points against better opposition. It's hard to understand how a team can be as dominant as we were in the 1st half and then not be able to string 3 passes together in the 2nd. You have to put it down to complacency, which is not good enough given what happened against Leicester. Some will be critical of Wanyama for his 2nd yellow, but a number of other players were just as at fault for allowing their player to run so far without any sort of challenge - which was typical of us throughout the half.

Bizarre substitutions from Koeman, it has to be said. With Leicester building up a head of steam and playing a fast-paced pressing game, it was the worst possible time to throw on a midfielder who is completely lacking in match fitness. Clasie was way off the pace and don't think that experience will have done his confidence much good. Romeu had to be the better option in that situation to try and get back some control in midfield. Credit to Leicester though - terrific performance from them in the 2nd half, although interesting that Ranieri gets credit for great subs at half time when it's baffling that he didn't pick Mahrez, by far their best player, from the start!

Really? Looks like utter horse**** to me! It lost me with the first line about us "working round the clock to prevent him from leaving", which is bull**** as we don't have to do anything to prevent him from leaving!

For those who are saying we should just get rid, consider the impact of that in the future. We can't allow players to just get what they want whenever they or their agents throw a strop, or they will all be trying it soon enough. The club are right in their stance of saying neither Vic or Mane will leave this late in the window, as enough have left already (which we are still working on replacing at this point), and it would not be possible to recruit good enough replacements in the time left. As for Vic's attitude, if he has any sense at all and cares about his career, he will apologise and knuckle down again soon enough once the window has closed, just as Morgan did last season.

Great to see Tadic back playing on the left and playing the way we know he can. Not really sure why we ever started playing him on the right last season as he just looks so much more comfortable on the left? Hopefully he will stay there now for a run of games. JWP also showed people what he can do - think a deeper lying midfield role where he can get on the ball, pass it and have more of an influence suits him well, but he needs to get more aggression and power in his game if he is going to be affective there against the better teams.

Just said on 5 live Tyler Blackett from Man U has signed for Celtic on a year's loan. A sign that VVD will be leaving?

I agree. As terrible as last night was, this is an important game for us, as we need to get our first win soon, before we start coming up against much better opposition than we've played to date! It won't help our cause if the fans are on the team's back from minute 1.

Our approach in last night's game was really worrying. There was so much long ball that it had to have been a tactic dictated from Koeman. It's not the way I like to see us play and it certainly isn't working, so hopefully he will revert to playing football again quickly! I know we have lost some very good players, but the ones we have left should still be capable of passing the ball to each other, certainly against a team as limited as our opposition last night.

Baffling game plan from Koeman tonight. Why play an excessive long ball game against a side known for being strong in the air? Why play 3 centre backs against 1 pretty limited and immobile centre forward? And his comments afterwards are even more baffling - we can only hope what he said to the team was somewhat different or it's going to be a hard season to watch!

So you are seriously saying that losing 3 players has depleted us from a top 7 side to a mid-table Championship team and there's nothing Koeman can do about it? He can start by not telling the team to play hoofball against a very average side. He can also not pick 3 centre backs to mark 1 very ordinary striker. As good a job as Koeman did last season, he's not covered himself in glory so far this season and is not immune from criticism when things go this badly wrong.

Koeman was to blame tonight, not JWP. If you play hoofball and by-pass your midfield, you won't get the best out of midfielders who can pass the ball.

Poor from Long there, should have gone on outside.

Hmmm...Looking more solid or just not playing Lukaku this week?

Wanyama and Mane need to be told by the club that they are not leaving in this window and that's the end of it. For me, it's that simple. If they want what's best for their careers, they will knuckle down, get on with it and do their best for Saints, just as Morgan did last season. Losing a player of Wanyama's influence at this stage of the window is not an option in my opinion, as many of the best options to replace him will already have been snapped up by now.

The press pack obviously think we've got off lightly this summer so far - time to give us both barrels now as we enter the final stretch of the window! So in the last 12 hours - Mane, Vic and Pelle all potential departures depending on which paper you read

We are not strong enough defensively at the moment to afford to play Mane in the No 10 position behind Pelle. Compared to last season's usual line up, we were weaker defensively in 5 positions on the field from the start :- Cedric weaker than Clyne defensively Targett weaker than Bertrand defensively Yoshida weaker than Toby Davis weaker than Morgan in holding role Mane weaker than Davis defensively (when played in advanced midfield position) As dangerous as Mane looks when he gets hold of the ball in central areas, we can't risk playing him in that position again until we have a much stronger platform. Maybe once we have a new centre back, Bertrand back and Romeu and Clasie settled in, we will be solid enough again to try it, but for now we have to go back to a more solid 3 in the centre. The only positive today was Romeu looked like he will be decent in midfield once he's settled in and gets to know the other players.

Interesting comments those as when Cortese was in charge, I distinctly remember him talking about how the manager/head coach at Saints was just another head of department within the club, which doesn't on the face of it seem that different to what he has at Spurs, even if the job title is different. I suspect the difference is that at Saints the manager/head coach is at least involved in the conversation when transfer targets are identified, whereas at Spurs it's more out of his hands completely and dealt with between the recruitment guys and Levy. I much prefer our way of doing things, as it has to be an advantage if the coach has at least had some input in recruiting players he is happy to accommodate in the way he wants to play.

Ramirez was signed before Poch took over so can't blame him for that one I'm afraid! Suspect that one wasn't down to Adkins either.