Lallana's Left Peg

They maybe want to announce it in one go when all roles have been fulfilled.

Has to be a right back otherwise it makes no sense.

I think we've got enough to stay up, but I don't understand why we've used this transfer window to negatively impact your chances when the financial penalty for failing is so significant. I get that Hasenhuttl wants to keep all members of the squad motivated, and that is hard to achieve with a big squad. That said, only the following moves make sense without a replacement: Davis Gabbiadini (given the emergence of Redmond as a striker) Letting Hoedt and Cedric go was a mistake without replacing them because: a) If Valery gets injured then who exactly plays wing-back? Stephens? A midfielder? Bad move. Then of course if you take Stephens out of the back line that assumes we must have Vestergaard, Yoshida and Bedernak available cause if one of them is injured then who plays at the back considering we play three at the back more often than not now? b) We only have four senior centre backs for three positions, and as mentioned one of them appears to be the backup right back. That is very thin. People can try and defend the moves all they want but we have easily come out of this window with a weaker squad and that means our chances of staying up have been negatively impacted. To what degree we'll find out in May, but it just feels a little silly to me.

He appears to have been frozen out but hardly mentioned in the media regarding potential moves or even discussed by Hasenhuttl. Anyone think there could be more to this than meets the eye?

Hard right now to see how we get anything from this with Shane Long our only fit and available striker.

Thought it was a pretty poor performance really against a team that wasn't interested until we gave them every reason to get their tails up and attack us with lumping balls up top and picking up all the bits and pieces. I thought our shape was pretty good but our quality was dreadful. If anything its yet another game where fringe players have a chance and none of them really take it. I thought JWP did ok as did Slattery. Redmond did well but had he got his head up a few times he would have a few assists and two goals. Targett wasn't at his best but he was better than Cedric. The two centre backs were atrocious on the ball. Elyounoussi offers nothing, I've no idea what attributes we thought we were buying but he can't run, has no quality and seems so downbeat. He's seriously challenging Carillo for worst signing ever relative to fee. At least when some of these players get binned off they can't claim they were never given a chance. If we do manage to stay up this summer a complete revolution is required.

First chance to see Jankewitz play.

100% from the Liverpool end due to the journo and the shoehorning of this: "The 27-year-old has rarely played over the last two years due to injury but made a successful comeback when he started against Manchester United recently." Yes, DEFINITELY due to injury. Definitely.

He's had chances under three managers and done very little. Even if you think Hasenhuttl will motivate and attack more Boufal is hardly the physical runner he typically likes. JWP has been told to roll his sleeves up and he's a million times more physical than Boufal, what makes anyone think Hasenhuttl is going to want to work with a lazy show pony?

See this game as a learning opportunity - get this and the FA Cup game out of the way and it feels like the season starts then. A bit of a shame as I think any team that can defend half decent could stifle Chelsea and threaten to get away with something, but clearly that team (in terms of defending properly) is not us right now.

Hard to take Wilson seriously any more after he did this: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/football/2017/12/28/southampton-keen-daniel-sturridge-ready-make-audacious-move/ Club probably think they could tell him the earth was flat and he'd print it.

Many of players you've listed are better than their counterparts in most of the other teams in the bottom half of the table though. There aren't many squads in the bottom half of the table I'd swap with ours. No doubt the overall quality of player we have has decreased considerably the last few years, but a good Manager gets more out of this lot.

How do we have a shortlist of candidates when our esteemed Chairman told us that we were going to undertake a thorough review of our football operations now Reed had be sacked? Turns out it was more BS from Ralph, and they are quite happy with the structure they just want a better candidate.

Don't bank on it. Anyone signed in the last few years who has come in and looked good has been dragged down to a pathetic level of crapness within half a dozen games, I've no doubt it would happen to academy graduates too.

That half had a bit of everything which has showed why we have been so bad the last few seasons. Insipid defending, allowing the opposition to do what they want whilst we believe just having numbers back is enough - check Lots of money spent in the summer but only one player good enough to get in the team - check Clueless in possession either keeping the ball all doing things with purpose - check No leadership - check No organisation at the back and players arguing with each other - check Square pegs in round holes - check Giving up lots of shooting opportunities - check Probably some more but I can't be bothered thinking too hard. This is so painful to watch.

I'm not a fan of solely judging things on stats, but there isn't much to choose between them over their Premier League career: https://www.premierleague.com/players/4617/James-Ward-Prowse/stats https://www.premierleague.com/players/3811/Nathan-Redmond/stats And it's quite clear in games that Redmond influences them far more than JWP. His pace, even if not used to his personal advantage, creates space for others and impacts the game. JWP is a different player altogether, so we're not comparing the same sort of player, but Redmond is needed in the team more than JWP.

I'm with you on that. Owner who only cares about a presence in a league, and leadership who are either lacking or have their hands tied behind their back. I think this is the norm for now. At least all the BS about ambition will stop I suppose.

I don't think it matters who we stick out there at the moment. 4 wins in 32 league games (or something like that), the entire squad lacks leadership and confidence. When the going gets tough, this lot crumble very quickly. It's two years of negativity and backwards momentum that is hard to stop. Whilst players have to stand up and be counted, I'm leaning more towards shocking leadership in the club and poor recruitment being more responsible for our downfall than any individual manager or player.

Well that's sort of the same at most clubs isn't it. It's entirely normal for clubs to have 50/50 records in the transfer market, our purple patch wasn't luck but nor was it a viable model for sustainable success. The quality of the squad has got worse the last three seasons, no doubt, but when you luck at the depth and the quality of player we have its far better than at least half the teams in this division so then it comes down to coaching and management.

I agree with this its just the inevitability of how teams will score against us now. We're not making them work hard for it. As well as we can play when you know just a simple percentage cross into the box, or a set piece, causes havoc then its a massive issue. The Brighton game set this game up perfectly - the team are clearly back to square one confidence wise - on the ball as individuals and in each other - and so we go away to a team and give away the sort of goals that relegation fighters do.

The complete lack of goal threat in that team is staggering. Think last season when we went to Man City it was the same - although we did manage to score that day. Ignoring the lack of ability in front of goal, I don't think that team will know how to keep possession either, or break with any understanding. It's going to be a long afternoon.

That might be to do with the fact they cost £50m and are far better than the players we sign. Also there is no other league like ours in the world - the pace and physicality is unrivaled. There are loads of players with the strength and speed to adapt that don't have the ability to shine, alternatively there are loads of players with the ability but lack of physical capability. Sure fire hits with both are out of our price range and signed by the big clubs. Anyone coming into this league from abroad has the same challenge.

I completely agree with this. If buying good players and selling them on for a profit was easy everyone would do it. The truth is we hit a purple spell of recruitment (not luck by any means) and are paying the price for not being able to sustain it. Don't get me wrong, avoidable mistakes have been made along the way, but to throw crap at us for not being able to do something no-one has ever done in history is pathetic. Most of all it just shows a lack of insight into the club and at worst football in general.

Fair enough - I'm just going on the highlights where it looked like Palace had a load of chances to score and McCarthy made decent saves. Many of them seemed to be post-penalty miss.

I wasn't there, but the highlights showed that Palace had a lot of decent chances. It's not lucky to have a good keeper, but I don't think we'd want to see him tested as much as he was on a regular basis. This is a Palace side without their best player as well. I appreciate showing a lot more attacking intent in the lineup will contribute towards that, but there will be some games we play like we did on Saturday and comfortably lose - we'll have to take the ups and downs with that.