Lighthouse

That second half was as bad as the two 9-0s. We could very easily have let in 6/7 in 45 minutes without a couple of decent saves and some wasteful finishing.

I agree. This team isn’t 2007 Derby. We’ve been in games, even if we are mentally weak and devoid of confidence. The fact that we got a point at in form Chelsea and were good for a win against Wolves until that penalty shows we have something about us. If I’m wrong and Chelsea ends up being our only point in 20 consecutive games then whatever, I’m giving up football.

So... who’s up for three more years of a slower, more ponderous version of the player we saw tonight?

We will stutter and dribble our way another 6/7 points in the games against Palace, Brighton, Fulham, Sheff Utd, Burnley, Leeds and possibly a surprise draw at somewhere like Spurs or West Ham. No amount of Saints sh*tiness will make the teams below us good.

Our defence has some sort of exponential algorithm, whereby the more they concede, the more chances they allow. Going 1-0 down very quickly becomes 2-0, 4-0, 9-0...

Meh, whatever.

Just bereft of any ideas, completely clueless, then they casually stroll through our team and score, unmarked.

Because he completely misjudged the ball and tried to make up for it by grinding himself into the legs of the attacker.

I must confess, at no point in the last hour have I wished Yan Valery was on the pitch.

Queuing up for a shot.

Yep, confirmed in the studio, pretty unequivocal. Tella should have been booked for diving if we're being honest but nobody is giving those decisions.

Unpopular opinion - Both of those were the correct call.

We ain’t getting this one. Oh well.

F**k me, Redmond!

They were chances, not sitters.

😆 I didn’t need my Danish phrase book to translate that one.

Red Sea defending there from Leeds.

Good composure from Salisu there, then lost his man 30s later.

He did tire badly against Newcastle and if he still isn’t fully match fit he could fade again playing twice in four days. Overall it looks like a decent call from Ralph, likewise the decision to drop Ings.

The Simpsons - This one opens another unnecessary can of worms. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-56166823

Palace really haven’t created much, which begs the question - Ayew Being Served. Edit: No sooner have I said, great finish there. Where was the marking?

I expect a St Mary's record attendance for our first pre-season friendly.

The whole black box thing is just a myth. Plenty of clubs have been using data analysis software to analyse players for years, we just had a period of generally good recruitment out of it; let’s not forget that we also churned out Osvaldo, Mayuka, Long (as you said), Gazzaniga and Forren in that period of time. We’ve had periods of good recruitment long before any of that too. Around the turn of the millennium we brought in Beattie, Pahars, Anders, Niemi, Tessem and Killer, despite being hampered by the Dell ‘s capacity and not having the black box. Being short term and reactive has never worked out well, like when we failed to replace our ageing defence in the lead up to 2005 and ended up with a bloated squad full of substandard stop gaps.

To me it’s more of a highlight of why we should be trying to trim the wage bill and not keep Bertrand. Let’s suppose, for the sake of easy maths, that he and Walcott want £60k per week and Forster and Lemina are already on similar. I make that around £3m each a year, or £12m total. So if we can offload those four, we could in theory sign a new LB for £18m (paid over two years) and a £60k wage packet, for exactly the same money. That should leave us with hopefully a younger, better LB and a saleable asset should the need for money arise.

That’s a pretty sad indictment of our recruitment and I’d like to believe it’s not true. There are plenty of decent young players out there not getting game time at bigger clubs. In the past we’ve done very well out of the likes of Bertrand, KWP, Romeu, Hojbjerg and Cork. There must be a player out there somewhere who is an improvement on a declining, slowing Bertrand.