Lighthouse

No. Assuming we did our bit and beat Palace, we would need one of either: Bompey win at OT on the last day (at which point the FA Cup final becomes irrelevant) Utd win the FA Cup West Ham draw or lose their last game.

Okay.... 5th - Europa League 6th - Europa League 7th - Europa League IF Utd win the Cup Finish below West Ham AND Liverpool - No combination of results will get us into Europe Europa League final has zero baring of Saints, regardless of any league outcome. That's about as simple as I can put it.

Everyone is on fire against Everton, they're sh*te.

Wait hang on... If we finish 7th and Liverpool 8th, we still miss out if Palace win the Cup don't we?

I highly doubt it. Probably something meaningless like a £25,000 fine.

Everyone knows this already but Utd losing at home to Bompey? Come on, really? Bournemouth have been sh*te since they achieved relative safety a few games ago. They've lost 5 of their last 7 and the only team they beat was Villa. Just. If they win at OT I will have sex with Vanessa Feltz.

Would mean we finish behind West Ham and Liverpool, which means no Europe regardless of where Utd come. Basically it is marginally better than us just finishing 8th.

You just know Utd will batter Bournemouth next weekend, then be absolutely sh*te in the Cup final.

No, I think I've lowered myself enough for one week.

I'm not sure about this whole supporting Man Utd lark. I feel like one of those weird gimpy men who pay dominatrices to chain them up and spank them. Yeah, it kind of feels good but it's so degrading and humiliating.

Didn't Stek make a pretty good save against Vitesse at St Mary's? I know, ONE save etc. but he's got it in his locker somewhere. I'd be happy enough with him as #2 'keeper next year. Certainly an improvement on anything I've seen from Kelvin or Gazza. Having said that, he's obviously not long term competition to Fraser, so it would be good to find someone who is.

The best single result (other than us beating Palace of course) would be Chelsea to absolutely batter Liverpool. We're 2 points and 2 goals ahead in the table. If their GD took a real hit tomorrow, a draw against Palace would probably be enough, unless 'pool absolutely spank WBA. Unlikely given how sturdy Pulis puts out his teams.

Please elaborate.

I get that he is being sarcastic I'm just not entirely sure what point he is trying to make. I think he's suggesting that the media think the success of Saints and Leicester is down to luck and is sarcastically mocking this suggestion, unless I have misunderstood.

Absolute nonsense, there's nothing the media love more than a decent underdog story. Find one credible media source which claims the achievements of Saints or Leicester have been down to luck.

You're right. For some reason I was thinking Martial scored first.

I wouldn't be too desperate, you're fairly safe on this one.

Didn't we do something similar under Poch? Not to criticise too heavily, he is an excellent manager but I do wonder about the mental strength of his teams. For all the talk of Leicester being strong enough to see it through, it has been Spurs who have well and truly bottled it over the last 3 games.

Something which occurred to me about yesterday's game was how typically Poch it was, with regards to his time in charge at St Mary's. Bags of possession, take the lead and then cock it up. Indeed, Spurs have thrown away a lead in their last 3 games. Anyway, looking at our season we've only thrown away a lead on 3 occasions and managed to pull something back on 8 occasions. The points difference is a bit skewed as you only get 1 point if you score an equaliser but lose 2 if you concede one. A definite improvement from Koeman it would seem. Points Dropped Leicester (h) - 2 West Ham (a) - 3 Chelsea (h) - 3 Total - 8 Points Gained Newcastle (a) - 1 Chelsea (a) - 3 Liverpool (a) - 1 Villa (h) - 1 Sunderland (h) - 1 Liverpool (h) - 3 Everton (a) - 1 Spurs (a) - 3 Total - 14

I'm not sure where this myth has come from that the League was 'there for the taking' just because Leicester won it. That somehow we've missed out on a golden opportunity. Leicester's point tally would have had them 2nd last season If Man Utd win their last 2 games, the threshold for the Champions League will be 69 points, compared to 70 last year. We could conceivably finish 3 points better off than last year and still finish 8th.

It has its moments but when it does work we just look hopeless. Bompey away was probably the worst deployment I've seen, hopelessly overrun in midfield.

We also went to Arsenal and shipped 6 goals in the first 25 minutes.

Other fixtures to watch out for in the mean time Tuesday West Ham vs Man Utd Wednesday Liverpool vs Chelsea Sunday Stoke vs West Ham West Brom vs Liverpool Supposing they win their games in hand, we would be 2 behind the Hammers and 1 behind the Scousers. If either of them fail to win, it's basically in our hands. Defeat for Liverpool against Chelsea would mean we just need a draw if they beat WBA by 2 goals or less.

So if.... Man Utd win the Cup and come 4th Saints finish 7th Liverpool win the Europa League and come 8th That leaves City with the EL spot for winning the LC Liverpool and Utd both go into the CL, giving us 5 English teams. West Ham get another EL spot for 6th Saints STILL qualify for EL with the 3rd spot, giving us 8 teams in Europe Have I got that right. Just trying to make sure there's no scenario where we'd miss out finishing 7th, UNLESS Palace win the Cup of course.

I don't think I can quite fit the words 'possible, Man, Utd, lose, home' and 'Bournemouth' into a sentence but you're right, mathematically speaking. I'll hold my hand up, I thought we were completely out of it. Whoever had money on us to beat City and Spurs, whilst West Ham, whilst the Swans beat Liverpool and West Ham, you're buying the drinks.