Baird of the land

Very good display by saints. Whole team played well. I'd still like to see us go through the middle more but at least the crossing much less aimless. Long seemed much more confident during his cameo after his goal midweek too. Only real disappointments were Hojberg's finishing & VVD injury.

We've had a horrendous league run including an unfair xmas schedule & we're still 8 points and a better goal difference clear of the relegation places. Complete hyperbole to act as if we are in a relegation fight. It's not complete suicide not to replace Fonte immediately & we're likely only selling because he's more of a problem for the club than an asset as this stand. If we can't get the right player Yoshida has shown himself perfectly capable this season whilst Stephens is highly rated by the club. I would like us to bring in a quality defender and a quality striker. However those sort of players aren't exactly commonly available in January. The sort of defender who may be available(like Richards) earns derision from posters. I certainly don't want us panic buying.

Personally i'd be happy to wait for the summer to bring in the right player. Yoshida has had a good season. Stephens has shown promise & Gardos is finally fit. Panic buying now just seems unnecessary.

Not a fan. Very average every time I saw him for Liverpool. Price being quoted is stupidly high too. Then there's his character coupled with his no doubt exceedingly high wages.

Sad that it came to an end like this but glad it's getting sorted and we are going to get a decent price for a 33rd year old. Great opportunity for jack Stephens to prove if he's good enough. Saw Gardos made the bench today too.

Got the result we needed whilst saving players for next 2 games even if it wasn't a particularly good display. Liverpool barely squeezed past Plymouth over 2 legs. Sounded like Redmond had an impact off the bench and mcqueen sounded one of the better performers. Good to see long get a goal, hopefully it'll help his confidence. Good experience for the other youngsters too.

Hopefully the likes of Stephens, Hesketh, Reed & Sims will get starts. Forster Martina Stephens Van Dijk, Mcqueen Davis, Romeu, Clasie Sims Jrod, Hesketh

Think the problems are for more the tactical approach of the manager than the quality of the players we have. We are completely one dimensional and a new striker unless he's a giant who can head the ball brilliantly isn't going to do much to help.

Going to Burnley who have big strong centre backs with a completely one dimensional constantly shovel the ball out wide and cross to their centre backs was just embarassing. Really frustrating as we were better than them but completely fell into their completely obvious game plan and then got caught out on a set piece.

We are completely playing into their hands by desperately only looking to play the ball out wide and then cross into their dominant centre backs. Why won't we try and go through the middle along the ground.

Very good display, though really could have done with cushion of 2nd goal for second leg. Still given ourselves every chance of making the final. Let's hope this helps perk up the league form too.

It's been shown it's very possible to get at this Liverpool. No matter the result I just hope we show more intent than the league game against Liverpool.

Really hope we avoid Sakho. Didn't think he was particurly great at Liverpool before his whole drugs mess and missed season. The money being bandied about girls him is a joke too.

I'm not necessarily against improving opportunities for nations to get to world cup. Would have preferred it to go up to 40 personally. I do fear this is political backhanders decision where too many places are to be added to overly weak zones. They should be addressing nonsense that is oceania having its own qualification zone and viability of combining nth and sth american qualifying to increase depth.

I'd be rather disappointed with just 9/10, the league is really mediocre outside of the top 5/6, a couple final might make it rather more palatable as well as actually playing slightly more entertaining football.

Went to the game. Rather frustrated at how we threw the game away from comfortable positions twice. Team has a real tendency to go into their shell rather than going for oppositions throat. Lewis doesn't look quite ready, soime nice saves but some awful decision making. Also i really didn't get why we started with Tadic through the centre and long out wide. Still feel we are rather ponderous going forward and if we're going to really on working the ball wide and crossing it, then we need a real target man quickly. At least we are still in the competition, got a home replay and we'll have quite a few reasonably fresh players to have a right good crack at Liverpool.

Perhaps but he was excellent against Bournemouth where even Howe suggested our rotation policy helped us. If Yoshida was at fault for equaliser Virgil was at fault for their winner which hardly suggests if we'd a less fresh fonte in he would have been anymore effective. Surely the fact that many people can't identify a clear first xi is evidence more of the fact we're looking like we have got a lot of depth but a lack of exceptional players.

Rotation is getting maligned unfairly imo. It's pretty essential when there's very small gaps between games imo as we've had over an unfair xmas period and europa league cup run season. Not only the risk of injuries but just simple sharpness. Many of the players who have come in have done well(Yoshida, Mcqueen, Sims etc) Also our so called senior pros, first xi have thrown in some of worst displays of season. Actually our depth in terms of performance between first x1 and rotated xi has been rather minimal as far as i can tell. That's pretty damning to the so called first xi, who haven't come near to levels of previous seasons.

Going to this game. Struggling for enthusiasm at the moment though because of both the quality of football and the results we've been delivering. If Puel's still planning on playing a young team my reaction is i'm not sure i can really tell the difference between the 1st XI & the rotated XI at the moment, which is part of the problem. Both look ok but not special. Still a risk for Puel because if he loses both this and league cup semi i can't see him recovering.

Van Dijk has been pretty bad today, should knock a few million of his valuation. Saints utterly devoid of ideas its embarassing.

I assume wages would be big issue with bringing Morgan back. Whilst I'd love him back I'd just be happy to see Romeu sign a new contract. Doubt we'll be very active in Jan which I don't mind as market is inflated and often only expensive dross like niasse available. If fonte leaves I wonder if we'll consider Stephens/gardos adequate cover for half a season. Puel seemed to be talking up Stephens recently so it'll be interesting to see if they feel he's ready for first team. We could certainly use a striker with height/strength which could perhaps be Gallagher or a new player. Equally I wouldn't complain if we brought in beratino as he has bags of talent and even with a tribunal fee it could still be a bargain, though clearly his attitude is a risk.

Yeah i consider it a derby just not the derby. I didn't like seeing them above us in the table at all even if it was only for a week. I definitely didn't like it when we were completely complacent and got hammered by them last season.

Great rotation by Puel. Great tactical change by Puel. Reed had played better than Hojberg(coukd equally have taken off clasie) but we needed more running from midfield and having Davis and hojberg on helped with that. Hojberg running with ball and harrying when without was much better than the first 30 minutes where he kept getting caught in possession and playing silly short passes. Jrod good first half, excellent 2nd half. Wonderfful finish for the 2nd and being in the right place to make sure on the first. Davis was my MOM, he was amazing 2nd half, Great passing, incisive running, vital tackling and tactical fouling. Defence looked good and solid with exception of a couple of their set pieces. Really good to win this derby(even if it isn't our main derby) especially after we didn't turn up against them last season at theirs.

Bertrand not just for his goal is standing out as the player really up for this sort of derby atmosphere. Reed also getting stuck in which is nice. Hojberg so much terrible play yet towards the end of the half he showed the one thing neither of the other 2 mids will do which is run with the ball. Feel if Rodriguez was sharper or redmond playing with more confidence we might have got a 2nd with redmond's cross and his duffed shot. Bournemouth still feel dangerous though. We can't afford to give wilshere time and space to dictate like he did for their goal.

I'm not completely convinced a striker is necessarily the solution. Our service to the front men has been pretty dire. I felt sorry for Long on Wednesday, the quality of ball and movement when he had it was terrible. I suppose someone who is fantastic in the air might help improve our terrible set piece conversion ratio and have more hope of getting on end of the aimless crosses we're putting into the box.