Saint86

Perraud (far better than Bree or Manning), ABK, Onuachu, and (obviously) Alcaraz, would all be getting game time for us next season in the champ if they were here. Depending on what happens with Bednarek and TBH, i can see Lyanco in this system as well. We'll have further outgoings this summer (players out of contract being the most obvious one), but the above are a reasonable set of players to return for championship team.

Ipswich have done something similar to what we did. Built a good team in League 1 with room to grow. They've then rocked up in the champ with simple enough tactics but players that know each others games inside and out - they've got a solid enough defence, and then clever attackers. If they keep the team/management together, there is nothing to stop them likely make a few good acquisitions and adapting to the prem. Sure, they might have a rocky start (like we did), but the squad and fan morale will carry them a long way. They're better that Luton and have more momentum than them going up, so i wouldn't write them off at all. If we do get promoted, i think it will be a much tougher prem next season than this season. But bizarrely, i think our style of play will suit the prem more. Equally, we've got some good players on loan at other clubs that can come back in without transfer fees, and you'd like to think we'd have a good shot THB and Downes as well. I actually think we'll be alright next season regardless of whether we win at Wembley or not.

Manning got destroyed at LB at the Hawthornes, and that was in a back 5. Stephens will be fine whether he is left or right.

There has been some Martin-Warnock conversations post Leicester me things 😂

Why, and do they? I think we are a better side than them - even with injuries. And on the experience front - We have Macca, "Janny B", Stephens, KWP, Downes, Aribo (including a European final no less), Armstrong as likely starters - not to mention the likes of Che and Fraser who we might well see tonight. Saints have got a lot of experienced heads. Saints are a more of a cup team than anything else imo - As a fanbase we're used to being the underdog and being up against it, in going for results in one off matches and causing upsets against the big sides - and we've been to Wembley far more than Leeds have in recent years and our fans are used to these sorts of games and performing in them. That will rub off on the players. Leeds didn't even play well to get to 3-0 against Norwich, Norwich were literally appalling. Confident if we get past West Brom (which worries me more), we'll see to leeds at Wembley.

Incredible how bad Noriwch are in this one. Just given the game away. 3 mistakes for the goals.

Its a good point and one that is hard to defend against. At what point does "no smoke without fire" apply to saints and the frankly unprecedented staff churn under SR? There has been grumblings previously, particularly re scouting and the academy staff - and that does beg the question of whether or not it relates to the ownership's vision for the club - if it does that doesn't bode well for those particular sub disciplines within the business. At least the first team seems to have a good atmosphere and morale these days - credit to Martin and wilcox on that front tbf.

Rasmus and sports republic came in and undermined a quality manager in ralph, wrongly sacked him imo, spent £160M to make us worse, got us relegated, completely destabilised the first team with 4 managers in half a year, tore up the club's backroom setup including the academy, general coaching, and scouting - and in the middle of all that, Rasmus stood up and gave a TED talk with the backdrop, "it if ain't broke, break it". There is little to build a defending argument on for Sport Republic currently, and i am not likely to be doing much defending of them until we've finished above the relegation zone in the premier league with a manager that once again looks capable of establishing us in the top 10 with proper funding. To date though, they've done little but damage our club.... and we look to be going into another summer with a mess in the background - academy staff once again leaving and no DoF. The one thing i will say about Sports Republic is that they are at least committed and they do seemingly have a plan... they've just got the execution very wrong so far.

I don't disagree - fluffing up the cup game at the start of the season also didn't help get them some early games. And on Rothwell - that was just a weird signing. Alcaraz is 3 times the player he is at least, and he is our own player - a young one we can develop, and one that made a point of staying over the summer. Maybe it was all about money and the loan fee, but its bitterly disappointing not to have kept him at the club and used him - particularly in Stu's absence.

I personally agree with you. But I think the point that was being raised, is that for some, it does matter. And that they would rather see us playing our own (longstanding) academy products rather than signing kids a bit older to fill quality gaps from our academy graduates. Don't get me wrong, i am disappointed we haven't seen more of Dibbling and Ballard etc. But equally they have only just turned 18this year. I would imagine we'll see more of them over the next couple of seasons - particularly if we don't win 2 matches before the end of may!!

Really? And shaw is the last one you remember? Not, i don't know.... 😛 As shocking as this is for some of our fans to understand (and not even aimed at you specifically), it feels like it needs to be repeatedly stated - Saints went down to the championship in 04/05, then suffered years of financial issues, and coaching talent drain - particularly in the academy (Fulham being one club that took advantage and then turned out players like Sessegon and Carvalho). On top of that, we struggled to then recruit the best academy players or pay them competitive salaries... because, you know... we were a 2nd / 3rd tier side in dire financial straights that almost went out of business... Academy kids join the club from about the age of 8 or 9 upwards. We made it back to the prem season ending 2013? So those first post prem batches have only just turned 18/19... Or put another way, the much maligned Cortese started to pump a lot of money back into the academy, training facilities, coaching etc. once we'd made it back to the prem... Fast forward 10years, the first 18/19 years olds are rolling off the production line. And we know that the age group just below this is pretty impressive (they finished runners up to City's u18 all stars and a few have been poached...) But for those 18year olds to have straight away been first team quality, that would mean we would have had to immediatley step our game back up to being one of the best academies in the country... Forget the brain and talent drain or needing to build our academy, forget also that other clubs poured money into their own academies during the time we were down.... But No No... Our fans have spoken, and they want to know why our academy kids aren't once again (and basically immediatley in youth player development terms) some of the defacto best in Europe. Unsurprisingly, we've offset the absence of top quality youngsters coming through by signing some - lower wages, different mentality, and higher profit potential. Its bizarre to me that you've also stated we don't give youngsters a chance, because as lighthouse pointed out - we very clearly do (Lavia and Tino being two very prominent examples). Also, Bazunu basically goes under the radar in this discussion... but he has the 5th most minutes for players under 21 in the champ, and that is limited basically because he is injured. Similarly, THB has the 9th most minutes under the age of 21... But if we're discounting them (not from our own academy), then i assume we're also discounting SAA and Meghoma as they also aren't our academy players? You also mention Tella above, another good example of the infill players we've purchased. and i think he also highlights something else - players rarely break through at the ages of 17/18 these days. Smallbone's breakthrough season was last year (aged 23), Tella's is the same (23). Harry Kane's breakthrough season was in 2014-15 managed when he was 21 / 22 and managed 2500minutes. The season before that he managed 500minutes, and the season before that he managed 530minutes for Leicester in the championship (aged 19/20...) and Kane is a world class player - I am not sure any of our curren 19-20year olds have world class ceilings... 😄 So to come full circle, what I think you're basically complaining about, is that we haven't put the just turned 18 years old Dibbling or Ballard (who has a few months first team footy in league 1) front and centre in this most critical of seasons - at the same time as the coaching staff and manager not thinking they're good enough? They're the best of the first really promising age group coming through, sure, but is it really realistic for them to have been getting loads of minutes this season, at such a young age? Not sure it is. And outside of that, the club very clearly puts a lot of focus on having a lot of young developing players maturing into the side - but doing that successfully takes years.

Saints fans caught being negative and toxic... shocker... that and actively looking for and focussing on the negatives 🙄😂

Have to say i am shocked by the negativity and toxicity from some of our fans. Was a very solid performance in a difficult tie - and one in which most pundits seem to have picked West Brom and Calderon to beat us... Sadly we're still stuck with too many of the fans that booed the side off in the last home game and couldn't be arsed to stick around for the player appreciation lap. I sincerely hope that everyone who goes on Friday is doing so with the intention of doing everything to support the players, as it will certainly be needed.

Listened to it earlier. One of them had a raging hard on Calderon, and basically used that to brush away any argument/evidence that Saints were going to win - Instead Calderon is the best manager in the championship (probably one of the best in the country in that guy's eyes), and we're actually the perfect team/manager for him to face off and showcase his tactical mastery against - i.e. he will easily be able to tactically outmanoeuvre Martin apparently.... But then fast forward a bit, and same podcast.... Saints beat West Brom twice this year and Martin is 4wins from 4 against Calderon when you count Swansea (a worse side) as well 😄.... The same guy then proceeds to double down and state WBA will knock us and Leeds out with ease to get promoted. 😰

Wait. Puma make man city kits... Now it make sense

Can't watch that and not be sad. Think by the end (with all the goings on under SR and the lack of support from the GAO ownership) he may have been exhausted... but in another world (with proper backing) he could have been a special special manager for saints i think. To have spent £160M and not given him what he needed really is a criminal waste in the world of running a football club 😰.

Surely he could be giving that course given his long and drawn out experiences at united... Or maybe he's giving Rasmus some pointers for his next TEDs talk? 😂

If it is, certainly don't term it as one. Our record in "must win" games is pretty f'kn atrocious recently 😄

I agree, it is a piss take. I would like to think that anyone who buys one now will have to sit behind all existing members as a minimum, and similarly behind any fans that have been multiple times all season. I sadly think there is a load of fair-weather fans (desperate to get games on their account for the playoff semi and Wembley) attending recent matches - sadly they'll be a lot of the same ones that booed the team off for finishing 4th and who couldn't even be bothered to stick around for the appreciation lap. A pretty shit state of affairs supporter wise. Does raise the question though, should we make it to Wembley and lose - will a decent portion of the fans that are there stick around for the team post match...? or is it perhaps more realistic to wonder whether they'll even stick around long enough to boo the team off?

Dead rubber it is then...

Whilst I agree our defence could have been better, we're a very attacking side and would have won promotion at a canter had our strikers been able to finish off the plethora of guilt edged chances in matches. Ultimately we have the highest xG in the division. Also, lets not overegg the pudding, we actually have 12 clean sheets not 11 - which puts us Joint 11th (still not good defensibly), but Leicester have 15 (after their last 2 clean sheets), and Ipswich have 14. So not actually that far off the top 2 - Its a balance. Slight improvements to our finishing and defence and we'd have been laughing. Sadly we spent half our transfer budget on a cripple up front and CDM who had yet to play a season of senior football. Good luck united 😄

It has been done to death. What we're ignoring is that if our strikers could actually finish we'd be pinging in 4-5 goals in some opening halves... like cardiff.

Never noticed before, but its a clear foul on Viafara re shirt pulling for their opening goal. Robbed! Justice that they went on to be the worst all time pre team I say! Ironically, Rasiak is the kind of player we need now. Someone to drift into space at the key moment and actually finish!! Would also take gabbi back in a heartbeat!

Its interesting that you dig down into Downes, and generally i agree and initially started with him when i was doing the breakdown above (https://www.transfermarkt.co.uk/flynn-downes/leistungsdaten/spieler/506189). I think we've got something like a 60% loss rate when he doesn't play, and only a 20% win rate (could be wrong - i was looking at that pre Leicester). I've been banging the drum all season that we're shocking when we don't have the right balance in central midfield - i.e. need a serious anchor, and need a creative player to properly dictate play (stu is the best, aribo is effective in his own way) - when we have a mixture of attacking mids, wingers, and forwards playing 5 of the 6 midfield/attacking spots (especially without a proper anchor) we just lose all cohesion to our play, we stop dominating possession, and teams are able to break us down and counter with ease. Its tended to happen a lot when we make changes circa 60-70min, and has been an issue repeatedly without downes. I think this does tie in with needing another serious window to tailor the squad. Its notable even now that once we lose Stu Armstrong or Aribo we lose our ability to control the game, hold the ball, make incisive passing etc. (and not to repeat myself, the loan swap of alcaraz and rothwell is still mind boggling to me as alcaraz is the kind of player we need (I assume it centered on the large loan fee we banked up front). But when you pair that lack of control in an attacking sense with a loss of a serious CDM anchor we become both unable to defend or keep possession. And its a recurring theme post 25game unbeaten run and falling apart defensively post subs.

Yeah i don't disagree, those two sides are clearly better than us on the defensive front - but equally they were both stronger sides that us last year (lets be honest), and have both been very good this year without as much change around and without entirely changing style. Just for comparison's sake, goals conceded per game for other top of the table sides (over the full 44 because i really CBA to take out any possible outliers 😄), WBA are currently averaging exactly 1 goal against per game. Leicester are 0.89 Leeds are 0.84 Ipswich are 1.2 Norwich are 1.38 Hull are 1.27 Coventry are 1.25 Mention for Bristol city on 1.07, albeit they've only scored 51 goals. On the goals scored per game front we're basically joint top with Leicester and Ipswich on 1.93 per game (over the full 44 - so ignoring any outliers where we got pumped 5-0 twice or 4-1). So in summary, i don't think all the negativity is perhaps justified. Whether we get promoted or not, next year will be tough. There will be a lot of change in the side regardless. Either to strengthen, or to replace some of our more experienced/talented (che adams? 👀) players (probably KWP 😰) that are out of contract or will attract moves to the prem. But then equally, it might allow Martin to have a summer where he can focus more on building a team than on trying to balance the ffp books and relying on loans etc. Although our director of football f'off prior to a big summer doesn't exactly help.