Wes Tender

Regarding the future progress of Pochettino, he'll do moderately well for a couple of seasons, getting us up to a creditable 8th or so in the second year. Then when everybody is least expecting it, he'll be fired, to be replaced by somebody else with ringing endorsements from Mourinho and Guardiola saying how the new guy will one day manage Real Madrid. The new guy will arrive to astounded comments from the football world deriding the way that such a capable manager has been dispatched and duly tell us all that he has been monitoring every Saints' kick of the ball for the past 6 months. He won't speak a word of English, but that won't matter, as all of the players will be either Spanish, Portuguese or Brazilian, so it won't be too difficult for either Cortese or the new guy to communicate with them.

It's called a comparison between two managers and what they do tactically. And how one's tactics are applauded and the other's similar tactics enable him to be labelled as out of his depth.

So I disagree with what you say and I'm therefore uppity about it? And you bet I wasn't happy with the decision to get shot of Adkins in that way.

And what an idiot that Ferguson is, eh? Fancy leaving three of their best players on the bench until the last 10 minutes. Just think what Scholes, Giggs and Nani could have achieved had they played the full 90 minutes.

Well, Pochettino only has to look at this website for the best possible advice regarding which players to pick in a match and for how long they should play. Take note MP, not starting certain players, or taking them off the pitch before the final whistle will be a cardinal sin and bring down on you the derision of the fans, because it will prove that you are as clueless as Adkins was on such matters. It doesn't matter whether these players are tiring from their exertions, whether the changes were tactical to counteract the oppositions changes, whether they are carrying injuries, etc. You are not to do it.

Yes, the introduction of those three substitutes won United the match when we played them last, but the circumstances are much different now, if you look at the players involved and the timing and players who were our substitutes. K Davis, J Hooiveld , D Fox, J Fonte, N Clyne, J Ward-Prowse, S Davis, J Puncheon (E Mayuka, 75), A Lallana (J Rodriguez, 79), M Schneiderlin, R Lambert (G Do Prado, 75) Personally I would say that we have a much stronger squad than we had then. Even if Lallana isn't playing, we didn't have Ramirez playing then. Thankfully the woeful Fox is now replaced with the impressive Luke Shaw. Probably the most influential change though, is the addition of a fit Cork, in partnership with Schneiderlin. Although Fonte is still out, we now have Yoshida doing a decent job in defence. In fact the defence we have now, even with Fonte out, is is a lot more solid than it was then. As well as all that, Puncheon is much improved and arguably Boruc is now the stronger choice than Davis. Personally I would welcome the similar match to the last one, with us ahead until the last 10 minutes. The arrival of Scholes, Giggs and Nani would be snuffed out by Cork and Schneiderlin this time. The biggest mistake we made that day was allowing Scholes the space to put in the killer balls into our box. We wouldn't make that mistake twice. In any event, those late goals of theirs had strong elements of them being flukes, what with deflections and miscued clearances. Our best hope is to employ the tactics for which Pochettino has a reputation for; playing a high line and pressing them hard, keeping possession of the ball and not letting them settle. The worry is that a high line might allow Van Persie to run onto balls hit over us, but thankfully players like Clyne and Shaw have pace. Discipline in the offside trap will be key.

I don't think that there is anywhere near the team-building value to this jaunt that there would have been on one of Lowe's clay pigeon shoots.

My tongue was firmly in my cheek. I'm of the opinion that when a manager chooses a team or makes a tactical switch during a match, then he has his reasons for doing so. Whether the selection or tactical change pays dividends or not is a matter of opinion. Even when Lambert and Davis scored coming on late against Manchester City, there were those who opined that had they come on earlier then we could have scored even more. As I said earlier, if the tactics go awry, the manager gets the blame, whereas if they go according to plan, the players get the credit.

Rubbish! Had Lambert been on the pitch from the start, we would have been so far ahead, we would be out of sight. Pochettino will start Lambert every match regardless of his condition, as everybody knows that it is stupid not to play your strongest team. Mind you, deciding which is your strongest team is a matter of opinion too. Ask ten posters on here and you're likely to get 10 variations. And I have heard it suggested that it ought to be the strongest team determined to an extent by what attributes will be required by the players to counteract the strengths of the opposition. Oh, perhaps it's not quite so straightforward after all.

It was when talking about him that Lowe suggested that he ought to feel grateful to be playing for us, as he would be earning a lot less in Morocco. I quite liked him and he was a good servant of the club when he was here. (Kachloul, that is, not Lowe) Lowe earned far too much out of us for what he did.

Why is it strange? It's human nature for fans to begin to talk down a manager's performance when he's dismissed and to talk up the new replacement to justify the change. I wasn't suggesting that nobody had criticised Adkins' tactics before. The acid test regarding opinions about Adkins' departure is to pay some attention to what neutral rival fans think about it and conversely to consider what we would have said about Pochettino had he gone to another team.

All I know is that when I read that Pochettino's main claim to fame in the eyes of some journos was his giving away of a penalty to Owen and Argentina being knocked out of the World Cup as a result, there was some video footage linked to it which in my opinion appeared to show that Owen had dived. Owen's reputation in that department obviously preceded him.

Yes and not a great surprise really. In view of the popularity of Adkins and the furore and surprise not only from the fans, but other sectors of the football media, this is not unexpected. There will now ensue a gradual rewriting of history, rumours of player dissent and unrest, analysis of every match where it can be suggested that there was a tactical decision made by Adkins that seemed bizarre or which backfired. On the other hand, Pochettino will be hailed as the next Mourinho, or Guardiola and much made of how they thought he was a brilliant prospect, unlucky to suffer his sacking because he was forced to sell all of his best players and that had he been able to keep them, Espanol would have been contenders for a champions league place. Mind you, had we been able to keep Walcott, Bale, Oxlade-Chamberlain and other players we had to sell, I expect that Adkins would have been able to get us up the table several places too.

Does it turn out that the players didn't buy into it? Which ones? All of them? Even the strikers who wouldn't have got a game if Lambert played every game? And should he play every match regardless of him carrying a knock, or tiring from too much exertion in too many matches close together, or whether tactically the team selection calls for a different type of striker up front? Personally I'm rather more inclined to trust the manager to make these decisions than the players, who might have issues of their own that they want to push. That's his job. If he gets it wrong, he takes the blame, but if he gets it right then the players will get the credit.

Pochettino doesn't particularly have an international profile. The reaction from most on here was to say who? So he didn't register much in arguably the best league in the World. OK, he managed one of the medium sized in Spain, so Guiardiola and Mourinho knew of him. A bit like saying that saying that Ferguson and Wenger knew Adkins. So he played for Argentina and that registered with most people solely because he gave away a penalty to an Owen dive that put them out of the World Cup. European players would come here mainly because of what we would be paying them, because they want to play in the Premiership, because we already have attracted some good foreign players, because Cortese has some contacts, etc. Pochettino might have an edge with Argentinan players and some Spanish ones, but that's as far as it goes.

Si is Spanish or Italian. I think the Portuguese word you were looking for is Sim

I'll leave it to others to decide who has been the moronic prat here. It isn't up to you to decide, as you are the one who first made that idiotic statement that WH were as likely as Man Utd to get relegated. If you like, I'll repost all the comments from other posters expressing their views that they thought it was idiotic.

You're quite right of course. Goals scored against us were sometimes the fault of mistakes by defenders or the goalie, as were missed shots the fault of the strikers who sometimes should have done better. TDD reckons that a lot of the blame for these dropped points is due to Adkins' team choice or tactics, but apparently none of those decisions were made because of injuries, fear of suspensions, tactically because a player was slowing up or carrying a knock, or to negate a tactical switch by the other team. Not that he would have any real idea whether the decisions were justified or not without the benefit of that information .

If I were you (which thankfully I'm not), I'd stop digging yourself even deeper into the hole you've made for yourself. Wes Tender: Observe the evidence and if capable of comprehending simple English, then you will understand that this was not an opinion of mine. You labelling it as more moronic and stupid than what you said, means that you must logically accept that your original comment was also moronic and stupid. Thanks for helping out. Game set and match.

See my post above, where I say that I don't believe that WH will go down and have never said that they will. But I see that in your bone-headed arrogance, you still refuse to admit that where one team is top of the division and the other 12th, that they are both as likely as each other to be relegated. Statistical analysis on Man Utd going down was unecessary, as it was already impossible that they could go down. But don't try and deflect the stupidity of your assertion by trying to say that others have been more stupid. It doesn't make what you said any less stupid.

No, I don't think that WH will go down and I have never said that I thought they would. Regarding me thinking that we would finish 10th, I have already pointed out that that was my pre-season prediction before we even kicked a ball in the Premiership. My knee-jerk reaction to Pochettino's appointment was that we would now be relegated. That is still a possibility, but my views have been tempered by the probability of new transfer window signings that will change our prospects. Before you start with the LOLs, do try and get your facts straight about what I said and when.

You can't really make a realistic assessment, because the team will be changed by the one or more new players signed before the window closes. But even without allowing for that, Adkins had achieved a 1 point a game average and it obviously escaped your notice that we had a pretty tough run of matches to begin the campaign, arguably the toughest opening run of fixtures in the history of the Premiership. There are still plenty enough games to go so that we will have a fairly even run in of easier and more difficult games, as will all of the teams around us. You've expressed your opinion that Adkins would have amassed less than a point a game, but it is my opinion that Pochettino will not do better than Adkins would have. But of course, that cannot be proven either way, as Adkins would have benefited from the additional new player/s too, so futile arguing it.

Well, if you hadn't owned up to this crass stupidity, then I would have been happy to have reminded everybody. What was effing hilarious was not posters trying to prove you wrong with statistics, it was your continued insistence that West Ham were as likely as Manchester United to go down. It doesn't take a genius to conclude that West Ham were far more likely to go down than Man Utd, as United were already safe, whereas WH are not.

Agreed. And the worst thing with these trolls is that they start new threads with opinions that could easily be added onto other threads. A troll, definitely. A skate, maybe.

Ok, I'll accept that you find it difficult to comprehend some things and we'll leave it at that, eh?