Wes Tender

G. K Chesterton :- ""The world will very soon be divided, unless I am mistaken, into those who still go on explaining our success, and those somewhat more intelligent who are trying to explain our failure." So presumably the 500 you label as the serial moaners explaining where we went wrong, are in fact the more intelligent among us.

What a bizarre conclusion to arrive at. So if we go down this season, Stanley's attitude will be as much to blame as the staff and players? I would be much obliged if you would kindly walk me through the thought processes that lead you to arrive at such a conclusion, because as far as I'm aware, Stanley has no direct influence on the choosing of the team, the way they play, who is fit or injured, etc. And I presume that the board are included in your definition of staff? If so, I'm sure that Stanley will be overwhelmed to know that he has as much influence on matters as them too.

Wotton is a donkey with no quality. I'd be quite happy if he never played for us again.

I forego my boycott and buy two tickets for me and my son, as having boycotted the last two home games, we had still only witnessed one home win all season. Having watched that boring crap, I'm firmly back in boycott mode for the next home match. I wish that I'd gone with my instincts, that £48 was too much too pay for a Tuesday night match when others were paying just £5 and that I could have saved the money and stayed at home watching the Champions league matches while listening to the Saints match on the radio. At least that way I would have seen some decent football. Having taken an hour to go ahead of a very poor Derby team playing with a total lack of ambition up until then, this being Saints, it was inevitable that we would throw away two points before the final whistle. We're going down.

G. K. Chesterton. If you're going to quote somebody, please make sure that you get his name right.

Not while Lowe and Wilde remain we don't.

Typical Echo. Is it an injury boost, or a recovery from injury boost? Anyway, I'm ambivalent about it, as Lallana is a player who promised so much at the start of the season and delivered so little. Where does one play him to best effect? Out wide and he has the annoying habit of not wanting to remain there to receive passes and give us width. In the hole? That's where he began the season and after a bright start, he faded out of any real potency. Now either Euell or McGoldrick seem better candidates for that slot. Mind you, it hasn't been that long since the inept Poortvliet went and we began playing a more realistic 4-4-2, so maybe Lallana might be more comfortable under those circumstances; rival teams had sussed him out and negated him when we played Porrtvliet's formation with one up front.

It is all part of Rupert's plan and he does indeed know best. At the vital stage of the season which is fast approaching, Rasiak will be sent off in vital matches and score own goals to help us out. John will score vital goals against our direct relegation rivals when they have dismissed him as not being a real danger. Cunning plan, eh? Brilliant in its simplicity.

Let's cut to the chase, Nineteen Canteen. I'll just ask you a few questions to which you can reply with a simple yes or no. 1) Is it desirable to have a high turnover of managers, or is it better to have stability? 2) Are you happy that the architect of our current parlous financial situation is currently the Chairman of the football board? 3) Are you happy that he enabled the return of the individual who was most responsible for our relegation from the top flight of football after 27 years? 4) Even though there can never be unity within the fan base while these two individuals are in charge, do you think that it is still desirable that they continue? 5a) Can you ever win anything by playing kids? 5b) Can you even survive at this level playing kids? 6) Is it a good idea when attempting to establish a firm base in this division on which to build, that one dismisses a perfectly capable manager experienced in British football at this level. 7) Is it a good idea to then replace said manager with a couple of foreign managers not only inexperienced at this level, but also having no experience of British football at all? 8 ) Was it a good idea simultaneously to allow all three of our most potent strikers out on loan, two of them to rival teams in this division and replace them with our youth striker and other teams' youth strikers brought in on loan? 9) What amount should be charged to watch this youth team? a) the same as we paid to watch us play Chelsea, ManUre, Arsenal, Liverpool, etc. b) Less; in line with the average teams in this division. c) Much less, in line with the bottom clubs in this division, which is what we are. 10) Is Dutch total football at this club dead? Was it ever a real possibility given that we had lower league Dutch managers attempting to teach it to mainly British youngsters playing in a British league? 11) Should the hapless Poortvliet have been given as much time as he was before he fell on his sword? After all, it might very well be too late to ensure our survival in this division, barring a miracle. 12) If we are indeed relegated again, would you then call for Lowe and Wilde to go, or do you think that Lowe ought to go for the fourth division and his hat trick?

It would be appropriate, as betting is certainly a dummies' game.

No.

Birmingham football clubs...let me see. Aston Villa, doing rather well, West Brom not going quite so well, so two Premiership Clubs. Wolves going quite well with Birmingham, but in the division below and then in the division below again is Walsall. So five clubs in the city to share the local fans, against us as the only club with the Skates of any size down here. I wonder why they have a comparatively smaller average fan attendance?

Not necessarily so. Because I did not renew, I benefited from not having laid out any money when I boycotted the last two home matches. I was away on business last Tuesday and will be in France next weekend too. As I have been able to get pretty close to sitting in our old ST seats by paying a day or two before the match, then there is little reason to buy a ST anyway. But as I said, I will renew my two when Lowe and the Quisling have gone.

I resent the suggestion that you can only be a real fan if you buy a ST regardless of who is running the club. I would counter that those who are prepared to do that, are also prepared to buy their STs regardless of how much they cost and regardless of the team or the manager too. Rather than calling those people real fans, I would counter by calling them sheep. And if there are sufficient numbers of people with enough principle to boycott a regime who have brought the club to its knees, surely it can easily be counter argued that it is the people who run the club that are killing it, not the fans. When Lowe and the Quisling are gone, I will renew my STs regardless of which division we are in.

What is the point in having a thread like this if some posters are going to attempt to use it to rewrite history? All very well praising the Dutch ethos of coaching youngsters and mentioning Saijis as an example, while at the same time ignoring the absolute crap signed by the hapless other Dutch maestro Poortvliet, those World beaters Smith, Pulis and Gasmi and the couple of brilliant strikers who we sent back, Peckart and to my eternal shame I forget the other one, such was the impression he made. What this proves, is that the double Dutch have been able from their experience of Dutch football, to sign a half reasonable player from Holland, whilst their ignorance of the British game meant that they signed a succession of duds from the British leagues, players largely rejected by their clubs. As for your earlier contention that Wotte has produced reasonable results against your list containing some of the best teams in this division, you ignore totally the fact that Pearson's team also played some of the top teams in the division in the short time that he was here and he had a demoralised team and loanee players with which to hit the ground running, instead of the amount of time that Wotte had as Poortvliet's subordinate in which to assess the abilities and worth of the squad. Mind you, us signing Dutch players is not a new phenomenon; we have had the likes of Monkou and Van Gobbel playing for us previously and also some good Norwegian and Swedish players, so we did manage to spot a few decent European players without the aid of the double Dutch, whereas the examples I gave of their choice of British players leaves a lot to be desired compared to the signings that Pearson made. And while you talk about the parlous financial state that the club found itself following the two years following Lowe's departure, will you have the decency to admit that during most of that time the club was run by appointees of the Quisling and that you condemn him for the mess he caused and place on record that he should have no part in the running of the club as a result?

No. Always had a firm belief that the entire concept was sheer lunacy. Thank God that wiser councils have prevailed once it became clear that had we persevered with the mad experiment we would certainly have been relegated. It is still a possibility, but at least there is a glimmer of hope now.

No it isn't. The current situation is exactly as it has been since before the arrival of Poortvliet. We are mostly playing older and more experienced players as the backbone to the team, together with a few talented younger players, which is a sensible strategy and certainly not unique to us. The big mistake was blooding far too many of them too early and the resultant damage to their confidence will set some of them back in their future development.

I've been away all week seeing clients on the Channel Islands. I had no access to hearing the match against Ipswich and only read the result from a hasty glance at the sports pages in a newspaper the following morning at the airport while transferring from Guernsey to Jersey. You could have knocked me down with a feather when I read that we had beaten the Tractor Boys 3-0. Having got back home earlier this evening, I have watched the highlights on Virgin Sports and it appears that Ipswich had a lot of the play and poor finishing and our good defending and another great save by KD made the difference between us and them and we are looking more confident in taking the chances offered to us at the other end, with Euell making a difference up front with Saganowski. I must agree that although it is still too early to make any sort of realistic judgement, it is certainly indicative that we might have turned a corner under Wotte that just wasn't there under the hapless Poortvliet. However, whether Wotte was culpable as Poortvliet's subordinate for the disastrous start to the season or not, has little relevance when it is plain that the policy pursued by Lowe through the two of them has thankfully been ditched before we have totally run out of time to redress things before it is too late. I never anticipated that we would win three matches on the trot and if we continue in this vein of form, we can hopefully climb away from the drop zone and breathe a huge sigh of relief. As it stands at the moment, Wotte has bought himself some more time and a growing reputation. But not for one milli-second does my loathing for Lowe diminish one iota.

Totally on the money. I'm frankly amazed that there are some who can even now attempt to rewrite history, dismissing the past few months of lunacy just because there are some signs of hope when the hapless Poortvliet is replaced by his number two, who gains a measure of success implementing measures that the sensible half of posters on here had advocated at the start of the season. Do those who disingenuously call this current common sense approach "plan B" admit that Lowe's bizarre "plan A" was a dismal failure? Have we heard one peep from Lowe showing an ounce of humility, apologising for his lunacy? At least having left it until the 11th hour, we must be thankful that he finally dismissed Poortvliet and although Wotte appeared to be an even bigger gamble, the fact that he plays a more traditional British formation, has the sense to blend youth and experience and seemingly has improved the attitude, belief and fitness of the team, is testament enough that the Dutch total football experiment that was touted as the exciting revolution, is now dead and buried. Hopefully it has come with just enough time for us not to be dead and buried with it.

Thanks, Spades. I'm indebted to you for taking the trouble. I've never seen it videod before and having seen it again it is even better than I remember, but it still seems as clear in my mind as if it were yesterday.

Both Radios Hampshire and Solent were eulogising about it, making comparisons with the Bank's save from Pele. I wasn't at the game, but hope that it will be shown somewhere as it appears to have given us an extra two points. In all my time watching Saints, the best save I ever saw was by Niemi shortly after he arrived. The ball seemed to be heading to the top left corner and he was in the centre of the goal. Everybody thought that it was a certain goal and there were gasps when he leapt towards it and somehow miraculously tipped it round the post. I had never seen such athleticism from a goalkeeper before. This Davis save appears to be at least as good if not better, judging by all the fuss about it.

I was thinking along those lines myself, Weston. I am a true fan and I must say that it has hurt me listening to those matches on the radio and not being there. The main reason for boycotting has not gone away, but everything that Lowe stood for in his mad experiment has been ditched and I believe that he has egg all over his face. Naturally I still want Lowe and the Quisling gone because of it, but I think that Wotte and this team do deserve support for the way that they have played these past two matches in particular. Of course it seemed that as effectively Wotte was Poortvliet's subordinate, that there was nothing to gain from promoting him on Poortvliet's departure as he was almost guilty by association, but apart from some unfortunate PR, Wotte does seem to be going about things the right way. Let me just mention one small thing as an indication. I used to like the team huddle just before kick-off. Poortvliet dropped it and I took it as a negative. I'm presuming that Wotte has continued it these past couple of games, as I recall him doing it for those last home games I did attend and I was happy to see that they did it in front of the crowd at the final whistle. It speaks to me of camaraderie and esprit de corps; team spirit. But as they said on both Solent and Radio Hampshire, Wotte has achieved an improving team because he has a decent blend of youth and experience, two strikers up front and has decided on a decent team and is sticking with it, so that an understanding will grow between them as they develop together. But these are things that most of us recognised were desirable in a successful team, but which were ignored by Lowe. Had the message sunk into his obstinate, pig-headed cranium much earlier, we could have been in the mid table comfort zone by now, almost assuredly with Nigel Pearson and on more recent evidence quite possibly with Wotte. What is proven fairly conclusively this season is that the maxim that you don't win anything with kids has been a lesson that could have got us relegated had we stuck with it. Thank God that we couldn't get Scacel and Euell off the wage bill because there were no takers. Thank God that they are not rotting in the reserves and that we decided that as they are here and ours, we might as well play them. Thank God that Perry has escaped injury and is a real professional with top level experience and has proved to be forming a solid partnership with Saeijs, who looks a decent buy. But most of all, thank God we perseved with Kelvin Davis, who is almost certainly the best keeper in this division having made every doubter of his ability eat their words. If the improbable happens and Wotte keeps us up, it won't be possible for Lowe to claim credit, as although Wotte was his man, he was effectively the second in command behind Jan nice but dim and success is coming not from Dutch total football, but tried and tested methods that have proven to be effective in British football at this level.

It seems that either me, or my son, or both of us are jinxes on the club at home. We've stayed away for the last two home matches and we have won them both, having seen just one win at home previously this season. So what do we do? Carry on the boycott which would grow more pointless if we carry on winning, as others will return and make the boycott meaningless, or return and by our presence restore the bad luck that we bring?

Me and my son aren't going again as I'm still in boycott mode. How many of that figure are the Cardiff lot? They usually bring quite a few, don't they? The figure to concentrate on is the core figure of Saints supporters, taking away the ST holders who are probably counted whether they turn up or not.