Pass the Dutchie

Is this still expected to come through tomorrow?

Let's hope Caceres can travel with them.

That's a poor dream though. A realistic thing to aim for? Sure, very much so. But my dreams involve winning the Champions League.

Sure you're right, but today showed some promising signs. It's nice to see our new forward scoring goals, and to see Tadic linking up with him well today. Today, for the final 65 minutes of the game, our team was good. I'll take that. We can enjoy that for two weeks now.

It's our biggest win of the season. We played relatively well and our new forward scored two goals, while a lot of the team showed promising signs. Responding to that with player scores that range from zero to six, with an average of four, that's either trolling or just being miserable. You can say, as you did, "the poster has backed up his opinion" but saying, for example, that Tadic - in his best game of the season so far - had "one of his poorer games" and that we should "get rid" of him isn't backing up an opinion. It's just adding to the nonsense of the score. Whatever though. I'd rather be happy about a win, but to each his own.

They didn't have tons to do and Man Utd will be a very different game, but it must give the boys in defence some confidence that they got their clean sheet.

From The Guardian:

[video=youtube;x-MBgZKmYGw]

First time we score more than 3 this season.

4-0! Loooooong...

Should have been his 3rd. Making a great impression!

Hopefully having someone scoring goals will give the rest of the team the confidence. We're a good team but just not showing it often enough.

Gabba the right man in the right place. It feels good to have someone like that in the team again.

I was just typing that we seemed to be slowly improving. Beautiful goal with his shoulder/arm.

Yesss!!

Disappointing start. Hopefully we'll be able to get out from under all the pressure soon.

So far, so good: http://www.feed4u.tv/watch/1907419/2/Sunderland-vs-Southampton-FC.html

That's horrible news for him, and really unfortunate for us.

A problem with taking statistics of this season so far as an indication of our potential for the remainder is that those statistics included Fonte and VVD in our central defense and Austin up front.

Matt Targett made his debut in the 2014/2015 season (6x PL) and got quite a reliable force in the 2015/2016 season (14x PL). But other than that, you're right.

In Koeman's 2014/2015 season, he gave Premier League playtime to the following young players: Reed Isgrove Targett Hesketh McCarthy Ward-Prowse Seager Gape In his second season, there was a lot less of that. If Puel's still here and has more of the squad he wants, and injuries and European games don't force his hand, I'm curious to see who he will pick.

Out: Taylor Martina Isgrove Reed Rodriguez Stephens Targett Forster I'm going to be positive and expect VVD to stay another season. In: DF: Tomothy Fosuh-Mensah and/or Nathan Aké Martín Cáceres (if he performs well these few months) MF: Hatem Ben Arfa FW: Alexandre Lacazette Strongest starting 11 Premier Leaugue 2017/2018: ----------------McCarthy---------------------- Cedric----Cácares----Van Dijk----Bertrand ------------Romeu----Højbjerg--------------- Ben Arfa--------Boufal-----------------Tadic ----------------Lacazette--------------------- Bench (9 next season?): Hassen, Pied, McQueen, Fosuh-Mensah (or Aké), Ward-Prowse, Davis, Redmond, Gabbiadini, Austin

Every single team in the PL would like to win the EFL Cup if they could. Playing a weakened team doesn't have to mean that clubs don't care, it's just that they're fearful about losing points elsewhere more. It's all about balance and willingness to take a chance.

Closest I can find: "The Saints have their moments and those moments can be bewitching. Manolo Gabbiadini’s debut goal was one such, the £14m striker smashing home off the bar from an acute angle to give his side a 12th-minute lead. But in certain vital qualities – strength, aggression, determination – they are lacking and after a day of topsy-turvy results Puel is looking over his shoulder at the relegation zone." https://www.theguardian.com/football/2017/feb/04/southampton-west-ham-united-premier-league-match-report I honestly don't believe we will be in a relegation fight, but I can understand that people aren't completely at ease.