Saints 2-3 Man Utd - Reaction

[trousers]

3 minutes ago, HarvSFC said:

Played well for 60 minutes

You might receive a few differences on opinion on that one! 20 minutes maybe but that's about it

[Greenridge]

10 minutes ago, Pamplemousse said:

Got to say Ralph is fully to blame, it was obvious we were tiring, needed subs on earlier.

We needed Puel at the helm. 

[Totton Saint]

5 minutes ago, DarrenLeTiss said:

Vestergaard was brutal today. We need to find a leader , we’re so weak mentally at times that any man or his dog knew what was going to happen . Second half was abysmal. Walcott invisible , need Ings back asap

I thought he should take  Walcott off when Long came on. But bringing Long on again was the definition of madness (doing the same thing and expecting a different result(

What a wasted 2 hours - tears came to my eeys

[saint lard]

Djenepo is complete shite. he’s obviously been asked to go backwards every bloody time. 
that’s not what his job is,it’s to create a threat. 
so many loose passes by so many today. 
And even when it’s obvious that we are under pressure we invite more with this consistent fecking about at the back and passing it backwards. 
which leads to more pressure and then shite passing. 
it’s time to look up and put pressure on the opposition.

ok,I know we are exceeding expectations right now but bugger me we are commiting suicide by inviting the opposition on and pissing around,we aren’t good enough at that. 
this is why I think Ralph needs to be less obstinate and compromise. 
forfeit a little of your philosophy and know when to change it up. 
 

[badgerx16]

%th in the table after 10 games, above both Manchester clubs and Arsenal, and half way to avoiding relegation. With the depth in the squad we have, where do we realistically expect to be ?

[nta786]

I’d like to know what the expected goals stat is- if I had to make a prediction I’d say something like that should’ve been 4-1 to Utd.

We didn’t deserve to win, but we squandered a 2-0 lead and that is why it hurts more.

I mean it is all well and good that Ralph watches the B team but do Tella/Obafemi really just make up the numbers? 

Stu, Theo, Che were all flagging so hard at the end that I’d have put one of them on.

[verlaine1979]

We are good at pressing, but too many of our players are no good at playing when pressed. United turned up and contrary to expectations, pressed energetically from the very beginning. Our goals came against the run of play and they eventually just ground us down.

Adams did well holding the ball up and Djenepo worried them, but the rest of the team looked stale and out of ideas.

[S-Clarke]

6 minutes ago, benjii said:

I've done my ratings. Here are my ratings.

McCarthy - 6 - dug himself out of a hole he seemed determined to dig. Looked shaky.  

KWP - 6 - OK but didn't make a forward contribution.

Bednarek - 7 - ok.

Vestergaard - 6 - you're not Beckenbauer and we aren't a world class team. Concentrate on defending. 

Bertrand - 6 - similar to KWP. OK but not a great day.

Romeo- 6 - meh. Bit sloppy.

JWP - 9 - quality. Can't knock the contribution. 

Armstrong - 6 - bit sloppy today.

Djenepo - 7 - looked dangerous. We didn't get the ball to him quickly enough.

Walcott - 5 - he's not very good at passing or shooting, unfortunately. 

Adams - 8 - we should have got the ball into him quicker. He did his job really well but unfortunately wasn't supported well enough.

McCarthy - 7 - Seemed like he wanted to give them a goal, but for his saves alone I have to give him a 7.

KWP - 5 - Thought he was poor today. Too loose in possession and didn't offer enough threat.

Bednarek - 7 - ok, nothing special - gets a 7 for the goal.

Vestergaard - 6 - Seems to be getting cocky again with the ball. He simplified his game, now he's complicating it again.

Bertrand - 6 - Better than KWP. More sound in defence.

Romeo- 5 - Had a poor one, he was picked off too often in midfield and got bullied on multiple occasions.

JWP - 8 - Can't fault his contribution, but he can't do it all on his own.

Armstrong - 4 - Thought he was rubbish today. Didn't keep the ball well enough, didn't make the right decisions when he had the ball, got bullied off the ball. Generally rubbish.

Djenepo - 7 - Our most dangerous attacking player.

Walcott - 5 - Pretty poor. Ran into players, ran into blind ally's, didn't pass when he needed to. Typical Theo really.

Adams - 6 - Bit too loose, didn't stick with him and Utd had him for dinner really.

Edited 29 November, 2020 by S-Clarke

[CanadaSaint]

I think we REALLY need Redmond back - with an improved attitude and commitment level. When the utterly unpredictable Djenepo plays, Bertrand becomes tentative and lost without his interplay with Redmond. Giveaways in really bad places are the result. I thought Bertrand was very poor today.

Adams, however, was outstanding.

[SaintJackoInHurworth]

Personally, I think we should have won that and were very unlucky:

• A few missed opportunities
• conceding a goal following on from a dodgy refereeing decision coupled with an injury to Bednarek
• timing of that first goal gave them just enough time to put the pressure on
• we are prone to panicking in such circumstances

Without the difference that Cavani made they were not going to get back into that game. Credit to Cavani for being the difference in the game.

With Ings I think we would have gone on to win it.

I can't believe some are criticising Hassenhuttl! The decision to bring Long on was maybe wrong, but other than that no fault lies at his door.

[stknowle]

Bednarek has now scored 3 goals for us. All of them in 2-3 home defeats after we lead 2-0. That is actually quite incredible.

[Totton Saint]

We were complacent and arrogant in the second half trying to slow the game down was inviting trouble

[Wes Tender]

3 minutes ago, stknowle said:

Let's face it we were lucky to be 2 nil up at half time. Very lucky.  

Maybe we were a little lucky to have a clean sheet, but no way were we lucky to be two up. The first was an excellent header by Bednarek and the second from Ward-Prowse would have beaten any goalkeeper in the world. For all of United's quality in attack, their defence was pretty poor.

[redkeith]

Commentator  said it was Longs 54th sub appearance without scoring. There may be a bit of a theme there ?

[hackedoff]

1 minute ago, saint lard said:

Djenepo is complete shite. he’s obviously been asked to go backwards every bloody time. 
that’s not what his job is,it’s to create a threat. 
so many loose passes by so many today. 
And even when it’s obvious that we are under pressure we invite more with this consistent fecking about at the back and passing it backwards. 
which leads to more pressure and then shite passing. 
it’s time to look up and put pressure on the opposition.

ok,I know we are exceeding expectations right now but bugger me we are commiting suicide by inviting the opposition on and pissing around,we aren’t good enough at that. 
this is why I think Ralph needs to be less obstinate and compromise. 
forfeit a little of your philosophy and know when to change it up. 
 

Totally agree however the football Oracle,Egg thinks otherwise.

[Suhari]

3 minutes ago, beatlesaint said:

We were not good today, half time score was flattering. I thought the front three of Theo, Adams and Armstrong were poor, Djenepo looked most dangerous.

Too many sloppy passes, second half was poor but United do that to us at home time after time no matter how we play.

Disappointing but no real surprise. 

Absolutely.

We were poor today, and had zero options on the bench.

Disappointing, but still a great start to the season.

[S-Clarke]

Just now, redkeith said:

Commentator  said it was Longs 54th sub appearance without scoring. There may be a bit of a theme there ?

He doesn't score when he starts or when he's a sub, so no real surprise.

He just doesn't score goals and never really has. He runs a lot though.

[tajjuk]

12 minutes ago, LGTL said:

Helps when you can bring on Cavani as opposed to Shane Long. 

Basically this, our best striker is injured and they can bring someone off the bench who is probably on £300k a week. 

We have a championship budget in comparison to Utd, the fact we compete at all is amazing and shows how bad in reality they are, they spend more on wages and transfers than pretty much anyone in Europe bar like maybe City and PSG. 

[badgerx16]

Perhaps, ( just perhaps ), the team that cost far more money to assemble, and has better quality across the squad both on the pitch and on the bench, were the better side. If only we could arrange a season long loan for a £65million striker.

Edited 29 November, 2020 by badgerx16

[striker]

I didn't think we played well even when ahead. Poor all around.

[OttawaSaint]

I feel that Walcott has been poor. We’ve kinda given him a free pass due to history but he seems out of synch with the team. Makes odd decisions, runs into coverage and his shooting is really poor. I think when Ings and Redmond are back then Walcott will be an option vs tired defences. 

[WALK DMC]

7 minutes ago, nta786 said:

I’d like to know what the expected goals stat is- if I had to make a prediction I’d say something like that should’ve been 4-1 to Utd.

We didn’t deserve to win, but we squandered a 2-0 lead and that is why it hurts more.

I mean it is all well and good that Ralph watches the B team but do Tella/Obafemi really just make up the numbers? 

Stu, Theo, Che were all flagging so hard at the end that I’d have put one of them on.

Saints - 0.50 v Man U 2.48 

EPL xG Table and Scorers for the 2020/2021 season | Understat.com

[igsey]

1 minute ago, OttawaSaint said:

I feel that Walcott has been poor. We’ve kinda given him a free pass due to history but he seems out of synch with the team. Makes odd decisions, runs into coverage and his shooting is really poor. I think when Ings and Redmond are back then Walcott will be an option vs tired defences. 

I agree, Walcott seemed to mess up everything he tried today. Adams was having to do everything himself when he's used to knowing exactly where Ings will be. Particularly evident after Long came on, instead of playing with 2 up top it was suddenly more of a lone-striker role for Adams, with Theo on the left and Long being God-knows-where.

[stknowle]

6 minutes ago, Wes Tender said:

Maybe we were a little lucky to have a clean sheet, but no way were we lucky to be two up. The first was an excellent header by Bednarek and the second from Ward-Prowse would have beaten any goalkeeper in the world. For all of United's quality in attack, their defence was pretty poor.

Well yes, I was kind of alluding to the fact that we were lucky not to have conceded rather than our actual goals being lucky. Our goals were not lucky.

[Hawkswood]

15 minutes ago, Micky said:

Got what we deserved, even at 2 nil they were miles better than us. When you look at the riches they have though we shouldn't be beating teams like them.  What on earth does Long contribute these days?  Will be interesting to see where we go from here. 

Yeah,  got to agree with this. We were 2 up against the run of play and they had so many chances ( in the first half mainly down to our sloppiness). Its never nice to lose from that position but Im not devastated about the final score.  Theyve got so much more quality than us its riduculous, but they are who they are and we are who we are. As has already been mentioned a few times on here, when youve got someone like Cavani as an impact sub and we chuck on Long, I mean what can you do. Its nice to be in a good position in the league so it doesnt hurt or worry me too much.

[Wes Tender]

14 minutes ago, S-Clarke said:

Nah, don't think we did. We were poor for the majority of the game and we gave Utd the handle multiple times. I don't think we ever had any control over that game, mainly because we were so flaming loose in possession. Armstrong in particular had a shocker in that sense.

There were large parts of the game where we had control with good passages of passing and movement. It was later in the match when we got tired and United brought on players of World class with fresh legs that the midfield became sloppy and the tables turned in their favour.

[OttawaSaint]

Long was utterly abysmal. What was the point of bringing him on? Might have well as just gone with Obafemi or one of the other young guys. We basically went down to 10 men with that sub.

[stknowle]

11 minutes ago, S-Clarke said:

He doesn't score when he starts or when he's a sub, so no real surprise.

He just doesn't score goals and never really has. He runs a lot though.

This "stretching teams" thing he is supposed to do which apparently makes up for never scoring didn't really happen today did it? I bet Man Utd didn't feel in the least bit stretched today after Shane came on.

[Turkish]

Did I miss something or did they not mention the 9-0 today?

[sydney_saint]

This is happening too frequently and Ralph needs to address this. To be the side that tops the dropped points table indicates to me that it is as much tactical as it is mental. There are plenty of mentally weak sides in the league that don't do this as frequently that we do.

I could be wrong, but I find we enter this zone between attack and defense when we have a lead that doesn't really work. We don't do a Burnley or a Newcastle, or more flattering a Mourinho, where we close the space and put the team behind the ball. We still leave a few upfront like Walcott, Che + 1 of Armstrong/Djenepo/Long. Not enough to be effective on a counter attack, but also means there is more space our defensive players have to cover. We should either commit to defending, or commit to picking them off or get further up the pitch. Of course it doesn't help players like KWP and Vestagaard losing their heads.

I absolutely love Ralph, but for the love of god no more Long. I value what Long has contributed to the club and have always liked him. But dragging this out is only gonna tarnish him. Time to leave him out so can't even be tempted to put him on.

On a positive, JWP was fantastic, as was Che despite no service. And ultimately we are competitive which we weren't 18 months ago. 

[badgerx16]

Just now, Turkish said:

Did I miss something or did they not mention the 9-0 today?

There wasn't time given the number of repetitions mentioning Utd's string of away wins.

[Charlie Wayman]

Second best all afternoon. We're missing the lift that Danny Ings brings to the team both in quality and morale.

They bring on Cavani, we bring on Long - say's it all really, end of story. He was utterly useless as usual.  Ralph seems blinded by certain players. What he sees in the lad is beyond me. Djenepo was at least a threat still.

[StrangelyBrown]

Again poor performance in the second half.

United didn't deserve that, but we are our own worst enemy when we lose our discipline and forget our shape.

Not sure vestergaard deserves to keep his place after that performance - why he was pissing off up the field in the second half is beyond me, Bertie looked out of sorts too and not sure that moving Walcott back into a 10 role does anything other than hurt us.

Long once again was not the answer - 2 runs and then nothing else of any note. Hassenhutl needs a different 2nd half game plan.

[Lighthouse]

6 minutes ago, stknowle said:

This "stretching teams" thing he is supposed to do which apparently makes up for never scoring didn't really happen today did it? I bet Man Utd didn't feel in the least bit stretched today after Shane came on.

Neither did Wolves or about 20 other teams he’s been up against. Bringing Long on has been the go-to lazy substitution for every manager since Koeman. Whenever you need to look like we’re working hard as a team, bringing someone on to chase tired defenders for a win or pressure a defence and see the game out - send on Shane.

[hasper57saint]

Why am I not surprised? I’ve lost count of how many times this has happened in the past. We are very thin on the ground with experienced subs.(exclude Long as he never performs any more ! ) When will we ever learn? 

[Dusic]

3 minutes ago, hasper57saint said:

Why am I not surprised? I’ve lost count of how many times this has happened in the past. We are very thin on the ground with experienced subs.(exclude Long as he never performs any more ! ) When will we ever learn? 

Learn what?

[Whitey Grandad]

34 minutes ago, Baird of the land said:

He's covering the near post from the shot.

It's a decision that with retrospect looks bad when the deflection takes the ball perfectly into cavani's head.

 

The problem there was McCarthy punching the ball out to the edge of our area.

[stknowle]

2 minutes ago, Dusic said:

Learn what?

Not to lose football matches against teams with immeasurably more money and far better players than we have.

Edited 29 November, 2020 by stknowle

[Toadhall Saint]

Shit happens- happened to us today. Without cavani we win.

[SW5 SAINT]

Well at least OGS’s job would appear to be reasonably safe now.....

[Forester]

Cavani made massive difference but in all honesty our half time lead flattered us and McCarthy kept things competitive in that match.  Didn’t create much from open play.

Need to put disappointment into perspective though, we would all have been thrilled with this points haul at this stage of season and some very winnable games coming up.  I am always looking at the half way point of the season to really judge where we are, and looking at the fixtures it’s very possible we could pick up another four or five wins before we play anyone else a second time.  Anything over 30 points at the midway would be excellent and have us in for a real shout if European football.

[Shanghai Saint]

God, all the bed wetters on this forum ... ! United were a significant threat from the beginning and have a bench that would grace the first eleven of most PL squads. We fought hard and eventually lost to one of the best strikers of our generation! We move on ... get over it.

[S-Clarke]

1 minute ago, Shanghai Saint said:

God, all the bed wetters on this forum ... ! United were a significant threat from the beginning and have a bench that would grace the first eleven of most PL squads. We fought hard and eventually lost to one of the best strikers of our generation! We move on ... get over it.

I think most people have moved on and gotten over it. It's a forum, so all about airing opinions and views on 'why' we let it slip in the way we did. Not seeing anyone 'bedwetting'.

No doubting the quality we came up against, but in any situation it's not good to throw away leads like that.

[stknowle]

3 minutes ago, Shanghai Saint said:

God, all the bed wetters on this forum ... ! United were a significant threat from the beginning and have a bench that would grace the first eleven of most PL squads. We fought hard and eventually lost to one of the best strikers of our generation! We move on ... get over it.

Bedwetting? No mate, ain't seen any. 

[hypochondriac]

These things happen sometimes as gutting as it is. Luckily we have had such a good start to the season that it's just a minor blip hopefully. If we had lost this 1-0 then there would have been a collective shrug of the shoulders, its just the manner of the defeat that's makes you sad. 

[Sarnia Cherie]

48 minutes ago, adrian lord said:

Gave the ball away far too much, K W-P especially poor, Armstrong too.

When Long comes on it is our equivalent of the white towel. 

I agree. My heart sinks when Long starts stripping off. I was waiting for Obafemi to come and bang one in. We were poor to start with then bucked up after the corner and free kick. Going in at half-time 2-0 up was encouraging but we were all out of sorts for the second half. Vestergaard obligingly playing Cavani on side. He managed very well without any help from us. I hate losing to Man U. 😡

[Sarnia Cherie]

12 minutes ago, Toadhall Saint said:

Shit happens- happened to us today. Without cavani we win.

Really? The way we played second half they would have still beaten us. 

[maysie]

Just heard Ralph interview on solent. Didn't seem too disheartened, said they gave it their all and ultimately Man Us class from the bench showed and we stopped pressing and dropped too much. Something to learn from.

Edited 29 November, 2020 by maysie

[SaintZamboni]

Wasn’t our best performance but in the first half we were nasty, niggly and made a real nuisance of ourselves. JWP yellow card took some of that away from us and I think it really had an effect.

Second half we had a couple of patches but lost that edge that had kept Fernandes quiet and complaining and let him start to orchestrate things. Djenepo looks dangerous but no surprise that lots of danger comes down the left when he plays.

Disappointed with how we lost our way. Few players were blowing hard around the hour mark too but no quality to come off the bench hampers us.

 

 

 

 

[Micky]

9 minutes ago, Shanghai Saint said:

God, all the bed wetters on this forum ... ! United were a significant threat from the beginning and have a bench that would grace the first eleven of most PL squads. We fought hard and eventually lost to one of the best strikers of our generation! We move on ... get over it.

I think the only bed wetter is yourself mate.   Most on here agree that we got beat by a team that played better than us and have much better resources available to their manager.  Go change your own sheets.