Will Still

[Willo of Whiteley]

If we hired managers based on reactions of those on SaintsWeb we would have a new manager every week regardless of whether we won or not.

It’s the nature of fickle football fans. I’m not saying I’m any different, all I’ll say about me is o couldn’t care less at this point, if we’re bottom three in January I’ll be more concerned.

If you’re losing sleep over a football team then I think those individuals need to ask themselves some serious questions. 😂

[Wade Garrett]

3 hours ago, sotonjoe said:

Prob best you do leave your seat empty of you can't shrug off the negativity and get behind the team

Thanks for the advice, means a lot.

[Wade Garrett]

3 hours ago, Willo of Whiteley said:

Who do you realistically bring in?

I’ve asked you this many times in the last week, an answer would be good. Who is genuinely a realistic upgrade that we could get?

Every single time the shit has hit the fan you’re first first to call for the sacking, yet also the first to act like it’s the wrong appointment.

You’re like a broken record (much like me to be fair).  But at least I’m not either club PR or a wind-up merchant.

[badgerx16]

1 hour ago, Lighthouse said:

I'm not buying the whole striker problem either. If Russell Martin, who's is apparently worse than getting a paper cut off a nude photo of Margaret Thatcher, can come fourth with Che Adams, then we can do a lot better than 20th with Cameron Archer.

Archer has scored 7 in his last 74 games, ( Saints and Sheff Utd ). We signed Che on the back of a 22 goal season for Brum.

Edited yesterday at 16:03 by badgerx16

[hypochondriac]

1 hour ago, Lighthouse said:

I'm not buying the whole striker problem either. If Russell Martin, who's is apparently worse than getting a paper cut off a nude photo of Margaret Thatcher, can come fourth with Che Adams, then we can do a lot better than 20th with Cameron Archer.

I know you don't but it's in your interest not to think we need a striker given you were the loudest voice in here in the summer saying we definitely didn't need any more strikers.

[Convict Colony]

big willy still gets us scoring this weekend

[Willo of Whiteley]

35 minutes ago, Wade Garrett said:

You’re like a broken record (much like me to be fair).  But at least I’m not either club PR or a wind-up merchant.

Oh yeah I forgot on a fan forum you weren’t allowed to share a different opinion. 🤦🏻‍♂️

Will Still out.

For the record I am neither, I’ve supported the club since I was ten years old and had a season ticket every year until around six years ago.

[sockeye]

2 minutes ago, Convict Colony said:

big willy still gets us scoring this weekend

He's gone to Trabzonspor mate.

[trousers]

30 minutes ago, hypochondriac said:

I know you don't but it's in your interest not to think we need a striker given you were the loudest voice in here in the summer saying we definitely didn't need any more strikers.

To be fair, being a contraian is not as easy as it looks

[stfrancisofbenali]

Signing players with potential rather than experience is a risky strategy, made all the more risky by appointing a young manager with potential rather than experience. It's this double whammy which is costing us dear.

I've no doubt that WS is on an extremely steep learning curve and will become a better and stronger manager for this experience but unfortunately we are having to endure it in the here and now.

Three very experienced Championship signings (Viktor Johannsen, Connor Coady, Ollie McBurnie types) would have made Still's life so much easier and it is the board who are entirely responsible for not predicting that he would need this on-pitch support.

[Wade Garrett]

35 minutes ago, Willo of Whiteley said:

Oh yeah I forgot on a fan forum you weren’t allowed to share a different opinion. 🤦🏻‍♂️

Will Still out.

For the record I am neither, I’ve supported the club since I was ten years old and had a season ticket every year until around six years ago.

Yeah right.

[Willo of Whiteley]

8 minutes ago, Wade Garrett said:

Yeah right.

🔧

I don’t really get your dislike or disagreement with me. We’re all entitled to an opinion, none of us are specifically right, we just want the team to perform and do well.

But to call people out, or in this case me specifically, for having a different opinion is just daft.

I won’t lose sleep over it, I just won’t engage with yourself any further. 👍🏻

[saintwbu]

I just can’t get my head round people thinking this group of players are not good enough to be higher than 20th in the league. 

Underperforming with this team should probably have us just outside the play-offs. It’s a squad riddled with proven Championship quality, most of which has probably never seen the bottom half. The manager is not getting enough out of them, simple as that.

[Badger]

3 hours ago, hypochondriac said:

I do think if we relieve Still of his duties this week I will look at it and think he's not the only one to blame here. He clearly has a lot of flaws but he's been really hobbled by the striker thing and the players we have bought who don't seem to fit into a coherent system. Also keeping old players to hang around like a bad smell. 

Can't disagree with any of that. 

[Osvaldorama]

15 minutes ago, saintwbu said:

I just can’t get my head round people thinking this group of players are not good enough to be higher than 20th in the league. 

Underperforming with this team should probably have us just outside the play-offs. It’s a squad riddled with proven Championship quality, most of which has probably never seen the bottom half. The manager is not getting enough out of them, simple as that.

100%. Championship is poor again this season.
 

Some of the opposition has been fucking dire. They just set up to make themselves solid and hard to beat, then catch us on the break with ease.
Put just Scienza in a few of these teams and they instantly trouble the play offs. 
 

It’s spectacular mismanagement from everyone at the club to have us in 20th. We can’t even do the absolute basics of football anymore. 

[Saint NL]

2 hours ago, Osvaldorama said:

Not buying this at all. 

Go through Blackburn’s team; or Hull or any other side that’s schooled us and tell me how many players you’d swap. 

Almost every team we play has worse players than us in almost every team in this league.

 

Our players aren’t PL quality but they’re good enough to be above 20th in the fucking league.  
Our keepers and strikers are very poor, but a good manager could set us up to be a lot harder to beat. 
 

It’s management & mindset. 
 

 

I agree with everything written here. 

Every other team seems to play to their strengths, whereas were lobbing in floaty crosses to short strikers. Still needs to look at what we have and make a plan accordingly, just like every other manager in the league has done.

[trousers]

4 minutes ago, Osvaldorama said:

100%. Championship is poor again this season.
 

Some of the opposition has been fucking dire. They just set up to make themselves solid and hard to beat, then catch us on the break with ease.
Put just Scienza in a few of these teams and they instantly trouble the play offs. 
 

It’s spectacular mismanagement from everyone at the club to have us in 20th. We can’t even do the absolute basics of football anymore. 

Highlighting the key word there...

Not sure why we've got a debate going on as to who's to blame... The players? The manager? Spors? Ankersen? Solak?

No need for a debate IMO... Can't we just agree that they've all played a significant part in this woeful start to the season....?

[saintwbu]

1 minute ago, trousers said:

Highlighting the key word there...

Not sure why we've got a debate going on as to who's to blame... The players? The manager? Spors? Ankersen? Solak?

No need for a debate IMO... Can't we just agree that they've all played a significant part in this woeful start to the season....?

I think most people agree the issue isn’t just the manager, but there’s no evidence to suggest he’s not a big part of it, and he’s without doubt the easiest part to fix

[Osvaldorama]

1 minute ago, trousers said:

Highlighting the key word there...

Not sure why we've got a debate going on as to who's to blame... The players? The manager? Spors? Ankersen? Solak?

No need for a debate IMO... Can't we just agree that they've all played a significant part in this woeful start to the season....?

Yep, not disagreeing with that. 
 

The question is what to do about it…

For me, he’d have been gone after the Blackburn debacle. But I do understand why they want to give it more time. 
 

I’m glad I’m not making the decision, tbh. 

[Doctoroncall]

Just now, saintwbu said:

I think most people agree the issue isn’t just the manager, but there’s no evidence to suggest he’s not a big part of it, and he’s without doubt the easiest part to fix

Fix requires a replacement and for SR, nothing is easy. 

[trousers]

5 minutes ago, saintwbu said:

I think most people agree the issue isn’t just the manager, but there’s no evidence to suggest he’s not a big part of it, and he’s without doubt the easiest part to fix

Fair point, but my fear is that fixing one component won't have any significant effect without fixing all the other components... (I'm sure there's a car analogy there somewhere).... That said, no harm in trying...

Edited yesterday at 17:46 by trousers

[Lighthouse]

1 hour ago, hypochondriac said:

I know you don't but it's in your interest not to think we need a striker given you were the loudest voice in here in the summer saying we definitely didn't need any more strikers.

A half decent manager should be able to get goals out of the forwards we have, even with Stewart's injury. Armstrong has consistently scored goals at this level for multiple seasons, Archer had 11 in half a season and Downs I'm sure is better than what we've got out of him so far.

Put it this way, there's a team in the top six who took us to school bringing on Sinclair Armstrong, who scored three goals last year.

[trousers]

2 minutes ago, Doctoroncall said:

Fix requires a replacement and for SR, nothing is easy. 

Exactly, we're relying on a broken part to fix another broken part...

[qwertyell]

6 minutes ago, saintwbu said:

I just can’t get my head round people thinking this group of players are not good enough to be higher than 20th in the league. 

Obviously they should be higher, given the amount of resources at our disposal relative to the league, but reputations don't pay the bills for long in sport - if you stand still you get overtaken. Entitlement doesn't win you many games. 

We're 20th in the Championship because the players/management/ownership in the here and now haven't proven themselves to be any better than 20th in the Championship. It makes no difference at all who did what, where, and how, in this league or that league, one, two, or three years ago. There are no legacy points on offer.

I hope the penny drops for some of them that their stock within the game that they once worked so hard to build up is presently in total free fall. I hope they shape up. And soon. But I'm not holding my breath.

[Midfield_General]

2 minutes ago, trousers said:

Fair point, but my fear is that fixing one component won't have any significant effect without fixing all the other components... (I'm sure there's a car analogy somewhere there).... That said, no harm in trying...

I think people are getting ‘changing’ a component mixed up with ‘fixing’ it.

It’s easy to change the manager, but that is a very different thing to fixing the managerial situation. 

Bringing in Jones, Selles, Juric, Rusk and now apparently Still were all examples of changes, but none of those changes fixed anything. 

[St Louis]

Sorry if already shared elsewhere, but I thought this was interesting and worth 10 mins of viewing...

 

Edited yesterday at 17:54 by St Louis

[Doctoroncall]

2 minutes ago, trousers said:

Exactly, we're relying on a broken part to fix another broken part...

And this is probably the reason why fans are willing Will to come good given his limitations. 
 

I would love to know the dynamics of the coaching staff with a couple of experienced coaches and a novice. Also, how much Still is being led by the data rather than illuminated by it. 

[trousers]

22 minutes ago, Lighthouse said:

A half decent manager should be able to get goals out of the forwards we have

Given our main problem is not creating chances but converting said chances, how does a "half decent manager" get more goals from such a profligate set of forwards? 

[coalman]

Meanwhile at Staplewood

 

[Turkish]

1 hour ago, saintwbu said:

I just can’t get my head round people thinking this group of players are not good enough to be higher than 20th in the league. 

Underperforming with this team should probably have us just outside the play-offs. It’s a squad riddled with proven Championship quality, most of which has probably never seen the bottom half. The manager is not getting enough out of them, simple as that.

i think it's hilarious. We've regularly put out a bench which cost 60m, with players who have played for England, Ireland, Scotland, Denmark and the US, plus many premier league games between them but we couldn't possibly expect any better than where we are 😂

[Sergei Gotsmanov]

Does anyone have any sense of how Will Still is received by the squad and around the club? Do the players like him or more importantly do they respect him?

 

[Lighthouse]

12 minutes ago, trousers said:

Given our main problem is not creating chances but converting said chances, how does a "half decent manager" get more goals from such a profligate set of forwards? 

Is it? Our problem against Hull was defending against basic, route one football. We also failed to do the basics right against Bristol City. We’ve had multiple games where we’ve played well, taken the lead and then completely lost our way. Pompey was just dreadful overall, we didn’t miss many decent chances in that, and Wrexham was also laboured for 89 minutes. We’ve made awful subs and our formation has been so completely at odds with the players we’ve signed that two superb Championship AMs are sat on the bench in favour of a third CB.

Missing chances is just one of our problems and even then, one of the worst examples was Jander. Signing prime Rickie Lambert wouldn’t have prevented his ‘mare.

[saintwbu]

34 minutes ago, trousers said:

Given our main problem is not creating chances but converting said chances, how does a "half decent manager" get more goals from such a profligate set of forwards? 

Missing chances should have us drawing games 0-0 or winning 1-0. Even our two wins this season we’ve had to come from behind because defensively we are all over the shop despite playing pretty much every defender we have at once - we also get overrun in midfield pretty much every game because we are playing so many defenders.

 

When Graham Potter was at Brighton they struggled to score goals and it was always ‘if Potter had a good striker they’d win the league’ - he leaves for Chelsea, De Zerbi comes in, same group of players, and immediately they become one of the highest scorers in the league whilst Chelsea suddenly struggle to score goals. Who knows what we’d do with a manager who could set this team up properly, but we won’t know until we replace the current one. 

[maysie]

On 28/10/2025 at 16:22, Pedantic Pete said:

🤣 if you seriously think Charles is the best player in his position in the league you are in cloud cuckoo land. I am not going to list those that are better as If you can’t see them, then you don’t know football. 

if you think Azaz and Fellows (as good as they are) were the very best in their positions in the league last year you live in cloud cuckoo land. I will give you a clue- check out the EFL team of the season last year! 
 
Armstrong wasn’t top scorer in his last full season in this league and scored three was it for West Brom last year in sixteen games? (In a team which had your best winger in the league to set him up?) again if you think he is the best in his position then you are in living in cloud cuckoo land. He is OK and will score goals but there are better players in the league who will score more. 
Edward’s…yeah wasn’t actually player of the season at a club which finished 15th in the table but again I will let you look up what he really got. 

Still may be rubbish but if you think this bunch of players are one of the top squads  in the league you must have missed the whole of last season.

I didn’t say it was a terrible squad but those who think we should be auto promoted or even play off guaranteed are watching a different team than me. Granted the squad should be doing better than the position they are, mid table or just tickling the last play off place maybe but nothing better than that. 

But never mind you carry on living in cloud cuckoo land where there is only one issue and it’s Still and our squad are good enough to get 13 points in the premier league. 🤣 also I am not fact checking anymore of your shit… use facts of F off 

Say cloud cuckoo land again please?

[Greedyfly]

2 hours ago, Lighthouse said:

A half decent manager should be able to get goals out of the forwards we have, even with Stewart's injury. Armstrong has consistently scored goals at this level for multiple seasons, Archer had 11 in half a season and Downs I'm sure is better than what we've got out of him so far.

Put it this way, there's a team in the top six who took us to school bringing on Sinclair Armstrong, who scored three goals last year.

So just AA then and even he has a few years in his legs Vs last time. Archer is utter toss and will never score 11 goals, and Downs looked great in a single cameo in preseason and ass ever since. Stewart was our only real hope for a decent striker and alas he's made of straw.

 

I never want to hear anyone suggest Archer as a reasonable answer to this mare ever again.

 

2 hours ago, Lighthouse said:

Is it? Our problem against Hull was defending against basic, route one football. We also failed to do the basics right against Bristol City. We’ve had multiple games where we’ve played well, taken the lead and then completely lost our way. Pompey was just dreadful overall, we didn’t miss many decent chances in that, and Wrexham was also laboured for 89 minutes. We’ve made awful subs and our formation has been so completely at odds with the players we’ve signed that two superb Championship AMs are sat on the bench in favour of a third CB.

Missing chances is just one of our problems and even then, one of the worst examples was Jander. Signing prime Rickie Lambert wouldn’t have prevented his ‘mare.

Yes. It's quite literally putting away the chances as evidenced by the fact that we create more good chances than anyone other than Coventry and yet have scored less than most of the league. We're shit at the back, sure. But we'd reduce the pressure and risk there if we just scored more of our big chances.

[HKsaint]

I don’t understand why there are still so many Will Still supporters here at this stage.

[Whitey Grandad]

6 hours ago, Greedyfly said:

So just AA then and even he has a few years in his legs Vs last time. Archer is utter toss and will never score 11 goals, and Downs looked great in a single cameo in preseason and ass ever since. Stewart was our only real hope for a decent striker and alas he's made of straw.

 

I never want to hear anyone suggest Archer as a reasonable answer to this mare ever again.

 

Yes. It's quite literally putting away the chances as evidenced by the fact that we create more good chances than anyone other than Coventry and yet have scored less than most of the league. We're shit at the back, sure. But we'd reduce the pressure and risk there if we just scored more of our big chances.

They're not 'good' chances though.

[Saint_clark]

1 hour ago, Whitey Grandad said:

They're not 'good' chances though.

Based on your subjective opinion rather than the cold hard facts.

[Willo of Whiteley]

8 hours ago, HKsaint said:

I don’t understand why there are still so many Will Still supporters here at this stage.

Because the alternatives that are realistic or available for a team of our current level are absolute dogshit 

[Sir Ralph]

This explains that Still isn’t the problem but the players are and recruitment 

Edited 10 hours ago by Sir Ralph

[Chez]

15 hours ago, stfrancisofbenali said:

Signing players with potential rather than experience is a risky strategy, made all the more risky by appointing a young manager with potential rather than experience. It's this double whammy which is costing us dear.

I've no doubt that WS is on an extremely steep learning curve and will become a better and stronger manager for this experience but unfortunately we are having to endure it in the here and now.

Three very experienced Championship signings (Viktor Johannsen, Connor Coady, Ollie McBurnie types) would have made Still's life so much easier and it is the board who are entirely responsible for not predicting that he would need this on-pitch support.

I take your point, but if we'd signed McBernie this summer, I think there would have been a fair bit of discontent on this forum. He's had a good start to the season, but we are talking about a 29 year old that scored 3 goals in 34 games for las palmas last season and 26 goals in 134 appearances for sheff united. No one was calling for McBernie this summer, so mentioning him now seems a bit unfair. No argument that Downs has not worked out, so far, so any other striker would have been preferable, but let's suggest McBernie was a consideration...we had to aim higher than him. Shame we didn't manage it.

Edited 10 hours ago by Chez

[Saint_clark]

11 minutes ago, Sir Ralph said:

This explains that Still isn’t the problem but the players are and recruitment 

Exactly why I still think we should be sticking with him. 

[Sir Ralph]

8 minutes ago, Saint_clark said:

Exactly why I still think we should be sticking with him. 

I agree - I don’t think changing him will help. This is Spors fault for not getting a striker  (downs doesn’t count as a player) and the players like Armstrong and archer for not finishing

[DT]

Tick. Tock. The sham is still here. Total shitshow of a club.

[Danbert]

16 hours ago, trousers said:

To be fair, being a contraian is not as easy as it looks

Oh yes it is

[skintsaint]

1 hour ago, Sir Ralph said:

This explains that Still isn’t the problem but the players are and recruitment 

I mean football is a game of momentum and confidence, if we bury a couple of chances, the opposition heads drop we gain confidence and who knows what the score could be. What happens is we miss a ton, our heads drop, opposition think 'hang on we can get a result here' and their tails go up, putting pressure on a defence that doesn't deal with the simple stuff well, scrappy goal and we know the rest.

[Pwoite]

1 hour ago, Sir Ralph said:

This explains that Still isn’t the problem but the players are and recruitment 

I might have missed this, but I’m presuming this table is based entirely on expected goals scored v expected goals conceded. I’ve not seen our actual v expected for conceded, but can I presume the actual is worse?

if so, it means misfiring strikers and poorly functioning defenders.  The former the manager has little control over, but I don’t accept that for the defence.

[sfc4prem]

5 minutes ago, Pwoite said:

I might have missed this, but I’m presuming this table is based entirely on expected goals scored v expected goals conceded. I’ve not seen our actual v expected for conceded, but can I presume the actual is worse?

if so, it means misfiring strikers and poorly functioning defenders.  The former the manager has little control over, but I don’t accept that for the defence.

I think Edwards has been largely shite. The formational changes haven't helped the overall sense of frailty and confusion in defence, for sure. That's on Still and his coaches.

[Dman]

1 hour ago, Willo of Whiteley said:

Because the alternatives that are realistic or available for a team of our current level are absolute dogshit 

Danny Rohl was up until a week ago. He's had a week on the training ground and transformed Rangers. A side who's fans were blaming summer recuritment etc. 

Before you say "its rangers theyre expected to win every week"... so are we in the championship. 

[LGTL]

3 minutes ago, Dman said:

Danny Rohl was up until a week ago. He's had a week on the training ground and transformed Rangers. A side who's fans were blaming summer recuritment etc. 

Before you say "its rangers theyre expected to win every week"... so are we in the championship. 

Should have got him in the summer. Should have got him once it was obvious Still is awful. Did neither and here we are stuck with the idiot.