Will Still

[Badger]

Just now, Winnersaint said:

Watford maybe!

Why would their captain go to the chairman knowing full well the manager would be out the door in about three months anyway ?

[Midfield_General]

1 hour ago, saintwbu said:

If you listen to the podcast, Charlie Austin doesn’t have a good word to say about most of the people he played under. He must’ve just been very unlucky to always end up in that position! 

I think Charlie Austin falls out with a lot of people because he is - and let’s be completely fair to him - an absolute fucking weapon 

[AlexLaw76]

More click bait 

 

[HarvSFC]

The site is using Alan Nixon as their source. Can't all of a sudden make out that he's a reliable source when it fits some people's agenda.

[Sunnyside Saint]

Couldn't believe it for a minute. If the players were going to kick up a fuss it would have happened under Russ, he threw them out there on the pitch with a playing philosophy none of them could execute and let them sink or swim with it. While none of it was his fault. If ever there was a time for a player  rebellion it was then.

[Miltonaggro]

1 hour ago, HarvSFC said:

The site is using Alan Nixon as their source. Can't all of a sudden make out that he's a reliable source when it fits some people's agenda.

Exactly, might as well trust Richard Nixon!

[LGTL]

It’s not Saints. I was speaking to someone who’s inside the dressing room, albeit not a player. He said the one positive so far this season is the atmosphere around the place. 

[vectraman]

7 hours ago, saint michael said:

What’s the rave about Rohl?  Maybe good but yet another have a go at being clever hire 

Indeed. He is so fantastic that he is currently without a job…

I don’t believe we should even be considering Will Still being replaced currently. Give the guy and new players a bit of time to get going - I believe we will come good. 
 

In the unlikely event we can’t get it going - we absolutely should be looking at an experienced old hand style manager, (your Dyche/Wilder/Warnock no nonsense type) - yes I realise they aren’t coming here - just an example of the type we should go for, if we have to. 

[Give it to Ron]

More likely Watford there was a TikTok of their manager after match chat wasn’t popular 

[Willo of Whiteley]

6 hours ago, DT said:

It really does feel like us and something that Jack Stephens would do. Then again, so would I as Still has been very below par and should never have been appointed. Or Stephens given a new contract. So terrible all round from SR. Standard.

Based on what?

There is no evidence to suggest Jack Stephens ever had or ever would do that. You just love a pessimistic rumour. 😂

[Hopper]

For as underwhelming as the start of the season has been I do think we need to give Will some time.

As a club we were an absolute shambles off the back of last season. A lot of change needed and I think they did a lot of work in the summer to move on from that. Still big areas that need to be addressed (keeper, striker) but I think the last thing the club needs is more instability at the moment.

I don’t dislike Will in fact I think he’s shown he’s happy to be ruthless with the team selection which is refreshing. He clearly is playing to win and a good chunk of our conceded goals have come from individual errors (again) which he’s usually punished by dropping those players.

Im not sure promotion this season is the best thing for the club in the long term. I’d much rather see us stabilise and kick on next season with a bit of continuity and Will knowing exactly what he does and doesn’t need during the Jan/Summer windows.

Obviously if it all goes tits up and we’re flirting with relegation in the next couple of months than sack him off and move on but if things improve, and recent performances suggest they are moving the right direction then I’d stay the course.

[AlexLaw76]

3 hours ago, Hopper said:

For as underwhelming as the start of the season has been I do think we need to give Will some time.

As a club we were an absolute shambles off the back of last season. A lot of change needed and I think they did a lot of work in the summer to move on from that. Still big areas that need to be addressed (keeper, striker) but I think the last thing the club needs is more instability at the moment.

I don’t dislike Will in fact I think he’s shown he’s happy to be ruthless with the team selection which is refreshing. He clearly is playing to win and a good chunk of our conceded goals have come from individual errors (again) which he’s usually punished by dropping those players.

Im not sure promotion this season is the best thing for the club in the long term. I’d much rather see us stabilise and kick on next season with a bit of continuity and Will knowing exactly what he does and doesn’t need during the Jan/Summer windows.

Obviously if it all goes tits up and we’re flirting with relegation in the next couple of months than sack him off and move on but if things improve, and recent performances suggest they are moving the right direction then I’d stay the course.

If we dont go up this season we will possibly have a new manager next year and likely have another high turnover of players in the summer.

So much for ‘stability’

[Wiggles31]

4 hours ago, Hopper said:

For as underwhelming as the start of the season has been I do think we need to give Will some time.

As a club we were an absolute shambles off the back of last season. A lot of change needed and I think they did a lot of work in the summer to move on from that. Still big areas that need to be addressed (keeper, striker) but I think the last thing the club needs is more instability at the moment.

I don’t dislike Will in fact I think he’s shown he’s happy to be ruthless with the team selection which is refreshing. He clearly is playing to win and a good chunk of our conceded goals have come from individual errors (again) which he’s usually punished by dropping those players.

Im not sure promotion this season is the best thing for the club in the long term. I’d much rather see us stabilise and kick on next season with a bit of continuity and Will knowing exactly what he does and doesn’t need during the Jan/Summer windows.

Obviously if it all goes tits up and we’re flirting with relegation in the next couple of months than sack him off and move on but if things improve, and recent performances suggest they are moving the right direction then I’d stay the course.

Exactly my take on things. 

[OldNick]

15 hours ago, Midfield_General said:

I think Charlie Austin falls out with a lot of people because he is - and let’s be completely fair to him - an absolute fucking weapon 

Ryan Bertrand also came out about RH. Ings I believe was not too keen either

[Dman]

12 hours ago, Give it to Ron said:

More likely Watford there was a TikTok of their manager after match chat wasn’t popular 

Yes, I saw this. Not a great look. 

However, my immediate thoughts were "we failed to beat these". 

[Turkish]

2 minutes ago, OldNick said:

Ryan Bertrand also came out about RH. Ings I believe was not too keen either

I remember initially Bertrand was glowing about Ralph, i believe he tweeted or posting something like "finally a manager with a plan" shortly after he joined. I think RH did fall out with a few senior players though. He would often come out and say he liked working with younger players so he could mold them.

 

 

[Charlie Wayman]

On 28/09/2025 at 20:36, Holmes_and_Watson said:

In other news, I heard that players of one Championship club, think their manager could be doing a bit better.

Fixed it for you

[Charlie Wayman]

8 minutes ago, OldNick said:

Ryan Bertrand also came out

That can't be right, he has a gorgeous wife.

[Ekelund24]

13 hours ago, Miltonaggro said:

Exactly, might as well trust Richard Nixon!

"I am not Alex Crook"

[Charlie Wayman]

5 hours ago, Hopper said:

For as underwhelming as the start of the season has been I do think we need to give Will some time.

Im not sure promotion this season is the best thing for the club in the long term. I’d much rather see us stabilise and kick on next season with a bit of continuity and Will knowing exactly what he does and doesn’t need during the Jan/Summer windows.

 

It was my understanding that promotion this season was a given as far as the owners were concerned. Against that yardstick time is the enemy of success. He won't be given that luxury.

Edited yesterday at 08:20 by Charlie Wayman

[SaintNewForest]

27 minutes ago, OldNick said:

Ryan Bertrand also came out about RH. Ings I believe was not too keen either

He fell out with Stephens & Bednarek as well. 

[Turkish]

15 minutes ago, SaintNewForest said:

He fell out with Stephens & Bednarek as well. 

He was right on that occasion 

It going to happen, no big deal. Staff pissed off with boss, boss pissed off with member of staff. Happens every day everywhere in the world

[hypochondriac]

I always find it funny when people say they don't want promotion this year. Don't people realise that it's going to be exponentially harder next season if we don't go up this year? Charles will likely leave and a few others who we would rather keep. It looks like one or more of the promoted teams will stay up this season which means we may be competing with the likes of Wolves or West Ham with many of their top flight quality players and resources that dwarf ours. Fail to go up this season or next season and we are essentially Swansea or Stoke and we could be down here for years with the quality of the team getting steadily worse. Come back and revisit these posts in five years time when all the quality in the team is gone and we're stuck with a team full of Jack Stephens. Do people not remember when we got relegated to league one playing the kids with no money and the potential for the team to no longer exist? It fucking sucked!

Edited yesterday at 09:02 by hypochondriac

[leesaint88]

1 hour ago, OldNick said:

Ryan Bertrand also came out about RH. Ings I believe was not too keen either

Charlie Austin too, he was on a podcast a few weeks back saying he was a bit of a bellend...

[SambaMaverick]

41 minutes ago, SaintNewForest said:

He fell out with Stephens & Bednarek as well. 

All players (Bertrand, Austin included - Ings not so much) we should've got rid of at the time to kick on, but we had no money. Ralph was let down so badly by recruitment.

Edited yesterday at 09:14 by SambaMaverick

[Patrick Bateman]

8 minutes ago, leesaint88 said:

Charlie Austin too, he was on a podcast a few weeks back saying he was a bit of a bellend...

Talking about himself?

[Turkish]

34 minutes ago, hypochondriac said:

I always find it funny when people say they don't want promotion this year. Don't people realise that it's going to be exponentially harder next season if we don't go up this year? Charles will likely leave and a few others who we would rather keep. It looks like one or more of the promoted teams will stay up this season which means we may be competing with the likes of Wolves or West Ham with many of their top flight quality players and resources that dwarf ours. Fail to go up this season or next season and we are essentially Swansea or Stoke and we could be down here for years with the quality of the team getting steadily worse. Come back and revisit these posts in five years time when all the quality in the team is gone and we're stuck with a team full of Jack Stephens. Do people not remember when we got relegated to league one playing the kids with no money and the potential for the team to no longer exist? It fucking sucked!

All the good ones will leave anyway, it's what we do. It's what SR are, unashamedly calling themselves a player trading organisation. I've long got over being attached to any player so certainly not bothered about anyone leaving, that's going to happen whatever league we are in.

Im not sure which is the worst or best option these days. It seems to be one of the follow

1/ being cannon fodder in the Premier league for a "competition" which is completely rigged to bigger clubs. Should you happen to break into the top half all of your best players and managers picked off with the club only to happy to sell them  to the highest bidder (player trading club remember). Not to mention the nonsense of PSR now which hold everyone who might threaten the big boys from kicking on.

2/ Being a yo yo club, going up and down hoping to survive for a season so we get more than one year in a row at a shot of being part of the self titled great league in the world and become a longer term option 1.

3 / Hovering around in the championship, more of a level playing field but obviously the standard of football will be lower and the club in a worse position financially

Neither of them are particularly attractive but honestly are any of them any worse than the other when you actually think about it? 

Edited yesterday at 09:35 by Turkish

[hypochondriac]

7 minutes ago, Turkish said:

All the good ones will leave anyway, it's what we do. It's what SR are, unashamedly calling themselves a player trading organisation. I've long got over being attached to any player so certainly not bothered about anyone leaving, that's going to happen whatever league we are in.

Im not sure which is the worst or best option these days. It seems to be one of the follow

1/ being cannon fodder in the Premier league for a "competition" which is completely rigged to bigger clubs. Should you happen to break into the top half all of your best players and managers picked off with the club only to happy to sell them  to the highest bidder (player trading club remember). Not to mention the nonsense of PSR now which hold everyone who might threaten the big boys from kicking on.

2/ Being a yo yo club, going up and down hoping to survive for a season so we get more than one year in a row at a shot of being part of the self titled great league in the world and become a longer term option 1.

3 / Hovering around in the championship, more of a level playing field but obviously the standard of football will be lower and the club in a worse position financially

Neither of them are particularly attractive but honestly are any of them any worse than the other when you actually think about it? 

Personally I'd like to try to survive a season in the prem so we can improve the team, have another shot at Europe, get some decent players in etc. I accept that will probably involve not having sports Republic in charge but I expect they would be more likely to sell at some point if we are doing well so that's another reason to wish for it. The likes of Bournemouth aren't doing badly and I don't want to see us slowly getting worse and worse with no resources to replace any of the quality that leave.

I remember going to Prague to watch us in Europe with the reasoning being that we probably won't be in Europe again any time soon and so it has proved. The whole of football is pretty broken but I'd still like to see us win a proper cup in my lifetime and we are only doing that in the prem.

[Patrick Bateman]

17 minutes ago, Turkish said:

All the good ones will leave anyway, it's what we do. It's what SR are, unashamedly calling themselves a player trading organisation. I've long got over being attached to any player so certainly not bothered about anyone leaving, that's going to happen whatever league we are in.

Im not sure which is the worst or best option these days. It seems to be one of the follow

1/ being cannon fodder in the Premier league for a "competition" which is completely rigged to bigger clubs. Should you happen to break into the top half all of your best players and managers picked off with the club only to happy to sell them  to the highest bidder (player trading club remember). Not to mention the nonsense of PSR now which hold everyone who might threaten the big boys from kicking on.

2/ Being a yo yo club, going up and down hoping to survive for a season so we get more than one year in a row at a shot of being part of the self titled great league in the world and become a longer term option 1.

3 / Hovering around in the championship, more of a level playing field but obviously the standard of football will be lower and the club in a worse position financially

Neither of them are particularly attractive but honestly are any of them any worse than the other when you actually think about it? 

Exactly. All we want is a football club to support, more wins than not (well, certainly SOME wins) and occasionally giving the big clubs a kicking (whether in the league or cup). 

I type that but then remember how good is was with Koeman and also the couple of European years ... Forest have that now, but don't look the same.  Fulham, Bournemouth, Brighton and even Brentford are 4 clubs in the top flight all much better run than Saints. The player selling will never go away, but the four clubs above are better at recruiting than Saints - although we'll see how Fellows, Jander etc turn out, I am more hopeful for those guys than before. 

 

[whelk]

14 minutes ago, hypochondriac said:

The whole of football is pretty broken

I agree to an extent but Crystal Palace, Bournemouth, Brighton and even Brentford would probably disagree. And none of those are bigger than us, just better run it would seem. 

[whelk]

4 minutes ago, Patrick Bateman said:

Exactly. All we want is a football club to support, more wins than not (well, certainly SOME wins) and occasionally giving the big clubs a kicking (whether in the league or cup). 

I type that but then remember how good is was with Koeman and also the couple of European years ... Forest have that now, but don't look the same.  Fulham, Bournemouth, Brighton and even Brentford are 4 clubs in the top flight all much better run than Saints. The player selling will never go away, but the four clubs above are better at recruiting than Saints - although we'll see how Fellows, Jander etc turn out, I am more hopeful for those guys than before. 

 

Just posted before reading this and just posted similar even to the point of ‘even Brentford’😀

[hypochondriac]

Just now, whelk said:

I agree to an extent but Crystal Palace, Bournemouth, Brighton and even Brentford would probably disagree. And none of those are bigger than us, just better run it would seem. 

Look at Villa. Very well run, brilliant manager yet has to sell all of their best players to meet ridiculous obligations. All of those teams you mentioned will eventually have a couple of big money signings in a row that don't work out and a manager that is underwhelming and may then be under pressure. Once it starts it's very difficult to not end up fighting near the bottom every season and then with relegation you're in the same position we are. 

No doubt they are much better run than us and some of them may be up there a while but in general the financial disparity tells in the end. All fans of those teams can hope for is that you can come away from that period with a trophy or a cup (Palace have got that already and the likes of Leicester if they went pop tomorrow can dine out on that league win for the rest of their lives.)

[hypochondriac]

9 minutes ago, Patrick Bateman said:

Exactly. All we want is a football club to support, more wins than not (well, certainly SOME wins) and occasionally giving the big clubs a kicking (whether in the league or cup). 

I type that but then remember how good is was with Koeman and also the couple of European years ... Forest have that now, but don't look the same.  Fulham, Bournemouth, Brighton and even Brentford are 4 clubs in the top flight all much better run than Saints. The player selling will never go away, but the four clubs above are better at recruiting than Saints - although we'll see how Fellows, Jander etc turn out, I am more hopeful for those guys than before. 

 

My hope for saints is to see us win a major cup competition in my lifetime and see us competing in Europe again. For both of those things to be realistic we have to be in the prem. Also one of my favourite moments watching football was seeing Lambert come on and score that goal against Scotland after I'd been bigging him up to my United supporting mate moments earlier so I'd take moments like that too.

[Patrick Bateman]

4 minutes ago, hypochondriac said:

My hope for saints is to see us win a major cup competition in my lifetime and see us competing in Europe again. For both of those things to be realistic we have to be in the prem. Also one of my favourite moments watching football was seeing Lambert come on and score that goal against Scotland after I'd been bigging him up to my United supporting mate moments earlier so I'd take moments like that too.

Agreed!  JPT aside, I can't believe I haven't seen us win a cup, at 49 years of age, sad. 

But when I look at this - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_FA_Cup_finals - the last 40 years have all been 'predictable' teams, bar Wimbledon, Portsmouth, Wigan and at a push Leicester and Palace. 

The league cup is just as bad - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_EFL_Cup_finals - FFS! 

Sorry diverting the thread away from Will Still. Maybe he's the one to take us to a final, next year ... let's hope. 

[skintsaint]

18 minutes ago, hypochondriac said:

Look at Villa. Very well run

Hmmm, kinda - their wage bill hit 95% of income which caused their issues.

[whelk]

33 minutes ago, hypochondriac said:

Look at Villa. Very well run, brilliant manager yet has to sell all of their best players to meet ridiculous obligations. All of those teams you mentioned will eventually have a couple of big money signings in a row that don't work out and a manager that is underwhelming and may then be under pressure. Once it starts it's very difficult to not end up fighting near the bottom every season and then with relegation you're in the same position we are. 

No doubt they are much better run than us and some of them may be up there a while but in general the financial disparity tells in the end. All fans of those teams can hope for is that you can come away from that period with a trophy or a cup (Palace have got that already and the likes of Leicester if they went pop tomorrow can dine out on that league win for the rest of their lives.)

Yes of course it will all be temporary and not sustainable but been like that for years. Mid PL teams can now attract better quality players and managers and so much hinges on tge coach manager - if we appointed Glazner or Iriola after Ralph we’d not be in the state we are in. So much is gambles and to a degree luck.

[hypochondriac]

2 minutes ago, whelk said:

Yes of course it will all be temporary and not sustainable but been like that for years. Mid PL teams can now attract better quality players and managers and so much hinges on tge coach manager - if we appointed Glazner or Iriola after Ralph we’d not be in the state we are in. So much is gambles and to a degree luck.

I agree. It seems so unfair that the likes of Palace have to be absolutely perfect for a number of seasons to keep some semblance of success whilst the likes of United can be a basket case for years, finish near the bottom with no Europe and can still outbid everyone and sign the best players. I know this is well worn ground but really being one of those teams too good to go down with an outside chance of a cup win or a European run is the best we can hope for. 

[AlexLaw76]

57 minutes ago, Patrick Bateman said:

Exactly. All we want is a football club to support, more wins than not (well, certainly SOME wins) and occasionally giving the big clubs a kicking (whether in the league or cup). 

I type that but then remember how good is was with Koeman and also the couple of European years ... Forest have that now, but don't look the same.  Fulham, Bournemouth, Brighton and even Brentford are 4 clubs in the top flight all much better run than Saints. The player selling will never go away, but the four clubs above are better at recruiting than Saints - although we'll see how Fellows, Jander etc turn out, I am more hopeful for those guys than before. 

 

If Saints sold 4 of their back 5 in one summer (like Bournemouth just did), we’d fuck it right up and try to be black boxy too clever for our own good.

[Turkish]

1 hour ago, hypochondriac said:

My hope for saints is to see us win a major cup competition in my lifetime and see us competing in Europe again. For both of those things to be realistic we have to be in the prem. Also one of my favourite moments watching football was seeing Lambert come on and score that goal against Scotland after I'd been bigging him up to my United supporting mate moments earlier so I'd take moments like that too.

My wish for Saints right now is just a period of sensible decisions. None of this thinking outside the box, trying to find the new Van Dijk, being clever. Lets build a good solid team with a strong spine and core, then we can start to add these one of the futures and integrate them. All this spunking tens of millions of crap or kids and doing things different has failed. Lets get back to basics, sign the best players we can for the money in key positions, bring a few promising youngsters in but that should be a complement to the strategy, not the strategy. Might sound boring and not hipster but i'd take that every day over narrowly avoiding being the worst team ever. In fairness the summer transfer window does seem a shift back towards that so at least its a step in the right direction

[tdmickey3]

Just now, Turkish said:

My wish for Saints right now is just a period of sensible decisions. None of this thinking outside the box, trying to find the new Van Dijk, being clever. Lets build a good solid team with a strong spine and core, then we can start to add these one of the futures and integrate them. All this spunking tens of millions of crap or kids and doing things different has failed. Lets get back to basics, sign the best players we can for the money in key positions, bring a few promising youngsters in but that should be a complement to the strategy, not the strategy. Might sound boring and not hipster but i'd take that every day over narrowly avoiding being the worst team ever. In fairness the summer transfer window does seem a shift back towards that so at least its a step in the right direction

Good post

[hypochondriac]

1 minute ago, Turkish said:

My wish for Saints right now is just a period of sensible decisions. None of this thinking outside the box, trying to find the new Van Dijk, being clever. Lets build a good solid team with a strong spine and core, then we can start to add these one of the futures and integrate them. All this spunking tens of millions of crap or kids and doing things different has failed. Lets get back to basics, sign the best players we can for the money in key positions, bring a few promising youngsters in but that should be a complement to the strategy, not the strategy. Might sound boring and not hipster but i'd take that every day over narrowly avoiding being the worst team ever. In fairness the summer transfer window does seem a shift back towards that so at least its a step in the right direction

Yes obviously in the short term we all want that but ultimately.I'd like to see us in Europe and to win a cup and that starts with sensible decisions, a bit of luck and sensible planning so we don't disagree.

[Give it to Ron]

2 minutes ago, Turkish said:

My wish for Saints right now is just a period of sensible decisions. None of this thinking outside the box, trying to find the new Van Dijk, being clever. Lets build a good solid team with a strong spine and core, then we can start to add these one of the futures and integrate them. All this spunking tens of millions of crap or kids and doing things different has failed. Lets get back to basics, sign the best players we can for the money in key positions, bring a few promising youngsters in but that should be a complement to the strategy, not the strategy. Might sound boring and not hipster but i'd take that every day over narrowly avoiding being the worst team ever. In fairness the summer transfer window does seem a shift back towards that so at least its a step in the right direction

Exactly this is how I feel just fed up with all this blue sky thinking why can’t we just be ‘normal’.

[Turkish]

35 minutes ago, hypochondriac said:

Yes obviously in the short term we all want that but ultimately.I'd like to see us in Europe and to win a cup and that starts with sensible decisions, a bit of luck and sensible planning so we don't disagree.

There are very few things that would give me more pleasure than seeing us win something and play in Europe again, even if its the conference league, will be some great trips in that. In fact that's just reminded me, remember the days when quite a few people on here were happy to give the cups a miss in their quest for "champions league or nothing" anyone that said they were dreaming was negative, not buying into the vision with a Dell sized mentality 😂

[hypochondriac]

16 minutes ago, Turkish said:

There are very few things that would give me more pleasure than seeing us win something and play in Europe again, even if its the conference league, will be some great trips in that. In fact that's just reminded me, remember the days when quite a few people on here were happy to give the cups a miss in their quest for "champions league or nothing" anyone that said they were dreaming was negative, not buying into the vision with a Dell sized mentality 😂

Yep bunch of twats. Our Europa league games weren't even sold out. I went to them all home and away apart from Israel. We can play Fulham or Liverpool any day of the week. Bizarre that fans would rather go to those snore fests. Playing in Europe for a team like saints is a rare thing and an absolute treat and privilege. 

[Lord Duckhunter]

1 hour ago, AlexLaw76 said:

If Saints sold 4 of their back 5 in one summer (like Bournemouth just did), we’d fuck it right up and try to be black boxy too clever for our own good.

Every year we have this nonsense, it was Brighton last season.
 

Neither Brighton, Bournemouth, Brentford or any other flavour of the month, have done any better than we did for 5 years spanning 3 managers.

Bournemouth finished 12th & 9th and everyone’s getting excited. We actually sacked a manager for finishing higher.
 

8th, 7th 6th & 8th whilst replacing so many top players & 2 fantastic managers was pretty remarkable. None of the “well run” sides of our size have managed that yet…

Edited 21 hours ago by Lord Duckhunter

[Midfield_General]

2 hours ago, hypochondriac said:

I agree. It seems so unfair that the likes of Palace have to be absolutely perfect for a number of seasons to keep some semblance of success whilst the likes of United can be a basket case for years, finish near the bottom with no Europe and can still outbid everyone and sign the best players. I know this is well worn ground but really being one of those teams too good to go down with an outside chance of a cup win or a European run is the best we can hope for. 

Totally agree with all that, but even trying to win a cup is openly rigged towards the ‘big clubs’ now with farces like the seeding of the league cup draw so the big boys can’t play each other and it’s arranged so they all get to play a club with vastly inferior resources and can knock them all out. The league cup for fucks sake, the one competition you might think they might let us have a go at winning but no, can’t have that can we. 

Every single regulatory force in football seems hell bent on making every single competition as uncompetitive as possible with only a handful of clubs permitted to have a chance of winning anything. And what’s the point in football without competition? It’s fucked. 

Edit: sorry for the rant, forgot this was meant to be about Will Still. Give him some time. The other side of Christmas at least. We can’t just keep sacking managers. Personally I think he’ll probably get us into the play-offs if he’s allowed to get on with it. 

Edited 20 hours ago by Midfield_General

[DT]

2 hours ago, Turkish said:

My wish for Saints right now is just a period of sensible decisions. None of this thinking outside the box, trying to find the new Van Dijk, being clever. Lets build a good solid team with a strong spine and core, then we can start to add these one of the futures and integrate them. All this spunking tens of millions of crap or kids and doing things different has failed. Lets get back to basics, sign the best players we can for the money in key positions, bring a few promising youngsters in but that should be a complement to the strategy, not the strategy. Might sound boring and not hipster but i'd take that every day over narrowly avoiding being the worst team ever. In fairness the summer transfer window does seem a shift back towards that so at least its a step in the right direction

100% agree with this. Watching Nuno last night and the immediate impact he has made to West Ham one phrase stuck out - let's defend first. We haven't set up like this for ages. We didn't invest in a decent keeper and are now reaping the rewards of that with a ripple of no confidence running through past the haphazard Jack in defence, through the not strong enough and error prone midfield, and on to the misfiring strikers. It feels like something fundamental is wrong when good players suddenly become a bit crap after joining us. This might be the coaching set up, or the atmosphere that SR create, or it might be yet another manager gamble designed to make the employers look like geniuses if it comes off, but in reality is far less preferable to just appointing someone with decent experience, shock horror, in the league we are in (not a ropey French one). So for me, yes, time to start making straightforward decisions. See for reference Wilder v Will to come in the next match. Think it will be yet another schooling from the land of reality to the land of the keyboard.

[Turkish]

6 minutes ago, DT said:

100% agree with this. Watching Nuno last night and the immediate impact he has made to West Ham one phrase stuck out - let's defend first. We haven't set up like this for ages. We didn't invest in a decent keeper and are now reaping the rewards of that with a ripple of no confidence running through past the haphazard Jack in defence, through the not strong enough and error prone midfield, and on to the misfiring strikers. It feels like something fundamental is wrong when good players suddenly become a bit crap after joining us. This might be the coaching set up, or the atmosphere that SR create, or it might be yet another manager gamble designed to make the employers look like geniuses if it comes off, but in reality is far less preferable to just appointing someone with decent experience, shock horror, in the league we are in (not a ropey French one). So for me, yes, time to start making straightforward decisions. See for reference Wilder v Will to come in the next match. Think it will be yet another schooling from the land of reality to the land of the keyboard.

Yep and without wanting to go on about Martin the idea that he would succeed with his philosophy bollocks by basically trying to play like peak Barcelona with players who are barely peak Bristol City was just absurd. We have to do things different but not in the way he thought, we have to be solid, compact and tough to beat, nick a few wins and build. Maybe after a couple of seasons you can start to be an bit more expansive when you've got better players. 

You've only got to look at the periods of success we've had in the last 25 years, Strachans team was built on a good keeper, a solid defence and being one of the fittest teams in the league, same with Pochetinos and Koemans. Solid teams, good defenders, good strong midfield players, a bit of experience and a few talented players round them. Its amazing that so many people seem to think anything other than this is better for a club like us.

[DT]

9 minutes ago, Turkish said:

Yep and without wanting to go on about Martin the idea that he would succeed with his philosophy bollocks by basically trying to play like peak Barcelona with players who are barely peak Bristol City was just absurd. We have to do things different but not in the way he thought, we have to be solid, compact and tough to beat, nick a few wins and build. Maybe after a couple of seasons you can start to be an bit more expansive when you've got better players. 

You've only got to look at the periods of success we've had in the last 25 years, Strachans team was built on a good keeper, a solid defence and being one of the fittest teams in the league, same with Pochetinos and Koemans. Solid teams, good defenders, good strong midfield players, a bit of experience and a few talented players round them. Its amazing that so many people seem to think anything other than this is better for a club like us.

Bang on. Even Hoddle's side went on a run of 1-0 wins. Can't remember our last run of clean sheets. Let's be boring for a bit.

[Dman]

 

10 minutes ago, DT said:

Bang on. Even Hoddle's side went on a run of 1-0 wins. Can't remember our last run of clean sheets. Let's be boring for a bit.

The thing is, we have tried that. We started with Jones then ended up with Juric. Our fanbase weren't having them and made a hard job even harder. Same with Puel.