Tonda Eckert

[Willo of Whiteley]

Absolute bollocks on the whole “the players dictate what happens” or “the board dictate the formation”.

There are that many leaks through the club it would be common knowledge.

Also it would be fucking stupid of Sprt Republic to try and build a reputation on players that aren’t good enough and a formation that doesn’t work. 🤣

[tdmickey3]

10 hours ago, Willo of Whiteley said:

Absolute bollocks on the whole “the players dictate what happens” or “the board dictate the formation”.

There are that many leaks through the club it would be common knowledge.

Also it would be fucking stupid of Sprt Republic to try and build a reputation on players that aren’t good enough and a formation that doesn’t work. 🤣

Well, they are doing it with a goalkeeper 

Edited yesterday at 07:54 by tdmickey3

[Weston Super Saint]

9 hours ago, Willo of Whiteley said:

Also it would be fucking stupid of Sprt Republic to try and build a reputation on players that aren’t good enough and a formation that doesn’t work. 🤣

Sadly, I now accept SR's 'stupidity' as the 'norm' for us.  

[AlexLaw76]

https://saintsmarching.com/tonda-eckert-just-affirmed-what-southampton-fans-have-been-saying-for-weeks

[Osvaldorama]

On 15/12/2025 at 15:43, tdmickey3 said:

Sorry, but there is nothing ridiculous about expecting a manager/coach to identify glaringly obvious flaws in our tactical set up and make attempts to rectify them but we have seen nothing so far.

We play one way and when it is nullified we don`t have an answer except desperate backs to the wall defending, yet in that defending we continually let teams put crosses in to our box virtually unchallenged, inevitably teams will score as was proven on Saturday

This backs to the wall stuff has been evident for a while now, we got away with it against QPR and West Brom, Millwall and Norwich beat us after our first half did not bear fruit we needed and we offered very little in the 2nd half of each game

Sadly i think the Coventry game will be the time it will be shown to be a major issue

You can’t just flick a switch and turn a poor team into a good one. 
 

So far he’s done better than anyone could have hoped for, results wise. 
 

I agree we are poor in the second half. I also would prefer a 3 man midfield. 

But stuff takes time and he has to work with what he has been given. 
 

[Dark Munster]

3 hours ago, AlexLaw76 said:

https://saintsmarching.com/tonda-eckert-just-affirmed-what-southampton-fans-have-been-saying-for-weeks

Weird headline. I didn't see anything in that article about Tonda affirming anything it says. It should say "Saints' defeat affirms what Southampton fans have been saying for weeks"

[StrangelyBrown]

On 15/12/2025 at 21:21, Willo of Whiteley said:

Also it would be fucking stupid of Sprt Republic to try and build a reputation on players that aren’t good enough and a formation that doesn’t work. 🤣

So what's your rationale for the multitude of managers playing 3 at the back despite it not working and not having done anything about Bazunu who is statistically proven to be one of the very poorest keepers in the championship?

[StrangelyBrown]

8 hours ago, Osvaldorama said:

You can’t just flick a switch and turn a poor team into a good one. 
 

So far he’s done better than anyone could have hoped for, results wise. 
 

I agree we are poor in the second half. I also would prefer a 3 man midfield. 

But stuff takes time and he has to work with what he has been given. 
 

You can expect to see some marginal improvement though.

Defensively we are still as bad as we've been for some time. Yes our players aren't the best but there are some simple glaring issues that can be addressed on the training ground - For instance what is Jack Stephens role in the defence? To the best of my knowledge he hasn't won a "best seat in the house" competition to watch the game so he should take responsibility for some defending. Why does Ryan Manning let his man have so much space game after game?

[tdmickey3]

9 hours ago, Osvaldorama said:

You can’t just flick a switch and turn a poor team into a good one. 
 

So far he’s done better than anyone could have hoped for, results wise. 
 

I agree we are poor in the second half. I also would prefer a 3 man midfield. 

But stuff takes time and he has to work with what he has been given. 
 

Not suggesting he could flick the switch but the 2nd half types of performance show zero signs of any moves to address it

[Willo of Whiteley]

53 minutes ago, StrangelyBrown said:

So what's your rationale for the multitude of managers playing 3 at the back despite it not working and not having done anything about Bazunu who is statistically proven to be one of the very poorest keepers in the championship?

But then you would hope that any one of those managers would’ve turned around and said “are you fucking deluded”?

I’m not disagreeing but I feel like if managers would be strong armed into certain criteria off the pitch then we’d hear about it.

[danjosaint]

18 minutes ago, Willo of Whiteley said:

But then you would hope that any one of those managers would’ve turned around and said “are you fucking deluded”?

I’m not disagreeing but I feel like if managers would be strong armed into certain criteria off the pitch then we’d hear about it.

Your not going to turn down £1.5m a yr on 3yr contract despite knowing you may be asked to play a certain way. There's evidence of other teams, Forest, Chelsea etc where the owners are interfering so whose not to say its happening here, it may or may not be happening you or I wont know, but for me there are enough snippets to think something is/has been going on 

Edited 5 hours ago by danjosaint

[LuckyNumber7]

4 hours ago, StrangelyBrown said:

You can expect to see some marginal improvement though.

Defensively we are still as bad as we've been for some time. Yes our players aren't the best but there are some simple glaring issues that can be addressed on the training ground - For instance what is Jack Stephens role in the defence? To the best of my knowledge he hasn't won a "best seat in the house" competition to watch the game so he should take responsibility for some defending. Why does Ryan Manning let his man have so much space game after game?

Since Tonda took charge, we have won 6 out of 8 games and scored 22 goals, more than anyone else in the league. Is that not a pretty huge improvement?

Of course there are still issues especially in defence, but I'm not sure why people expect him to be some kind of miracle worker. He still has the same mostly shit defenders and goalkeepers to choose from, and that probably won't change until at least the summer.