Colchester 0-2 Saints - Match Thread

[CylonKing]

3 minutes ago, Patrick Bateman said:

My 12 year old said "Dias is rubbish".

No more text required.

But what are his thoughts on Carlton Palmer? 😁

Edited 22 hours ago by CylonKing
Added an emoji...why not!

[Harry_SFC]

4 hours ago, saintant said:

Archer was the player who kept the ball in with a header then Larin gave it to Azaz.

Thought Archer was decent and is a player we should keep as he is a useful asset and we won't get much for him. Better to keep him than sell him cheaply.

Totally agree with this.

Archer has been promising in pre season and looked a threat today. 

Imagine we'd want at least half of what we paid for him (so £7.5m) and as you say, not sure who's going to pay that for him. 

[Saint Matty 76]

Feels like some slightly harsh criticism of Fellows as an option whatsoever in here.

9 assists last year and a player at 23 who has every chance to improve. Needs to score some goals this year without a doubt, but certainly would not be giving up. Brilliant ball carrier who needs to and hopefully can step up.

[Sir Ralph]

2 hours ago, Lighthouse said:

He's not a horrendous footballer and he was no worse than three or four other players. He lost his confidence and form completely playing two campaigns above his level in two of the worst teams the PL has ever seen. Like Dobbin he was effectively making his competitive debut in this team and the former was hardly any better.

He can’t lead a line - lack of physical dominance and never comes short to offer an option. 
 

my mate who I went to the world cup with is a derby ST holder. He said they should buy him as a left winger. We don’t need him there. Sell.

[SaintTex]

6 hours ago, Tommy Mulgrew said:

 

Here’s the link for you to bookmark:

http://www.fawanews.sc/

It was very reliable last season.

i second this. it was a godsend last season.

[Toadhall Saint]

9 hours ago, SNSUN said:

Liked him soon as I saw him. He's a bit of everything, tap in merchant, runs and shoots, can hold the ball up. He's still not old for a footballer too these days and you can tell he has bags of experience. The WC highlighted he can do it on the big stage too. 

Another striker in a similar vein and we will cook this season. 

Can we just play football? All this master chef stuff just gets in the way . 😉

[Dark Munster]

9 hours ago, Lighthouse said:

He's not a horrendous footballer and he was no worse than three or four other players. He lost his confidence and form completely playing two campaigns above his level in two of the worst teams the PL has ever seen. Like Dobbin he was effectively making his competitive debut in this team and the former was hardly any better.

Bazunu, Downs, and ... hmmm
Can you give us a clue on the other one or two?

[Saint_clark]

Really good play and finish by the young lad. What position does he actually play, winger, CM? Be good to have a few more youngsters around the first team as long as they're able to contribute.

[StrangelyBrown]

11 hours ago, Lighthouse said:

He's not a horrendous footballer and he was no worse than three or four other players. He lost his confidence and form completely playing two campaigns above his level in two of the worst teams the PL has ever seen. Like Dobbin he was effectively making his competitive debut in this team and the former was hardly any better.

He was awful in everything he did.

The simplest thing he had to do was press the keeper, which he did with no pace, but more importantly he bottled the last yard every single time so the press was completely pointless.

His touch was laughable.

He couldn't get near anything that went into the box apart from one header because his positioning was so poor.

He backed off every ball so lost almost every 50:50 before he'd got near it.

Name one thing he did well because I didn't see it?

[trousers]

Given it seems unlikely that Charles was ever going to get minutes on the pitch yesterday, I assume he was taking up a place on the bench just so that he could say his goodbyes to the fans after the game...? Tonda getting soft / sentimental in his old age...?

Edited 13 hours ago by trousers

[The Kraken]

1 hour ago, trousers said:

Given it seems unlikely that Charles was ever going to get minutes on the pitch yesterday, I assume he was taking up a place on the bench just so that he could say his goodbyes to the fans after the game...? Tonda getting soft / sentimental in his old age...?

Tbf, I quite enjoyed Tonda being asked about it pre-game.

”Given the rumours of Shea Charles being linked with a move to Fulham, what does him being on the bench tell us?”

”That he’s a Southampton player”.

[suewhistle]

2 hours ago, StrangelyBrown said:

He was awful in everything he did.

The simplest thing he had to do was press the keeper, which he did with no pace, but more importantly he bottled the last yard every single time so the press was completely pointless.

His touch was laughable.

He couldn't get near anything that went into the box apart from one header because his positioning was so poor.

He backed off every ball so lost almost every 50:50 before he'd got near it.

Name one thing he did well because I didn't see it?

I'm afraid Lighthouse that this analysis hits the mark, and your defence of BBD, although admirable, really has little to sustain it. I don't like being negative about players either but I really don't see that he brings anything to the team

[Sarnia Cherie]

4 minutes ago, suewhistle said:

I'm afraid Lighthouse that this analysis hits the mark, and your defence of BBD, although admirable, really has little to sustain it. I don't like being negative about players either but I really don't see that he brings anything to the team

My heart sank when I saw his name in the line up. He didn't do anything to lift my spirits either. It's early days but we managed very well without him last season and unless he finds some good form we can manage without him for this one.

[Sarnia Cherie]

15 hours ago, Chez said:

what was bbd like up front?

T S I H. Rearrange the letters. 

[warsash saint]

PLEASE PLEASE can we stop with the 'we spy when we want' chants!!  Absolute noddy song especially when the next chant is 'f**k the EFL'!!.

The new song at the very end was good though

Edited 10 hours ago by warsash saint

[The Kraken]

8 minutes ago, Sarnia Cherie said:

My heart sank when I saw his name in the line up. He didn't do anything to lift my spirits either. It's early days but we managed very well without him last season and unless he finds some good form we can manage without him for this one.

I suggested pre game it was perhaps his last chance to convince Tonda that he has a role here, and he couldn’t have done anything more to prove that he just doesn’t fit into our system as a central striker. Just looked horrendously poor. The fact that others were also off colour, particularly in the first half, doesn’t in any way mask how bad BBD looked and how little he gave the team as an outlet. 

It’s getting a bit worrying that we have no other striking option apart from Larin (Archer gives us something different but not the focal point we clearly need for our system). Maybe that’ll be enough, but I thought the way we were able to dovetail Cyle and LND last season kept both of them fresh and sharp. Maybe we were spoiled and one striker will be ok. Big risk though. BBD showed he is no backup whatsoever.

Edited 10 hours ago by The Kraken

[Saint Pete]

6 minutes ago, The Kraken said:

 

It’s getting a bit worrying that we have no other striking option apart from Larin (Archer gives us something different but not the focal point we clearly need for our system). Maybe that’ll be enough, but I thought the way we were able to dovetail Cyle and LND last season kept both of them fresh and sharp. Maybe we were spoiled and one striker will be ok. Big risk though. BBD showed he is no backup whatsoever.

It most definitely won't be enough if our aim is as we say it is to get promoted this season, preferably in the top 2, starting from -4 points. We can shrug our shoulders and say "maybe BBD can do a job as a backup to Larin" and perhaps Tonda can eventually get a tune out of him to perform at mid-table Championship standard. But that is not what we need, we don't need an understudy to Larin, we need someone at least on the same level as him that we can interchange with him in the same way as Stewart did. And it also needs to be someone who can provide that strength and focal point up front so that we can maintain that through 90 minutes, which worked so well in 2nd half of last season. Larin is 31 years old and playing as a lone striker is hard work, so he won't be able to start every game in a long hard Championship season, even if he stays fit. 

I think we have seen enough from BBD in his previous spell and so far in pre season to know he isn't the man to do the above job at the level we need to achieve promotion, so I hope we are not going to waste our time coming to that conclusion in the same way we have in previous seasons regarding decisions over strikers, as it will cost us if we do. 

[chiknsmack]

3 hours ago, Saint_clark said:

Really good play and finish by the young lad. What position does he actually play, winger, CM? Be good to have a few more youngsters around the first team as long as they're able to contribute.

AM, but can play elsewhere in midfield. He popped up on the left of the attack a couple of times in preseason too.

Playing Matsuki as an 8 today was an interesting idea; against inferior opposition maybe we don't need two holding mids and can play an extra central attacker? It'd be a way to use more than one of Azaz/Dobbin/Matsuki/Archer, instead of Dobbin being Azaz's competition for the 10 role, Matsuki being a backup winger (not the best fit), and Archer being a backup striker (also not the best fit since he's not in the Larin/Stewart mould we want).

It didn't work with Matsuki (maybe he's too lightweight, maybe BBD incessantly dropping into left midfield instead of playing as a proper striker didn't help), it hasn't worked in the past with Azaz who wasn't mobile enough, and maybe it isn't necessary when the best name to fill the blank in "Azaz + Downes + ______" is Jander. But perhaps Akachukwu would be an option. He's got decent size about him for one thing.

Last season Downes, Jander, and Charles shared around 8,800 minutes. Bragg had 1,000, then there were around 400 minutes in central midfield for a bunch of others. This season we expect Charles to leave, Bragg to get his ~2,500 minutes, leaving 1,400 minutes for the rest. Akachukwu and O'Brien-Whitmarsh have put their hand up for some of those minutes, and while I'd expect the latter has seniority and is a better fit for a more box-to-box midfield role, Akachukwu has impressed me even before today's goal.

[EssEffCee]

47 minutes ago, warsash saint said:

PLEASE PLEASE can we stop with the 'we spy when we want' chants!!  Absolute noddy song especially when the next chant is 'f**k the EFL'!!.

The new song at the very end was good though

What was the new song? I left bang on the FT whistle.

[BarberSaint]

1 hour ago, suewhistle said:

I'm afraid Lighthouse that this analysis hits the mark, and your defence of BBD, although admirable, really has little to sustain it. I don't like being negative about players either but I really don't see that he brings anything to the team

Cones.

 

On a hot day.

 

Ice cream cones.

[hypochondriac]

11 minutes ago, EssEffCee said:

What was the new song? I left bang on the FT whistle.

-4 who gives a fuck we are the saints and we're going up?

[Lighthouse]

3 hours ago, trousers said:

Given it seems unlikely that Charles was ever going to get minutes on the pitch yesterday, I assume he was taking up a place on the bench just so that he could say his goodbyes to the fans after the game...? Tonda getting soft / sentimental in his old age...?

Most likely we were sending a message to Fulham that it’s not a done deal yet and we’re still willing to put him in our squad until we get an acceptable offer.

[Starksj1995]

59 minutes ago, Lighthouse said:

Most likely we were sending a message to Fulham that it’s not a done deal yet and we’re still willing to put him in our squad until we get an acceptable offer.

Fee agreed 30M

[Noodles34]

3 hours ago, hypochondriac said:

-4 who gives a fuck we are the saints and we're going up?

Shit. Gutted to have missed that. Should have stayed. 

[warsash saint]

Anyone know if the fan that fell down the steps at the end of game is ok??

[trousers]

4 hours ago, Lighthouse said:

Most likely we were sending a message to Fulham that it’s not a done deal yet and we’re still willing to put him in our squad until we get an acceptable offer.

Yeah, a reasonable hunch 👍🏻

[Dark Munster]

7 hours ago, Sarnia Cherie said:

T S I H. Rearrange the letters. 

HITS?

[Stud mark of doom]

23 hours ago, The Kraken said:

Just reinforces how much a strong spine is vital. Changing Bazunu and Armstrong/Archer for Peretz and Stewart/Larin made the biggest differences last term.  Having a four of Downes, Charles, Jander and Bragg was a privilege. Big chance for Bragg to be more of a CM cog if Charles goes as expected.

Thank god the Bazunu experiment is over (as you say, hopefully). His disastrous spell at Stoke really only served to enforced his quite obvious flaws.

Also aligns with the change in strategy from buying players we can hopefully sell for a nice profit to buying players to form a football team 

Also a change in business guru Ted-talk bollocks to something more akin to “if something is broken, consider fixing it” 

[Sarnia Cherie]

3 hours ago, Dark Munster said:

HITS?

If only he could and into the back of the net!