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Reply | So Russell martin Does Have A Plan B
at 12:00 20 May 2024
So those of us advocating a change to something like he used v WBA have now understood all season how to avoid some of the issues his favoured 4-3-3 system created for this group of players, but when he changes, literally in the Last Chance Saloon, he's a "tactical genius".
Total puff piece without a hint of remorse. |
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Reply | Looks as if Adams is on his way out to Wolves
at 09:43 17 May 2024
Don't have an issue with Adams seeking a better quality of football - I think he'll do well if his head and his heart are aligned.
I say however that we beat WBA, then Leeds and buy Piroe or another of the Leeds forwards. |
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Thread | Lalana to Saints?
at 09:41 17 May 2024
Did I read the BBC right in that he is interested in playing one last season for us? |
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Reply | VAR Yes or No?
at 09:39 17 May 2024
There is a balance between accuracy of decisions and the spirit and passion the game should generate.
Goal line tech = yes, keep it.
For me however the delays, controversies, hairline decisions, etc are all robbing the game of the energy and passion the fans want and feed on and having a small percentage of more accurate decisions is not worth it.
I also hate seeing players throw themselves down in the box and then making the square sign to the ref asking for VAR. That should be a yellow card. |
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Reply | Three teams that got promoted are straight back down
at 11:27 13 May 2024
If we think that there is no point in chasing promotion to a league which is assumed to be too good for us, why bother playing at all?
The logical conclusion to your point is that clubs like ours should abandon ambition and the better financial rewards of the higher league and instead be content where we are.
The only way that owners and investors would be continue to be attracted to the like of Saints, if it were accepted that the PL was forever barred to us, would be a radical shake up of the leagues and their money making system. Very, very few owners are content to support clubs because they have a passion for football or the club. they are in this for the return in investment.
Some of the ideas for a radical shake up make sense. Regional leagues with salary caps for instance. Would get the vote of the eco warrior class. Matches televised every day. Would get the vote of the couch potato class. A European super league for the "top" clubs with perhaps four teams demoted each season - promoting a play off system domestically. Would get the vote of ?
However to suggest that owners etc will never get to the PL where for the moment the riches lie, would see a mass exodus in the "lower" leagues of the necessary investment. |
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Reply | Details of Stadium changes & fan parks!
at 16:32 7 May 2024
And this has nailed the whole purpose.
The club wants fans to get there early, buy their overpriced and undervalue drinks and food and now stay longer after the match and spend yet more money.
Not for me - nor I suspect many others.
If block 29/30 is going to be under siege from away fans during and after a match, why would I want to stay?
If I want decent food and drink in Southampton, there are dozens of places I'd go in preference to SMS.
The club however wants to make 90 minutes of dull and boring football the centrepiece of a "matchday experience".
Well good luck with that. |
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Reply | Russell Martin Lays Out Play Off's Strategy For Ross Stewart
at 14:52 7 May 2024
I find it very hard to criticise Adams and AA when by any measure of Championship statistics, they are more or less where we finished in the league.
The "what if" game is in the realms of fantasy football.
What if we had discovered in our junior teams somebody like Bale, Walcott, Bridge who came into the first team and scored 12 goals?
What if we had found a perfect keeper busking on the street corner and recruited him?
What of, we had found a manager who player to the strengths of the team and not forced them to play in a system unsuited to this league?
(OK - I'll give you the last one). |
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Reply | I've tried, but I can't accept it
at 14:46 7 May 2024
Good afternoon Mr SaintNick
The key point I wanted to emphasis but was perhaps lost is that RMs latest statements seem to be directed, not at bolstering the confidence of the team and giving them good vibes ahead of games coming up but rather defending himself and his methods. IN other words he seems to be getting his retaliation in first.
Further, football players are by and large not the most articulate of people and nuances in messaging will often be lost or misinterpreted. They will take a literal meaning over a metaphor any day.
If RM is saying things in a more direct manner to his players but trying to paint a picture for the owners and the media that is different, this is dangerous ground. He risks building a false edifice which - should it crash and burn - will destroy his, and our club's, integrity.
It's also very unsettling for him to be claiming credit for something that at the end of the day is in his job description. |
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Reply | Details of Stadium changes & fan parks!
at 10:32 7 May 2024
For me this plan is a disaster.
I'm a Kingsland boy and having the away fans next to me is not welcome.
I also come in through the industrial estate (along with thousands of others) and if that route is not available, it means a detour.
(Presumably the bus from the station will also have to go elsewhere now?)
My typical match day experience is to arrive 15 minutes before the game, get in, get to my seat, stifle my frustration at our boring tactics, spend 20 minutes getting out of the stadium at the end, walk to the station in 25 minutes. and hopefully get the 5:30 or 5:40 train. This plan will put an end to that. |
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Thread | I've tried, but I can't accept it
at 10:23 7 May 2024
The latest statement from RM is something I should ignore and move on from - but I can't.
He seems to be saying that he should have credit for keeping together a team when "two thirds" of the squad wanted to leave and that getting to the playoffs was all along the master plan.
I'm calling BS on that.
A first team squad is what, 20 players, 22? Saying that 12 to 14 wanted to leave is literally unbelievable.
We know that JWP and a couple of others (Tino, Tella etc) were sold because the club needed the money, Did they express a desire to leave?
We know that some were not wanted (Tall Paul, etc)
We know that some clearly wanted away but I doubt that was more than a handful.
A better measure might have been to ask the squad after the run of four defeats early in the season, who wanted away?
I just don't buy the statement and I see it as RM trying to buy compliments.
Then to suggest that a play off place was his "plan"?!
With arguably one of the best three squads in the league and his "system", to suggest that he had met his target is either delusional or he's seeking to weight his annual appraisal.
To suggest that a play off place is "success" screams a lack of ambition and perhaps (dare we whisper it) a lack of belief in his own system.
I really hope that we win the lottery/playoff and get to the PL> If so, I hope the owners have a good hard look at the managerial set up and alongside some investment in the team, consider improving it.
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Reply | Desperate Tories - or tactical masterstroke?
at 16:50 1 May 2024
Genuine question.
If we get a boatload of immigrants with no permission arriving from France, why can we not take them back on the next ferry and drop them back in Calais? |
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Thread | My invite to a season ticket in the Northam
at 16:42 1 May 2024
Has just arrived.
Standing - at my age - no thanks.
So my reward for having bought tickets in the Kingsland this season is an increase of 10-15% in prices; being next to the away fans; having to go a long way around the ground to reach turnstile F.
I fear that the disaster I saw against Stoke will be the last game I will see at SMS.
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Reply | The case for sticking with Russell Martin
at 15:15 1 May 2024
Most managers have studied the game for years and have a plan, a system that they believe is effective. The very best coaches in the UK and Europe have gravitated to teams with pretty much unlimited funds to buy players. The result is that the quality of players can (and does) mask a number of flaws in their preferred systems. Those flaws are most often exposed when they need to chase a game from a losing position. When their game needs urgency and a degree of reckless attacking, we see the problems of trying to change the mindset of players who have been told for months to keep the ball.
Teams of lower quality need to have much simpler systems to play because individual players will make errors or fail to follow the plan. In these situations, the manager needs to find a compromise between possession based tactics requiring technically good players and pacey football. By pacey I mean get it forward quickly to speed merchants or play one touch football or try to achieve overloads in certain areas of the pitch.
In my view RM has strayed too far towards possession which he sees the better PL and European clubs use well because they have better players.
Leicester and Leeds and especially Ipswich (all finished above us) have a better blend of slow, slow, quick, quick, slow. Leicester because they have quality. Leeds because they has passion and drive. Ipswich because a lot of their players were in L1 last season and don't know any other way (and a very rich sponsor).
We may be the best of the rest in the Champ, we've all seen that possession and slow football is not enough to get promoted except in the lottery of the playoff.
This is something that RM could have fixed before Christmas - and chose not to. This is why I think he's a few percent short of what we need.
I'm not calling for his head but equally I'll not be overjoyed if he stays because I can't see him changing his views and playing to the strengths of the squad and the requirements of this league rather than his own "vision". |
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Reply | Should Russell Martin Put Out Another Reserve Side For Leeds United Trip
at 09:20 1 May 2024
He should be looking at his fit players, deciding his first 11 and then think about how many he can leave out rather than risk injuring.
It's also a case that some players will want to play because they need to be involved and others welcome the rest and do not think that their form will suffer if they do. Only RM can do that.
The above though means he needs to know his preferred starting 11 in the play offs - and I don't think he does. |
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Reply | 5 Things From Saturday
at 10:01 30 Apr 2024
I'm sorry Mr StMichael but you are offside here.
I've never met Mr Nick but simply giving us the opportunity to comment and complain and praise is not "influence".
I'm not a user of social media but I suspect that there are forums (Facebook, Telegram, Twitter) where many fans vent their feelings and as such picking on this forum, which you have to be a member of to comment, is a little unfair. To then suggest that the facilitator is more to blame than others here who are no fans of RM, doubles down on that.
I do not like the way RM chooses to play. Whatever happens in the next month or so, I hope that next season if he is still with us, he looks hard at the weaknesses in his system and how a good side will exploit them and makes changes. That might be personnel or shape/tactics but something has to change.
Threads elsewhere are correct in that at the very top level, the game is about money. The owners of the top 6 (7?) care little except for dividends or in the case of the Middle Eastern owned clubs, reflected glory and prestige. That sort of mentality is filtering down the leagues and SR are a good example of wannabe's to that exclusive club.
Picking RM as manager was a move calculated to advance up that greasy pole.
And if the fans don't like the way we play, the overbearing ego of the manager, the changing of the away end in what can be described as a moment of madness, then tough on the fans.
To say that the criticism of the manager and all other aspects as above is out of line. |
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Reply | Southampton Should Not Fear Anyone In The Play Offs.
at 16:53 29 Apr 2024
RM will not change the way we play.
The players (based on last Saturday) are either not good enough to play it, have lost faith in it (and perhaps RM?), have seen Leeds, Ipswich and others counter it easily.
We therefore have to hope that RM can motivate the team to get back to pass and move whilst learning something from the games we've lost this season.
I think that is a vain hope and we will see more of the same.
If I were a supporter of Ipswich, Leeds, WBA, Norwich or Hull, I'd be wanting to meet us early doors before taking on real opposition in the final. |
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Reply | Premier League to introduce spending cap
at 16:48 29 Apr 2024
It'll be ignored by those funded from the Middle East because they have the view that "our" rules should not apply and because they have money, they can do what they like.
There will be so many exceptions and exemptions that it will be meaningless. |
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