What an awful performance. Totally bereft of tactics, heart or skill from a team that is clearly just going through the motions. The defending was atrocious, hardly a tackle made by the midfield and the forwards barely did a thing all game. But enough about Leicester, Saints did pretty well today.
Couple things: it's a big risk to leave replacing Fonte until summer when we might need to replace VVD, as well. Second, our season certainly isn't over financially...every position from 8th - 15th or thereabouts is a possibility, and the difference between the two in revenues is more than it'd cost to replace Fonte. Not that any one player is worth seven places in the league, but a good CB (and striker) could put a pretty significant down payment on their transfer fee over the remaining 16 matches.
Just watched it on Sky, it was a forward pass but the technology seems to indicate Maya was in line but not off side, we woz robbed, good job it didn't matter.
It is indeed irrelevant: A player is in an offside position if: any part of the head, body or feet is in the opponents’ half (excluding the halfway line) and any part of the head, body or feet is nearer to the opponents’ goal line than both the ball and the second-last opponent The hands and arms of all players, including the goalkeepers, are not considered." From: http://www.thefa.com/football-rules-governance/lawsandrules/laws/football-11-11/law-11---offside Vin
My preference, when he's on the pitch, would be for JWP to always take the penalties (not that we get many!). Tadic did well this time but he doesn't strike the ball as well. I also like the aggression he shows when he plays. Aggression but without the indicipline. Add in his usually reliable dead ball delivery and I am never disappointed to see him on the pitch. He doesn't always play as well as he did today but then he doesn't get many opportunities.
Although I mocked people at the suggestion of relegation, if VVD is injured for the rest of the season (purely speculative) we could be fighting to stay up. Yoshida, Stephens and Gardos is not a premier league quality line up.
I have sympathy with that view. I don't see the season as over...as we are in two cups,,,,but we are not in such a dangerous position that it is worth risking an expensive mistake in buying the wrong player. The right player being available changes the situation. A loan perhaps...safety in numbers....but it could be a chance to give Stephens and Gardos a chance.
https://southamptonfc.com/news/2017-01-23/90-in-90-southampton-leicester-city-premier-league https://southamptonfc.com/news/2017-01-22/gallery-southampton-3-0-leicester-city-premier-league
Interesting piece from Danny Murphy regarding our old friend, the Diamond. http://m.bbc.com/sport/football/38713714
That was a marked improvement yesterday. I am usually not a fan of JWP but I felt be was superb, not only because of the very well struck goa, but also because his crosses seemed to carry more threat. He was one amongst a handful of standouts with Yoshida having a very good game. Soares also impressed me and Tadic had flashes where he reduced to his former self. Shame that Redmond's finishing is lackluster and I can't say that Hjobjorg impresses that much. The Dane makes too many mistakes which tend to distract from some of his better passing. This was the best performance I have seen for a long, long while. Leicester looked woeful and were lucky that we took our foot off the gas between the second and third goals as there were moments when we threatened to run them ragged. I was quite impressed with Gray amongst the opposition players.
Leicester's next 4 games: Burnley (A) Man Utd (H) Swansea (A) Liverpool (H) After that it's March and just 12 games to go. Could be interesting.
Interesting that you were impressed by Gray, who runs down the channels, cuts inside, but then blazes wide or over. We have a similar player but his finishing is lacklustre it seems. Actually, he is young and so I will cut him some slack. And I will also do the same for Gray. Both show great promise.
I think we need to buy a CB now, however I'd like to understand where you get your assessment of Gardos from? I'm a ST holder and so seen his games for us and I've been unable to make that assessment due to lack of playing time. I can accept that it would be a gamble due to fitness, but why would a fan assess him as not good enough for the PL? We don't know. He may not be but the games he did play, he played well, with the exception of a league cup quarter final in Sheffield. I'd offer United away to off-set that one.
I agree with some of that Ian. I thought Pierre was very good if you forgot his finishing. Gray didn't impress me much. Nice that you can come on here and post when things have gone well. It helps bring you into this community.
Look at how long it is taking Rodriguez to get back to his best after over a year out with injury. Gardos has been out even longer and even if, at his best, he is a capable premier league defender, I really doubt we will see him at his best for some time. Certainly not in this season. That is if he ever actually recovers from the injury. All too risky for me.
Saw that on MOTD and found it interesting. Our players were talking about how hard it was to make the diamond work and they put in a lot of training....would always be difficult to suddenly switch to it. Ranieri admitted it was his fault to introduce it.