What a result!
I’m quite simply buzzing my proverbials off, having watched that.
We had 3 chances on target and 23% of the possession, according to the stream I watched.
And we still came away with the win.
Go figure that one.
I’ll update this shortly, but this to me, has to be close to the steal of the century.
Totally chuffed to bits!
Bill – Benteke was on straight after Kozak’s goal at 66 minutes or so. From what I could tell the weak link in the second half was Lowton in for Vlaar but I’ll need to watch the highlights a few more times(!). Can’t blame Lowton though Donacian might have been a better choice for the bench since we were playing all three of our main central defenders. Both their goals seemed to come in where Vlaar would have been. Benteke had a couple of good goes but didn’t really get hold of the ball and when he did take a touch too many and was crowded off the ball in the box he went down. Nice try but I don’t think it was fooling anyone.
The long ball hoof to Kozak/Gabby/Benteke to not win was really depressing. Whenever Saints kicked a ball long there was usually someone in the right place for the ball to be headed to, it’s as if Benteke/Gabby/Andi/Kozak need to spend a few weeks practicing bringing down long balls. Saints always had someone getting into position to receive knocked on long balls and it seemed always directly up pitch and the same distance. Maybe Guzan needs to shorten his range and get it so there are a couple more choices for Benteke or Kozak to try to head to? We’re back to using the midfield as forward defenders again. I’ve noticed that when Guzan kicks short to a defender he usually gets it back because the midfield aren’t coming to collect the ball or making themselves enough space to receive it and our man is quickly closed down so kicks back to Guzan to hoof to the front line.
Our defence has come on in leaps and bounds since last year and now they’ve been made to get this good by constant action the midfield needs more work, I think we have a pretty good strike force. El Ahmadi didn’t do much at all (why no Sylla?) apart from losing the ball, getting it back and crossing (the important word here – crossing) it in perfectly for Kozak to loom above the defenders and head it in. I’m not sure how many good crosses in I saw, maybe just that one. I really like Delph and while El Ahmadi has started to play well I’d be looking to get Sylla in more or go for two more midfielders.They’ve both had their chances, haven’t they?
I have a feeling Saints were expecting a 4-3-3 and the 5-3-2 worked really well against their rampant forward line. Everyone now knows Guzan will punt the ball long so they crowd Benteke and Kozak off the ball. Surely the next tactical surprise to pull must be to start passing the ball out and up the field? Vlaar for a start is bloody good at passing and if we can get the midfield interested then we might get Benteke more interested too. That or get Steer in for a while, his long balls in pre-season seemed to be incredibly accurate.
A couple of excellent comments overheard in the midst of a crowd of Saints fans on the way out “F**king Agbonlahor” and my favourite, “why did they have to go and ruin it with five f**king defenders”
Nice assumption foxy of the game, yes did see Lowton half hearted with his jump to the ball, and drop his head down as the ball hit the net, I said at the time to myself shit going to miss Vlaar hope its not serious, as for the fans they have always had no like to people past Newbury going north. Still had a worth while trip to st Mary, thanks foxy.
Giddy its Langford. Our mate.
Bill what do you mean mate?is langford being ooha lol?
Why the fuck would I want to be that negative prick? 🙂
Change your name for fucks sake…there is only one oohah
Oops been found out, I’m standing up.
I am so confused with the names…there seems to be 3 oohah’s now lol…will the REAL one please stand up?
Whoever this person is i for one prefer them lol.
I will NEVER be negative again 🙂
Now i know it’s not ooha for sure.
What was it 23% possession and 3 shots and we come away with 3 points in the bag? Happy Days.
You have to give Lambert credit, he got the tactics spot on last night, great goals from Gabby and Deplh and we owed then one for last season.
This site is tremendous.
An away win at a previously unbeaten side and we moan about possession stats.
Brilliant !!!
Roll on Fulham and the home banker against Man U.
I thought I was actually praising Lambert???
Did his home work let Southampton play their pretty football in the middle of the park then hit them on the break, all good in my books.
Your head still a bit fuzzy from last nights celebrating?
Wasn’t knocking your post BWS, some of the earlier ones.
Head still has that dull thud lol ! Hopefully ready for Fulham, having a few scoops in that London the Saturday night.
Fair play to you mate.
You really are seeing the best of this side travelling to the away games should imagine it was amazing down there last night, bet Saints fans were wounded (shame).
My Saints mate described our performance as dogged.
I quite like what Lambert is doing but it will take time.
If we could get clean sheets and goals we’ll all be happy (well, most on this site lol !).
Who is moaning about possession stats…..certainly not me. The best stat of all is 3 shots on goal, 3 goals and 3 points……wonderful stats
And all the negative peeps on here saying we were lucky, so what?…..WTF is wrong with being lucky?…more luck please. And the Saints won with a penalty last year when one of their players clearly dived. Revenge is sweet, very, very sweet!
Langford nothing wrong with being lucky, I’m never lucky, never will be lucky, but and a big but, Villa was f,.’-ing lucky nothing wrong with that hey. 🙂
Where’s tel j mate?not that im missing him.
Fishing
I think you’ll find Langford their manager said the penalty against us at home last season was fair as his man only went down to avoid the incoming foul. A classic bending of the truth as far as it can possibly go! Before the West Brom match we had commentators banging on about previous results and how we balance each other out on results but do you remember two or three years ago they beat us at home after Herd was sent off at the start for being fouled in the box, the decision being completely wrong and them scoring from the resulting penalty? It would be interesting to see how many matches we’ve won and how many we’ve lost due to bad refereeing. Arsenal fans say we only beat them because of bad refereeing but what about the Chelsea match a few days later? There’s a difference between being unlucky hitting the woodwork or missing the goal (like Southampton yesterday) and having a referee who gets all his decisions wrong. Two things screwed us over last night, Vlaar going off injured and us constantly giving the ball away. If we hadn’t taken our chances and scored the goals and won, and had we lost 2-0, we’d be screaming blue murder. As it happens our defence did a very good job and we played a classic counter attack game. All three goals were absolute crackers.
Bring on fulham stick it up um.utv
Up em I say giddy..
We’re going to thump Fulham, can’t wait.
7-0 to the villans no probs.utv
Just to put you in the picture Giddy Terry TJ, is in Belgium fishing with the winter league none workers, he did say that he would now and again pop in, we told him to take his time not popping in and keep fishing. I do expect him to have his say in the near future. He’s only done that so not to send out Christmas cards.
This is the headline in the Metro
“Southampton defence must learn to deal with long-ball teams after criminal result against Villans”
What a load of old bollox and excuse me but wasn’t gabby’s goal from a ball played inside the fullback? Hardly from a long hit and hope punt upfield.
Kovak’s came from a cross from the right, again hardly Wimbledon and the pièces de ré·sis·tance Delph’s screamer from 25 yards, worthy of winning any game.
If that’d have been Man U – Arsenal – Chelsea it’d have bean a wonderful display of counter attacking football.
Its OK Bill, the editor is going to specsavers, Gabby came across from right to left past 3 players to score, kozac cross off the right wing, and as you said Delf picked the ball up from box to box and a 25 yard shot. Metro is never a news paper anyway, its a free rag.
wot a change a result does lmao am I on the rite site 🙂
I agree with most posts ~ lambert employed the rite tactics ~ when we got the ball it was deep in our half , so playing keep ball was no no. we went direct which again was spot on, long nope ~ rites balls yep 🙂
great delph goal was the icing on the cake. the plan nearly went pear shaped when vlaar went off ,hope its not bad injury
time 4 my moan I want lowton playing right back /wing back not bacuna he shown enough 2 warrant a midfield slot /wing role defending isn’t his game hes quick but always out of position, he seemed 2 get dragged narrow leaving loads of space which wasn’t exploited thank god
Any update on vlaars injury?as we know he’s not a quick healer.