Southampton Banter Archive October 22 2013

22 Oct 2013 20:12:51
who agrees that lovren is probably our best player

You could make a case for
Rickie
Spiderman
Artur
Adam
Luke
Dejan
thats what's special
they have all been fantastic and I hope that by the end of the season Osvaldo will be top of the list.

Player of the season so far is Artur followed by Dejan

But watch out for Nath Adam and Luke to make the England squad

Personally I would say that Adam Lallana has been the stand-out performer this season. Last year I feel that Lallana was a little disappointing, but he seems to really have the bit between his teeth in every game. If he carries on this way, he will make it very hard for Roy to not pick him for En-ger-land.

As for Lovren, it isn't just that he's a quality player, but he is a leader. He has taken control of the defence, and has had a huge impact upon our defence, along with many hours coaching from MoPo and his team.

Jose Fonte has also showed a huge improvement this year, and as for Boruc, in him we have a world class keeper.

In all honesty, it would probably be a lot easier to pick the worst player, or player who has disappointed the most. I'm guessing most people would pick Gaston since he isn't in the team, and perhaps Osvaldo, since we've not seen too much from him so far. Still it's early days, but we do need to work on attacking link-up play to get more out of him.

What I am finding so exciting is around half a season ago we had what appeared the worst defence in the PL, now we have what appears to one of the best defences in EUROPEAN football!
Not a huge change in players but a great deal of hard work.

Looking at the squad we have goals a plenty from all positions, and whilst we have yet to show that in 4-0 wins, or similar, I am confident MP will develop that as well over the coming months.

I really can't see a team in the Premiership this season that Saints can not beat so let's just hope the players have the same confidence!

Saint Martin

I did suggest 6th for this season-I am starting to think I have been a little pessimistic.

Best player is one of:

Lovren
Schneiderlin
Lallana
Boruc

All very different though so hard to say.

Dont think Morgan has been his usual self (not bad but not as good as he was last season) Shaw has been decent but not outstanding. Rickie hasn't been himself lately. So personally I would say Artur, Dejan and Adam would be my choices!

Morgans hard work goes some what un-noticed at times, but he has put in some match winning tackles and interceptions. Take him out the team and I think you would see a massive diffrence.
He would be the hardest Saints player to replace and the reason he does not stand out so much this year is because there are more players playing well in the team.

22 Oct 2013 15:20:58
Just over a month ago, on the 19th of September, I posted that I thought Saints didn't look likely to concede any goals, and was basically told by a few posters I didn't know what I was talking about.

Well guess what? Since then we've played 5 games and only conceded one goal - away at Man Utd.

It was great to hear the chat on MNF where Gary Neville referred to Saints as having the best defense in the Premier league by a mile, and likened the quality of defense to the likes of the AC Milan side of the 80's.

It's all tremendously exciting stuff, but we are going to drop points at home to sides that come to sit deep, defend, and try to hit us on the counter.
I'm sure that Nicola, and MoPo will be strengthening again, bringing in more attacking talent to help brake these sides down. In the meantime we as fans need to be a little bit realistic, keep our feet on the ground, and be patient when we struggle to beat these sides. After all, it's not so long ago that we were on the verge of going out of business all together. Above all, Thank you St Markus.

Quite agree St Christopher. I believe NC/MP were looking for at least one more player in the summer who could unlock stubborn defences at St. Marys but it is not easy to attract top players to clubs without European football and maybe going to suffer second season syndrome. This is why I am hopeful Saints can stay in the top six through into the New Year because then I think we will see that extra ingredient added. I am not writing off Gaston in that regard but he is obviously having problems coping with the Premiership on top of constant travelling backwards and forwards to S. America.

Saint Martin

You don't hear Cavani or Suarez complaining about playing for Uruguay, and they don't sit on the bench when they get there, then they come back and score goals.
Big Vic has done more travelling than Gaston recently - this is not a valid reason for poor form and if it is he should stop playing for Uruguay until he can cope with it for the sake of his own game. Catch up and stop thinking of him like some sort of princess - MoPo clearly has already.
I'd rather have Puncheon in the team and he's out on a free, and MoPo would rather have Guly in the team FFS - and so would I!

Can't understand your point re poor form. Gaston has hardly featured this season so form can't be judged.

MP is playing a particular brand of football which requires extreme fitness and to get this players need to be training twice a day. The Saints squad is but Gaston is not able to much of the time, and was not exactly a Duracell Bunny when he joined. Can MP get Gaston to the fitness level needed? I suspect he is working on it and we will see what success he has.

Can't see where you are coming from re Jason, he is a completely different type of player and is hardly likely to be an answer to teams parking the bus, whereas I do believe Gaston has the potential to do so.

Saint Martin

To Saint Martin, So are you saying that the only reason that Gaston can't even get on the bench is his fitness? Is he not even up to joining in to help move that bus for the last 30 minutes? As it would appear that Guly's beaten him to that job now, I would also follow that up with saying that I do think Punch worked well as an impact sub to break other teams down.

Gaston, I agree has the potential to break down other teams, but with a strong emphasis on the word "potential".
No one can say the guy does not have potential - that is why this situation is so frustrating he has loads of it.

To say that Gastons form can't be judged is not strictly true either because that's part of MoPo's job and if the guy was in form he would get on the bench at least, wouldn't he?

I just don't totaly buy into this blaming it on playing for Uruguay fitness BS thing, then turning up a fortnight late for pre-season because he needed a holiday. Then not being fit enough to play beause he missed that fortnight of pre-season. Then not being fit enough to play because he has been away with Uruguay again - like he's the only princess in town?

If its true what you say that "Gaston is not able to do the double training sessions much of the time" and if he is not injured then ship him out to whoever wants him, at some point you have to think about doing a Forren on him.

If he comes out and says he will work his socks off for Saints (like Morgan did) and is commited to his future here and working his way back into the team (like Steve Davis did) or that he loves playing for Southampton and is not looking to move (like Osvaldo did) then I would give him a bit more time, but
letting his agent (who works for him) talk to the press about wanting to move on because he is not in the team is just pure lame.

In short he has loads of potential but if as you say he is not fit enough to do the job he is being asked to do then as a professional athlete there is no place for him to hide. How long should we wait for him to get fit, his contract is only four years so at the end of next season his agent will be on overtime again.
If we stick with him I truly hope it pays off big style but right now I don't think it will.