Southampton Banter

29 Jan 2026 07:39:08
{Ed's Note - thefutureisoldgold3 has posted a new article entitled, Planning for the Championship: Wolves' Financial Rebuild

25 Jan 2026 14:04:01
Too many wayward passes
Too many loose tackles
Gave Pompey way too much space
Sat too deep
Game plan? Not sure there was one
Very, very disjointed football .
Aziz playing too deep .
Poor football

25 Jan 2026 18:21:58
You can't really judge a derby game.

Derbies are like the Mike Tyson quote of getting punched in the face when trying to stick to a plan.

Fans and pressure will always be on the players back so all in all, considering we nearly won that game I'd take a point.

What's more worrying are the results/performances prior to this game and the likelihood of them continuing.


No point sacking Tonda regardless because they haven't/won't have put any thought of who to bring in to replace him.

I say keep him in the job till summer now and spend all this time carrying on with the search for the replacement they should have bought in to replace Still.

.or do what I said and bring back Still to see out the summer and see if things turnaround for him.

25 Jan 2026 21:33:32
Lesleee, just when I think you’re making sense you revert to this totally illogical obsession about Still.

The boy was totally out of his depth.

And yes you can judge players in derby games. Have they got the bottle to fight a good fight - do they know what it really means to wear the shirt?

I watched the game from a hotel bar in Rio de Janeiro before visiting Christ the Redeemer which overlooks the home of football - the Maracanna Stadium (rather than St Mary’s) .

Trouble is distance doesn’t dampen the disappointment (as St John will testify! )

26 Jan 2026 01:28:52
Millertime!
S
I agree totally …
Technically we might be a good ish bunch of players, but as a team we are playing disjointed, almost amateurish football. I saw more misplaced passes in one game than you’d expect to see all season. As for hoofing it out of defence? A tactic I last heard from my sports master when I was 6!
For some reason we have broken up the interplay, the triangles. aziz and Armstrong worked well together. It made AA a much better player than he is! Aziz was scoring for fun. scienza was the other part of the triangle and it was causing havoc. I now see now interplay between these, except for the pass that put scienza through.
the core tactics of the team have changed dramatically.
And as for Stephens marauding up the pitch? What
He is not even a great defender let alone an attacking one! Meanwhile fellows sits on the bench.

We were passing, not to players in great positions, but players in dangerous positions. Not in dangerous attacking positions but in defence!

Yes I know we put a few good tackles in, some stupid! But wow wee, was this the highlight of the game? No it’s shouldn’t have been .

As for hoofing the ball around like a local pub team, awful!

Stewart came on a spent most of the game is some bizarre attacking midfield position, or even out wide.

Whatever sport I ever competed in, there was one golden rule. When you are playing an inferior opponent, don’t reduce your game to their standard!
Well we certainly tried to. and to be fair to Pompey they had much more of a game plan than we did, they also had overlapping players, players out wide, off the ball runners . meanwhile we are playing some clueless football!

26 Jan 2026 08:17:00
Hey Millertime trust you had a great time. on Copacobana Beach whiich didn’t detract you from your primary secret undercover mission of identifying about ten quality players and send their details to St.Mary’s for a follow up!

26 Jan 2026 12:01:27
Didn’t he do the same with Martin. The obsession (in order) seems to be the managerial bounce, Will Still and Martin.

26 Jan 2026 15:24:57
It’s funny you say that St John because as I strolled along Copacabana Beach, I marvelled at the locals (boys and girls) playing beach volleyball using their feet and heads only. Incredible first touch and spatial awareness. I thought no wonder they are technically brilliant footballers.

It seems a long time since the “it’s just like watching Brazil” charts from the terraces!

28 Jan 2026 05:11:36
In hindsight what a chaotic glaring mistake not selecting Michael Carrick when the open opportunity presented. Apperently he has sorted out Man Utd. Players toxic dressing room (similar to Saints) witthin days of his arrival.I doubt he would re-consider Saints position at seasons end should he not be retained by United. With regards to transfers I have a gut feeling that should Armstrong move along SFC may for young Chelsea C/F (recently brought back from loan at Strasbourg FC) Kendry Pa’ez.Russian A/M Aleksey Batrako also look a promising player if he should be released this window, plus a couple of quality C/D and a competent left back and we’re in business with a goalkeeping review at season’s end.

23 Jan 2026 07:39:08
{Ed's Note - Ed001 has posted a new article entitled, Matchday 22 - Quick Round Up

21 Jan 2026 07:39:08
{Ed's Note - MK Scouser has posted a new article entitled, Liverpool's Pre-Season Concerns Overblown Despite World Cup Disruption

19 Jan 2026 21:58:52
I have been away for a while. Somehow we went from top table form playing fast, attacking football to rugby passes and Sheff Wed form.

What happened? Told to change style? Players got complacent, opposition figured us out?

Or all of above!

20 Jan 2026 21:36:36
Whatever happened between Still getting sacked and Eckert getting appointed full time is long gone. Which is so bizarre given nothing has changed in theory. Think we were one point off the play-offs. Now we’re five above the bottom three!

21 Jan 2026 13:12:25
I've said it before, I'll say it now and I'm sure I'll say it again.

Managerial bounce.

🦘〰️

21 Jan 2026 16:26:22
EVERYONE FROM SAINTS BOARD hasn't GOT A CLUE OF WHAT THEY ARE DOING. CHEAP AND USELESS IS NOT THE ANSWER. WE NEED A MANAGER THAT KNOWS EXACTLY WHAT HE IS DOING. JUST LOOK AT THE LAST LOT OF APPOINTMENTS, THEY ARE ALREADY WELL GONE. GOOD NEWS FOR US, BUT FOR GODS SAKE PUT SOMEONE WHO WILL SORT THINGS OUT. WITH OUR PLAYERS WE SHOULD BE RIGHT UP THERE.

22 Jan 2026 13:42:12
No need to shout!

23 Jan 2026 06:22:55
I am genuinely confused what caused the huge decline.

Of course some players motivation will drop after a new manager is in and teams will set up better against us but why stop the fast attacking football that was working?

Did somebody at the top say we want possession Football back?

It's old school but can we just try 4 4 2 with Wellington, Bree, Charles, Leo, Fellows, Azaz, Archer/Arma and Stewart.

Panic defences knowing Leo or Tom can cut in and shoot, thread a through ball to the top striker in the div or cross to big Ross.

Some speed and unpredictability. At least lose in style!

23 Jan 2026 12:15:55
“At least lose in style” - quote of the New Year and a measure of how low our expectations have dropped.

Whatever shape/formation it cannot include Downes or Stephens. Downes has become more and more regressive with each passing week. And Stephens needs to be put out to pasture.

If the unthinkable happens and we get thumped by the mob down the road on Sunday, then I think that will be Tonda’s hopping pot.

For me, that makes Sunday a win win scenario.

24 Jan 2026 16:22:36
It is where we are!

With our large squad we should have gained places over winter not lose them.

Nervous for tomorrow. In a weird way 0-0 is the worst result. If lose Tonda might go. If win maybe it will give a needed boost.

19 Jan 2026 07:39:10
{Ed's Note - Shappy has posted a new article entitled, Manchester United's Dominance Over City Offers Hope

17 Jan 2026 20:10:44
Eckert `We did enough to win the game`

Totally deluded.

We actually didn`t Tonda - they scored 2 clinical goals. We didn`t.

They played fast counter attacking football. We played ponderous sideways and backwards russball.

Just can`t see how we get out of this downward spiral.

17 Jan 2026 20:50:32
Solution is get rid of all ideology around it. Anyone who had that indoctrinated into them needs to go. All players, all coaches, chefs, coach drivers. And start again.

Football isn’t a hard game. We just like making it incredibly difficult. All United really did today was defend in a solid shape, press at the right times and counter attack clinically. When you do that against a team passing it around and not creating good chances, you will only lose if you make a bad error. They didn’t, Hull didn’t.

What’s really worrying is the years and years of people within the club saying ‘we did enough to win the game’, ‘we were the better side’, ‘we were unlucky’, ‘we just need to take our chances’. We’ve been told that for the best part of five years and know it’s absolute bulls**t.

We’ve haven’t been doing the basics right for a long time. Buying journeymen hasn’t done it, buying expensive primadonnas hasn’t done it, the best bet is to focus on the academy again and grow kids into what we want as Ralph was trying to do.

Fed up. Upset. Less than a decade ago we beat Inter Milan and were in a cup final. So sad.

17 Jan 2026 17:22:38
It doesn't not matter which manager it is, suicidal back passes, consistently poor man marking, atrocious tracking of a player, very poor positional play, poor reading of a game. are unforgivable for professional footballers.

Week in week out I see players with all these qualities. poor qualities .

It's a joke!