10 Feb 2014 21:48:07
Apparently Poch is already planning for next season, he said this when he rubbished reports linking him to Real Madrid, saying that the rumour flatters our play and shows we're heading in the right direction, let's hope he gets and signs a new contract soon!
Poch wants out. Why else would he deny us a cup run?
Poch did say last week that Europa league would kill us, maybe that's why he put out a weaker side. I don't think he wants out.
Tonythesaint
Shambolic performance could have been 90 mins from Wembley and drawn one of the championship sides if that's not an incentive I don't know what is, abysmal
I think Poch throwing the cup is a sign he wants to stay. I mean if he wanted to leave he would have aimed for cup glory so he could go out on a high; at the cost of leaving us in trouble for next season with the ton of additional games we would have to play in the Europa (which he has said he would not want to lead us into, he wants Champions League at Southampton).
Instead what he has done is sacrifice the cup this year allowing the team to not face the Europa League next season (which would be especially draining to a team following a world cup which means less of a summer break). This looks to me to be a sign of more long term plans on his mind and hence I think Pochettino will be staying into next season at the very least.
The team didn't perform. The manager can only do so much, but he can't play the game himself.
Poor performance all round, and generally very sloppy.
I understand that people who went (me included but I live in West Yorkshire so 200 mile round trip for me rather than 600 from home ) are disappointed and it was a poor performance in the sense that we did not look like we wanted to be at the stadium of light.
Poch has stated that he does want the europa league, so has Brendan Rodgers at Liverpool who now with spurs beginning their late week travels again this week leave liverpool with a real opportunity over the next half a dozen games to seal that fourth or third place.
can we blame them? What was a great european competition has been turned into a champions league B movie with the prospect of away games on a thursday evening being followed with the league game on a sunday. Looked what it almost did to Swansea.
We currently do not have a squad that is deep enough to cope with the amount of fixtures that we may need to play if we finish high enough to qualify.
This also applies I think it fair to say with Liverpool as well and Everton and of course Newcastle whose form when they were in the competition had then in the bottom three at one stage.
The poster above may be right in thinking that these are strategic decisions by poch who I assume will have support from within the club to have gone away on Saturday and played like that.
He is we hope preparing for next season and understands that the europa can undo a lot of hard work that has been undertaken over the course of this season.
I do not like it or support what we have done but there it is welcome to the modern game. I was at the dell in 73 as a schoolboy in the rain too watch us thrash Victoria Setubal. I have the programme somewhere I am sure. It was straight cup knockout then and if memory is right they thrashed us by a bigger margin in the return in Portugal.
Last time saints in europe? Under Strachen, lovely warm evening at St Mary's, Steaua Bucuresti ( Romainian spelling before anyone posts that I have spelt it wrong) they played us off the park. Maybe we should give europe a miss just now?
I think the Fairs Cup game you were on about is Vitoria Guimaraes which was 1969-70. The scores were Saints 5, Vitoria Guimaraes 1 and Vitoria Guimaraes 3, Saints 3. I was too young to go to that game but my brother said when Setubal made it 3-1 at the Dell [6-4 on aggregate] the scorer went mental and did about two laps of the pitch like he'd won the Fairs Cup!
The other one around this time was the UEFA cup in 1971-72 and this time Saints went out to Athletic Bilbao after beating them 2-1 at home they lost 2-0 away.
The one I went to was Anderlecht which was 1976-77 Cup Winners Cup, Saints lost the first leg 2-0, were 2-0 up at the Dell then Jim Steele tried to back-heel the ball on the edge of the penalty area and 'bang' 2-1 and out. Anderlecht won the CWC that year too.
On the MoPo note I have a sneaking suspicion that he won't like the new approach to the way the club is going to be run and will use it as an excuse to leave in the close season.
Also anyone know why there are currently about six vacancies advertised on the Saints website? Has there been a sudden exodus?
Yes you are right and I was wrong it was VG and not VS and it was 69 /70.
I was nine and again I seem to remember the rain hammered down throughout the match.
Sadly my programme has gone but I have found a complete set of players autographs for the squad of 69/70 which I had completely forgotten I had. Paine, Davies and Channon, Hugh Fisher has the neatest handwriting and Bobby Stokes would be the worst by a mile.
Ha! You're about the same age as me then. My first game was 1970 [I was eight] my brother took me to see Leeds United at the Dell on Mick Jones birthday, he scored two goals and Saints lost 3-0. My brother was always amused that the crowd was recorded as 30, 001.
It's a risk turning this into a memory-lane-fest but I reckon if you've been going as long as me you'll be as jaded and cynical as me. You should have seen it all before!