Southampton (A) Post-Match Thread

[Platt Lane 59]

Last night reminded me of the Norwich away defeat. Plenty of possession and territory with too many dinked, high balls that the tall Southampton defence easily headed out.
Very few of our attacking and midfield players (exception being Phil & Kev) take a speculative, long shot. We are now the modern day Arsenal trying to score the perfect goal.
Finally, both Dave & Ferna looked knackered with 20 minutes to go. Why did Pep only use 2 subs ?
Let's hope we take our shooting boots to Wembley, as I feel Arsenal will press & defend, going against Arteta's attacking philosophy.

 

[Roachy]

Watching that back, two or three things strike me.

The Che Adams goal isn't a worldie at all. It's a well taken goal, and it was the glaringly obvious thing to do. He's got a lot of space to aim at. Ed is at fault there, being that far off his line when there's Southampton strikers lurking. But his mistake merely compounds Zin's. What was Zin thinking, trying to dribble across his man, when there's nothing behind him except a huge gap to his keeper?
The Southampton defence and keeper don't play a worldie either. They get across and block well, which is after all their job when there's that many of them in the box for most of the game. Stephens played well. McCarthy played well, but he didn't frankly have to pull off any world class saves à la Joe Hart against Dortmund and Barcelona.
We've now lost two league games out of the last three partly due to a truly horrible mistake by our left back. It makes it worse that it was two different players. Both of them are pretty useful going forward, in my opinion. But that's not enough. Anyone playing in the back four has got to be savvy in defence. Neither of them are. Angeliño is apparently not the solution. Ban or no ban, this problem has got to be addressed, along with the third reliable centre half one, in very short order. I think we can survive and even do well for one more season without dealing with the Kun problem, and even the Fern problem. But those two positions must be addressed.

Oh, one other thing. Gaby has got to do better on that initial chance from the Rodri cross. To not even get it on target is poor, and he'll know it. I believe that if he puts that in, it's a different game entirely. The team relaxes, starts playing its natural game, and tucks chances away rather than snatching at them.

Agree with most of that, apart from one point. Zinchenko was dispossessed on the halfway line. Ederson was positioned correctly at that point because he had no idea what was about to happen.

 

[citymad]

I think a big part of the problem last night (and other times) is our lack of height... How many times did we pump the ball into a very crowded box only for the defenders to head it away? Southampton could have done that all night (and did) - there is no way we should be attempting to fire crosses into a crowded box with D.Silva, B.Silva, Mahrez and Jesus in there... just won't work.

I agree, at times we needed a Dzeko last night.

 

[Akpowell]

I'm afraid that the scum would have battered them.

 

[citymad]

I'm afraid that the scum would have battered them.

Yes, both of them would've found a way through.

 

[prestonibbo_mcfc]

What does everyone think Zinchenko should have done with the hospital pass Laporte gave him?
Zinchenko had no "out" ball

Back to Eddie, was one out ball.

 

[BlueRain]

I agree, at times we needed a Dzeko last night.

A player like Dzeko would be one solution - another solution would be NOT to press teams back into their own penalty area for the majority of games, invite teams to come out and create the space(s) and then hit them... It's the one thing that has annoyed me for a lot of games this season... a football pitch is plenty big enough for 22 players but squeeze that pitch into 1/3 the size and all of sudden it's a very crowded place.

 

[dickie davies]

We need 4 maybe 5 quality players to come in during the summer and we should be fine.

Four or five, so just half a team then and a spend in the region of £250,000,000/300,000,000

 

[domalino]

A player like Dzeko would be one solution - another solution would be NOT to press teams back into their own penalty area for the majority of games, invite teams to come out and create the space(s) and then hit them... It's the one thing that has annoyed me for a lot of games this season... a football pitch is plenty big enough for 22 players but squeeze that pitch into 1/3 the size and all of sudden it's a very crowded place.

I can't believe we're 4 seasons and 8 trophies into Guardiola's tenure and people still want us to sit back.

If they did what you wanted, we would not lose 9 times, we'd have 20 0-0 draws.

 

[Blu3m00n91]

These are pretty much the same players who went on the incredible run at the end of last season. 14 games in a row to win the league and pick up the cup. Now compare that to this side we’re watching and fuck me you wouldn’t even think it’s the same team, no one has a divine right to win every game/trophies etc but the sheer drop off from last year is concerning