Southampton (A) | Pre-Match Thread

[DMA's]

I've been thinking that too. His stock is rising, doing a very good job.

Surprised Dortmund aren’t after him personally

 

[Withnail]

Going to be a difficult game without a doubt. I hope the Saints come out to play, but I suspect they will be cautious and try and hit us on the counter. We really need to win this game, a draw will not suffice.

Ederson
Walker Dias Stones Cancelo
Bernardo Gundogan Kdb
Torres Aguero Foden

 

[SamBlue]

Going to be a difficult game without a doubt. I hope the Saints come out to play, but I suspect they will be cautious and try and hit us on the counter. We really need to win this game, a draw will not suffice.

Ederson
Walker Dias Stones Cancelo
Bernardo Gundogan Kdb
Torres Aguero Foden

That's terrible formation and pick of players mate....seriously! To start with, Aguero doesn't look as a starter and Bernardo....again, seriously?

 

[Damanino]

They are much better than last year.

24 points in 13 games is huge for them, last year they were on 9 points and 19th place after 13 rounds.
(11-29 goal diff., now they have 25-18, huge change in attacking/scoring).

We are on 20 from 12 games, last year we were on 25 after same number of games, but fixture to fixture we are -7 points down actually.

Also Soton-City fixture was a 1-0 Soton win in July, with the usual stats:
73% possession for us
26-8 shots to us
6-4 on target only for us
13-2 corners for us
1 goal for them, 0 for us.

 

[r.soleofsalford]

Ederson
Walker
Dias
Stones
Cancelo
Bernardo
Kev
Gundogan
Jesus
Torres
Foden

 

[chaddblue]

For a start... the petty stubbornness has to stop.. get Laporte back in the team

FFS.. apparently we didn’t win the league cos he was out last season and now for some unknown reason he can’t get in

also Bernardo needs to be given a chance and a run so he can build up his form and confidence

 

[Withnail]

That's terrible formation and pick of players mate....seriously! To start with, Aguero doesn't look as a starter and Bernardo....seriously?

Aguero needs game time and I would give him 45 mins and see how he gets on. Bernardo I am still hoping he can rekindle some form and we need some energy in midfield

 

[ctid83]

Think saints will have to much for us
Be good to try and keep a clean sheet though

 

[wolviedinho]

I can see us win this 1-2. At some point we might turn the corner and resemble a pep team. The players might not be good enough but our manager is one of the best.

 

[SamBlue]

Aguero needs game time and I would give him 45 mins and see how he gets on. Bernardo I am still hoping he can rekindle some form and we need some energy in midfield

We need players and the formation to start scoring goals and not to get a certain player back to form. Hopefully Aguero can get some 20-30 minutes at the end in some of easier games, if there any like that. Bernardo...he doesn't deserve to be in 16, he's been horrible for 18 months now.
I would really like him abandoning 4-3-3 with a false 9, it just doesn't work. The more he stretches the pitch, the more other teams play compact defence and we end up bombing all those futile semi-long box to nobody. I would like to see him going back to 4-1-4-1 with Raheem at the top and Jesus and Foden just behind and then Gundo and KdB behind them. And then we depend more on one of our CBs coming out with some through balls, Otamendi was excellent in our first title winning season under Pep, Laporte as well. One of those blokes sitting behind Pep need to tell him stretching the pitch doesn't work any more.