Cardiff 2 Saints 1
By: Mike |
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You can change the players, you can change the manager but some things never change for Saints. We always start the season badly, we always let in late goals and we always concede from set pieces. Against Cardiff we managed to achieve all three despite a spirited performance which was full of effort, if not quality. That could in part be put down to the poor conditions but the fact is that we’ll need to grind out points home and away if we want to spend the season looking to the play-offs instead of the relegation zone.
Michael Svensson was back and if he can return to even 70% of the player he once was it will be a huge boost. He’s a natural leader in defence that Saints have missed so badly in his absence and given the lack of able competition at the back we’ll need him to start more league games than not this season. Another obvious bright spot for Saints was the goal, with Surman and McGoldrick both hinting that this season they might convert their promise into more assists and goals this term (as they’ll have to!).
Looking ahead, we’ve got the tricky away tie to Exeter in the Carling Cup then the home game against Birmingham on Saturday. For a young side momentum is even more important that usual and I get the feeling that one win could become a decent run but another defeat, with difficult games looming, could leave us with the all too familiar feeling of falling behind the early pace.
Category: Match Reports
Pennies found down back of Rupert’s sofa
By: Mike | Add Comments
Normally Saints signing a promising young player, especially one interesting Premier League clubs, would be a cause for celebration. The player in question is Morgan Schneiderlin; an 18 year old midfielder from Strasbourg who is a France under 19 international. We’ll have to wait till the new season to find out how good he is and how he copes to the English game. However signing someone for a fee possibly rising to £1.2m has raised another question regarding Saint’s finances.
Namely, where has the money come from? Here are some of the possibilities:
Category: TransfersBacked into a corner
By: Mike | 2 Comments
The appalling state of Saint’s finances led to some pretty extreme measures being announced on Friday the 13th. 3 of the 4 corners at St. Marys are to start the season closed, the gates are to open 15 minutes later on matchdays and Saints are seeking council approval to stop subsidised bus travel. The corner closures affect roughly 700 season-ticket holders as well as others who regularly sit in those areas, the only open corner next season will be the family area inbetween the Chapel and Kingsland stands.
As one of those season-ticket holders affected I’ve been offered the choice of a refund or a seat move – anyone know where the best view is at St. Marys? The biggest worry for those not directly affected by the closures is the impact the changes will have on the atmosphere at matches with next season, especially as blocks 1-3 were the second noisiest area after the Northam stand.
The ongoing dispute regarding Jan Poortvliet’s compensation doesn’t help to inspire confidence that planning for the new season is going smoothly. Nor does the wait to see if any of the following out-of-contract players are going to be retained: Mario Licka, Darren Powell, Nathan Dyer, Alexander Ostlund, Simon Gillett, Inigo Idiakez and Jermaine Wright.
All of which doesn’t exactly ramp up excitement for the new season, despite the fixtures being announced today. It’s Cardiff away first up with Notts Forest away as the last game of the season. At least Saints have signed 2 players before the start of the season, Lee Holmes joins from Derby and Chris Perry joins after his successful loan spell at the end of last season. Only Saints could announce they are intending to give youth a chance then sign a 35-year old within a fortnight!
Category: The ClubNew managerial menagerie takes over
By: Mike | Add Comments
At various stages during his first spell in charge at Saints Rupert Lowe appointed Stuart Gray, Steve Wigley and Clive Woodward (not as manager, but still). Each time there were rumours that the masterplan was to adopt a more continental-style structure without a traditional manager- just specialist coaches.
Obviously his time away from Saints hasn’t persuaded him to deviate from the masterplan and it didn’t even take a couple of weeks for Lowe to go even further. Today Saints replaced Nigel Pearson and appointed two dutch coaches, Jan Poortvliet and Mark Wotte, alongside Stewart Henderson and Dave Hockaday as the new coaching team. Poortvliet will take the role of Head Coach but Saints are saying that the four will work together interchangeably.
Saints fans will undoubtely be split (aren’t we always!) over the departure of Pearson and will be mostly sceptical about the new coaching setup unless/until results vindicate the decision. The most worrying part of today’s announcement was the multiple references to money or lack thereof. Indeed Saints are actively boasting about taking the cheap option and it looks like we’ll have a very young side next season with academy players training with (if not making up) the first team.
The silver lining of seeing kids given a fair chance in the team and the outside chance that Poortvliet will be a poor man’s Wenger will probably persuade the fans to back the side at the start of next season. But if we don’t start the season well then there will be so much fan unrest that more boardroom turmoil would be inevitable.
Category: ManagerialEnd of Season Awards Part 1
By: Mike | Add Comments
Time for the first ever “Saints @ The Offside Annual End of Season Awards thingy”.
Award for Best Player
Start with an easy one. I know Andrew Davies won the official gong but for me the one player most responsible for us staying up, and thus the only possible receipient of this award, is Stern John. 19 goals, with no other player getting into double figures, tells its own story but the lack of good crossing or final passes throughout the season meant he made many of those goals himself through his power and good touch on the ball.
Franny Benali award for being a nutter
From the likes of Mark Dennis, Benali himself even up to more recent examples like Patrick Colleter, Saints have a rich history of players just as liable to kick one of the opposition into the stands as the ball. In recent seasons our demise has coincided with a lack of grade A, top class nutterdom. I’m going to say Kudos then to Youssef Safri who, while not in the same league (literally or figuratively), as previous alumni has shown a streak of temper to collect 2 reds and 6 yellows this season. The fact that many of our best performances have come when he’s been pulling the strings in midfield and some of our worse when he’s been suspended show the rest of the squad need an upgrade in mentalness.
Légion d’honneur for finest capitulation
That would be the Saints team who travelled to Hillsborough and thanked the visiting supporters by conceding 5 goals in 24 minutes, 4 of them in a 14 minute second half spell. Remember that Wednesday themselves only finished 16th! They fought off strong competition for this award from the sides at Preston away (5-1, 3 in the last 15 minutes) and Hull away (5-0, 4 in the second half).
Category: FeaturesNope, just lows.
By: Mike | Add Comments
Well that didn’t take long! No sooner had the NAMG possibility being suggested it has been pretty well debunked by some investigation over at The Saints Forum. Probably best to make your own minds up but it looks dubious to me.
Thus far names like Dave Merrington and Graeme Souness are being thrown into the hat as members of various consortiums by the papers. It’s presumably only a matter of time before the Branfoot, Hoddle and Redknapp consortium make an offer… Well, at least there’s a worse possibility than the current situation!
Category: Takeover NewsPoised for a summer of highs and Lowes?
By: Mike | Add Comments
Well, now the boring business on grass involving 22 men and a ball is out of the way SFC can return to what it does best – off the field power struggles. The EGM on Friday should see Rupert Lowe and Michael Wilde assume control of the football club once again due to their combined share holdings of nearly 50%.
The real area of interest for Saints fans at the moment is a possible takeover by either the Jonathan Fulthorpe-led consortium who have been in discussion with Saints for some time or a new (possibly non-existent) group. The main barrier to a deal is whether or not Lowe and Wilde will be willing to sell up at a price any interested party can afford to offer, especially as they are about to assume control themselves.
Hopefully someone will have the funding in place to persuade all of the major shareholders to sell up and funding to make the club, at least, more secure financially. At the moment very few details on the takeover bid have been revealed but could it be linked to this?
A construction company, NAMG, have announced a deal with a UK company regarding the takeover of an unnamed football club and redevelopment of the surrounding area. I think very few Saints fans would begrudge an incoming takeover if it meant respite from the constant boardroom squabbling and the loss of a few nearby gas holders!
Whether the unnamed football club is Saints or not, I think all fans will be hoping that there will be an end to uncertainty in the boardroom early this summer so we can actually prepare for the new season properly.
Category: Takeover NewsSaints 3 Sheffield United 2
By: Mike | 1 Comment
Phew! A rollercoaster game to end a rollercoaster season saw Saints survive by the skin of their teeth. Why an extra 10,000 people suddenly felt the club was worth supporting for one day I don’t know but Saints were glad they did at the atmosphere generated was the best since our relegation and roared Saints on for the entire game.
The game started evenly with both sides showing nerves as passes went astray. Saints were just starting to apply some pressure with Andrew Surman prominent when they got caught by a sucker punch. Hulse won the ball on the right and looped a cross over Jermaine Wright for Quinn to head home. United then had their best spell of the game with Richard Wright making a point-blank save to deny Sharp.
With half time approaching Saints knew they needed a goal to only leave themselves a one goal swing away from Leicester who were drawing at Stoke. The goal arrived after good work from Euell down the left and a deflection saw the ball loop over Kenny in the United goal and Saganowski dived in to score. At half-time Saints were down but playing well enough to raise the level of hope among the fans.
Saints started the second half well and were rewarded when Stern John chested a ball down to Saganowski who chipped the ball over the defence back to John who calmly steered the ball home. At 2-1 with Coventry losing and Leicester drawing Saints were safe and Saganowski should have secured the win when put through but he took too long at was tackled before pulling the trigger.
Sheffield substitute John Stead equalised when Jermaine Wright made a meal of a clearance and allowed Quinn to cross for Stead to steer home. The St. Mary’s crowd instantly tried to rally the team and it worked when John made a chance out of nothing on the edge of the area, turning his man and firing home.
Substitutes Lallana and Licka were doing well when John got him self stupidly sent off for a rash tackle following on from an earlier booking when he removed his shirt celebrating his first goal. With 10 minutes remaining it was a case of desperate defending but Richard Wright inspired confidence with some assured handling from the crosses being slung in and Lallana proved a willing runner to give the defence some breathing space.
Eventually (following some confusion) the whistle went and confirmation that Stoke and Charlton had done their parts ensured that Saints would remain in the championship. Today showed that with 32,000 in the stadium and a positive atmosphere every match we really could be pushing for promotion. However their is an EGM looming which will probably see yet more boardroom turmoil and quite possibly another managerial change to go with more turnover of players.
Category: Match ReportsSaints 0 Burnley 1
By: Mike | 1 Comment
If the Bristol City game showed why Saints should be challenging for promotion, then this defeat showed why we’re battling relegation. Since relegation from the premiership I’ve lost count of the number of games which follow the same pattern: Saints dominate possession, opposition defend and hoof, we don’t create any real chances and get caught out from a set piece. There’s a basic lack of power and pace throughout the squad which leaves us far worse off than teams with less technical ability like Burnley.
Saints started quite brightly with Surman joining attacks well from left-back and Licka looking lively cutting in from the flanks. But we failed to create any clear-cut chances with Wright-Phillips looking desperately low on confidence and John starting to look tired after carrying the goal scoring burden for so long. After Surman had a long range effort well saved Burnley broke and Lucketti gave away a soft free-kick. Saint’s marking was poor and only a superb Richard Wright save denied Burnley. However from the resulting corner Saints let Caldwell wander from back post to front completely unmarked allowing him to head the only goal of the game.
Second half Saints continued to dominate without creating; a number of crosses and pull-backs narrowly missed onrushing or backpedalling players betraying a lack of composure in the final third. Saints best chance came when Wright-Phillips steered the ball onto the post from close-range and Euell couldn’t force the rebound home. Jensen in the Burnley goal made two good saves from Idiakez and Safri but the fact that Saints had to resort to shots from outside the area told its own story.
It’s all eyes on the other teams next weekend as Saints don’t play till Monday away at leaders West Brom. Leicester and Wednesday play each other in the biggest game from our point of view, anything but a Leicester win will see us back in the relegation zone but a draw is probably the best result as long as we pick up some points in our last two games. Unlike most sides in this division West Brom actually try to play attacking football so I’d expect Saints to have some joy going forward, however our brittle defence will mean a 3-3 draw is probably the best we can hope for!
Category: Match ReportsCharlton 1 Saints 1
By: Mike | Add Comments
Saints inched a further point towards safety in an open game against play-off contenders Charlton. Both sides went looking for the win initially and Saints got a bizarre lead when Charlton’s young replacement keeper Randolph dropped a soft Stern John effort on to the back of defender McCarthy’s head and the ball bounced back into the net. From that point onward Saints looked to preserve the lead rather than extend it and Charlton deserved their equaliser through Andy Gray after a free kick from a Jermaine Wright handball.
Like last week against Bristol City, both sides had a number of penalty appeals rejected, this time Saints were probably happier for the referee to turn down all of them. Richard Wright made a superb save from Ambrose shortly after the Charlton goal to earn Saints the point. Leicester’s last minute equaliser against relegated Colchester was a shame but it was still a bad result for them which keeps the foxes 2 points back. Hopefully Plymouth can do us a favour by beating Wednesday and we’ll start against Burnley knowing that 2 wins from 3 games would definitely keep us up.
Category: Match Reports
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