Southhampton Match Thread......

[Mr Fulham]

Well, 11 games in the context of a 38 game league season is a fair chunk, wouldn't you say? I don't think anyone could be accused of panicking prematurely, none of these games we are losing and drawing are kickabouts that don't count!

Couldnt agree more. 1 win in 11 is terrible.

Our next 6 games

Swansea (H)
WBA (A)
Wigan (H)
Man City (A)
W Ham (H)
Man U (A)

We'll lose the away games. On paper the home games look winable, but Swansea are a far better side than us. West Ham always beat us, so its just the Wigan game then....

Would like to see our goal difference after the Manchester  matches. By the way, United should be a home match as we lost @ Old Trafford.

[Aaron]

Well, 11 games in the context of a 38 game league season is a fair chunk, wouldn't you say? I don't think anyone could be accused of panicking prematurely, none of these games we are losing and drawing are kickabouts that don't count!

Couldnt agree more. 1 win in 11 is terrible.

Our next 6 games

Swansea (H)
WBA (A)
Wigan (H)
Man City (A)
W Ham (H)
Man U (A)

We'll lose the away games. On paper the home games look winable, but Swansea are a far better side than us. West Ham always beat us, so its just the Wigan game then....

Would like to see our goal difference after the Manchester away matches.

I think the Man U game is at home?  Is it not?  It'd need to be as I have tickets! :)

[Denver Fulham]

Senderos is not a good defender. He was inches from being culpable several times in the second half as he got beaten goalside. His poor header starter started the clown show that led to their goal, but many others will involved in that idiocy, too.

Schwarzer's distribution has become an enormous issue, since we don't have any players who can seem to hold the ball under pressure.

We got what we deserved today. We were played to a complete standstill by a crappy promoted side at home. We had two shots on target against one of the worst defenses in the league. A few other shots whistled just wide, but come on. That's awful.

I know Jol's somewhat limited with the guys he has right now, but this Rodellega thing at outside mid has to stop. Also, Ruiz shouldn't be playing right mid in a match where he's coming off a hammy and we can't keep hold of the freaking ball in the middle of the field.

It's all very frustrating at the moment, but we're on 21 points and two teams have 10. We should be able to hold Reading and QPR below us, and if we can't finish ahead of ONE of Wigan, Southampton, Norwich, Villa, Sunderland or West Ham, then we get what we deserve.

[deeffc]

On Senderos, he has potential which is why he was at Arsenal, Milan and now us. If you're scouting a centre back he has all the things you look for, big, strong, decent pace. However he has either never learned to defend or never been able to put the theory into action on the pitch. I'm pretty sure it's the latter. I'm sure if you froze the game on tv and asked him where or what he should be doing, he'd give the right answer but in games he is not anywhere near consistent enough at making these decisions. In this game, among a few other examples that were not fatal in terms of scoreline he made errors like not challenging for the ball against Lambert when he dropped deep, allowing himself and Hangeland to be split too easily and others. A number of people have said he was ok, and he didn't perhaps affect the scoreline today but he was poor and gave Southampton a number of chances they weren't capable of taking advantage of. He isn't the sole player at fault and probably not our worst on the day but until he is capable of translating theory into practice he shouldn't be near the first team.

[RidgeRider]

We got what we deserved today. We were played to a complete standstill by a crappy promoted side at home. We had two shots on target against one of the worst defenses in the league. A few other shots whistled just wide, but come on. That's awful.

It's all very frustrating at the moment, but we're on 21 points and two teams have 10. We should be able to hold Reading and QPR below us, and if we can't finish ahead of ONE of Wigan, Southampton, Norwich, Villa, Sunderland or West Ham, then we get what we deserve.

Very true.....but I am also left with the questions "WHAT happened to our ambition?"...... What happened to the attitude of guys like Reither who was talking of a top 6 finish after our first few matches? What happened to our determination? Our team spirit?

Did it all drain away with two successive injuries to a single player?....Ruiz

I'm not satisfied with finishing 17th. I want more. We deserve more and we have the players for more. The fact that we are all thinking about just surviving now is an indictment of the club, as a whole, and the moves it has made over the summer and on the pitch this season. Some of the players don't care as much and that worries me the most.

We need to sort it out!!!!!

[bill taylors apprentice]

Main problem as I see it...
We have no play maker in CM (Ruiz?) and rely on getting the ball out wide quickly.
But we have a number of wide players who all (duff apart?) do not keep the ball for more than a couple of touches, get past the opposition into dangerous areas enough, do not cross into the box enough and give the ball away too often too cheaply.
When you have 2 CM who sit in front of the back 4 and we keep giving the ball away it puts you on the back foot again and again and isolates the forwards however good they are and puts even more pressure on.
The players picked in the team by the manager cannot play the way he wants it to  

[Denver Fulham]

One addendum: It was *plainly* obvious after Dembele and Dempsey left in late August that a lot of our fortunes in the first half of the season would be pinned on Bryan Ruiz. Berba can handle that role, but then he's just spraying the ball around to guys who aren't very good or aren't very experienced.

Ruiz is not a defensive player, but when he's fully healthy, his ability to hold possession and create helps our defense. We simply could not keep possession in the second half today. It was appalling.

We're going to need to buy a midfielder (or two) in January. It would also help if Duff got healthy again and we could have Diarra for a few games before he traipses off again to Africa for the Cup of Nations. Also, Briggs needs to get a runout soon. Riise's just adding nothing to the equation right now.

[Denver Fulham]

I'm not satisfied with finishing 17th. I want more. We deserve more and we have the players for more. The fact that we are all thinking about just surviving now is an indictment of the club, as a whole, and the moves it has made over the summer and on the pitch this season. Some of the players don't care as much and that worries me the most.

Be satisfied with that. The last time that happened, we qualified for Europe the next season. This was always going to be a transitional year after we lost Dembele. He was so crucial to this season. We made a good short-term buy with Berba and we grabbed some points early before injuries and the flaws in this depleted roster have been exposed. We'll steady ourselves in January, get enough points and stay up, which is the only goal now for this season. Then we can continue the overhaul over the summer.

[H3Matt]

Actually.. You know what?  It's Jol.

WHY was Kaca taken off for Ruiz?
WHY was Ruiz stuck out on the right?
WHY was Senderos or Baird on the pitch at all today?
WHY has Schwarzer not been dropped?
WHY do his substitutions and more often than not selections period make no sense?
WHY are we instructed even in scenarios where better options exist to pass it straight back to the keeper for him to give it away or bash it straight to the opposing keeper?

I see no attempt whatsoever to try and remedy the problems we have all been talking about for the past 4 or 5 weeks.  Before anyone says it, I don't know what the answer is either, but I'm not a Premiership manager.  All I see from us week in, week out, is the same bullpoo lack of anything going forwards and no attempt to shake things up.

The team is crap as well mind you.

Couldn't agree more. You can only blame the players for so much, Jol's tactics, team selections and sub decisions have cost us dearly this season.