Don't confuse not getting out of third gear with that level being the maximum a team is capable of, like I said earlier Chelsea have had some good results this season but on the other hand when they've played the very best (City, Madrid, Juventus) they've been largely outplayed and comfortably beaten.
Overall I don't think we have seen the best of any of the top teams, Chelsea have just made the most of this so far.
Both City and United have really been pushed for some of their results so it would be silly to right off Chelsea right now, of the teams we have to play home and away they are the one I am most worried about, could well have a new prem record of goals scored in the away fixture (when ever it is rescheduled).
Hmm quite a bad day really for us. Getting trounced by a team we outplayed last year shows how much we have regressed.
pingwing did you go to the game? (apologies if you've said previously in this thread). I had to rely on the radio and it didn't sound very positive.
Something is wrong within Saints and I really don't think Adkins is to blame. I'm not sure what exactly is the cause of this seasons results but it seems to be following the same path as when Pardew was in charge. The only logical explaination is Cortese and his influence on the team but that seems unfounded.
Also I fully believe that Guly should never play for us again after his drink driving charges. I used to be a fan of his in the Championship but to use him instead of Lambert or even Mayuka seems very strange. Once again the lack of defensive signings in the transfer window will cost us dearly.
I can't help but feel that the £18million spent on JRod and Gaston would have been better spent on decent defenders and an experienced Goalkeeper.
Edit: Adkins is far from blameless and has been at fault for his naive tactics and strange substitutions.
Yeah I went
(a mate wanted to go and I can't say no to a game that is 40 mins from where I live)
We out played them completely too, they are a TERRIBLE l2 team who know how to draw **** nothing fouls and get their way with the ref. Carroll is a worthless lump of this and we let him dive under challenge so many times someone should have walked up to him and just stamped him to put Carroll out of his diving misery. It was shocking.
Guly was one of our best players with Steven Davis, actually strung passes together, got forward when he needed too, got back when he had too. Puncheon was the biggest pile of crap I have ever seen (again) by comparison, just ran into dead ends, kicked into nothing under pressure and couldn't manage his way out of a paper bag.
Adkins can't be sacked because he is stuck with what we have, CB's with no composure/confidence, a pressure to play the "experienced" keepers who are both USELESS is undermining the club. I am under the impression we are having to live up to contracts opposed to form. So Boruc is signed as first team and has finally gotten close to fitness to show that he's worse than Gazza. Same for Punch that he's contracted to be first team and we are having to live up to that despite being a shocking footballer.
Gaston is the buy I will defend till the cows come home, best player at the club, we wont see anyone as good as him for a long time.
Rodriguez was best part of 12m too much. Burnley owe us a lot of money/karma for taking that waste of space off their hands. He is just useless, overhyped and English, like most of the u21's int team. Has to go on loan at christmas to score some goals as he'll never get them in the prem.
We could have blown all our funds on a keeper and some over rated CB's but we would have been in the same position, Gazza is the best keeper at the club and the million we spent on him just shows he is a bargain. We should be playing him the other 30 prem games let just to get him ready for a season in the champ followed by a return to the prem. He's good enough, Jos isn't, Maya isn't and Fonte probably isn't (Seaborne is already out in the knackers yard) which sums up the problem. We have no CB's who can do the job, overall they all get into some sort of mad "the prem is amazing" syndrome that means they fold like cards.
Only thing we can do is buy madly in jan or at least get a coach in to scream at them till then as it is just poor defending that is repeatedly costing us.
On the plus side Clyne should be good enough just, Lallana is good enough (glad we have hung on to him), Lambert is prem quality though it is a shame EVERY team's solution is to man mark him with 2/3 players to take him out the game. We also have the midfield to win games as Schniderlin, Davis, Cork and JWP are all excellent in the middle, just need to take a few more chances to put games to bed quicker and stop giving rubbish teams nothing goals (Fulham comes to mind for that description).
I am worried because teams will start turning up expecting points against us and we will give them because some of the team can't handle the prem, despite it being horribly over rated.
Oh last edit, Mayuka isn't a winger, it shows badly. When we did the subs today we didn't mix it up to where people would be best, Mayuka should have gone up top with Lambert as the "no 10" in the hole, Lallana out on the left with Guly right. Instead we stuck out with straight swaps so Mayuka was stick in the same position punch was which didn't help him, Lambert wasn't best up top and Lallana isn't a in the hole player. Frustrating as I thought after "sub gate" against United we had gotten over the Burley thing of playing people out of position but we are back at it again because of a lack of something.
(starting to look forward to the prospect of the champ again, it'll be cheaper)
(I prefer to remember as a comfort that it always was a lot worse than right now)
