EFL Championship Match 7 - Southampton 0 Ipswich 1

 

Chapel Arms, 6.45pm

After the shitshow of the last two games, we welcome Ipswich town to St Mary’s and it feels like we are properly getting into the Saturday, Tuesday, Saturday, Tuesday nature of the Championship. This means that basically, you have no chance to dwell on whatever result you got a few days ago.

Ipswich have been doing the tour around the Championship and League One like we did and in fact, the last time we played them in the league was in our Championship promotion season of 2011/12. In that season, we had a very significant 5-2 win at Portman Road earlier on in the season and the return was a midweek game at the business end of the season that saw us pick up a 1-1 draw. Around that time, their manager Paul Jewell had found himself on the front page of the tabloids for starring in his own porn films. It was funny and grim at the same time.

The Ipswich Town of 2023 got promoted out of League 1 last season and have taken that momentum into this campaign under Kieran McKenna and are absolutely flying with five wins out of the first six games. The only defeat was a narrow 4-3 reversal at home to Leeds. All that and our shocking form over the last two games makes this a very difficult assignment.

The question is how will Russell Martin approach it and if the press conference he gave is anything to go by, then we will go about it the same way as we have done every game this season and we just have to hope that we do it better. I think that if people can see that things are improving then there will be no problem but with the expectations that are on the team this season, losing three games in a row or getting hammered like we have done in the last two games, it’s going to see peoples patience wear thin very quickly.

I just hope we don’t give a goal away in the first five minutes and I wouldn’t be against going full Peter Kay mode and belting the kick-off out of the ground with 28,000 home fans shouting “have it“ as the ball disappears off into the River Itchin.

The quick turnaround since Friday means that Flynn Downes is a big doubt for this game through injury so the potentially“stable” defensive midfield of Downes and Charles will have to wait for another time. There was one bit of good news is that Bobby Madley was unsurprisingly, wrong and the red card against Sulemana was rescinded on appeal. This will only actually be good news if Sulemana can actually be bothered. There is no question over his ability, just his attitude and heart.

Hopefully, Jan Bednarek will be fit to add some stability to the back for and this will of course mean Shea Charles moving in the defensive midfield position. In theory, we should be more solid though it would be incredibly fucking difficult for this not to be the case.

So. I’m walking up from Ocean Village and the team news comes in. I stare at my phone and suss out the 11 names and I divert into the Chapel Arms as I need a drink.  What the actual fuck is that?  Having been outrun and outfought against Leicester, particularly in midfield, the one change is to bring in a player who can’t run in Joe Aribo, which leaves us with Will Smallbone as the defensive midfielder.  Amazing.  Other than that, there are no other changes with Bednarek and Holgate on the bench, meaning Shea Charles is at centre back again.

Saints start ok and by that, I mean that we didn’t let in a goal in the opening two minutes.  Progress.  In fact, we had the first meaningful attack with Fraser making a break down the left before turning out rather than crossing on his left foot and knocking it back to Manning. Manning knocks it inside to Captain Arma to hammer a shot at the near post but well wide and the keeper had it covered anyway.

The first Ipswich foray into our half ends in a corner and the ball ends up in the net but there is an attacker quite clearly holding Baz down which the referee mercifully spots.  We win a corner ourselves when an Ipswich defender needlessly passes it behind and once the delivery is nodded away to KWP, his cross back into the mixer sees Charles flick a header narrowly wide.

The Ipswich left-hand side is becoming more noticeable, containing as it does on-loan from Manchester United Brandon Williams and on-loan from Chelsea in Omari Hutchinson. Williams has always been a prick and Hutchinson seems determined to bring down KWP on every occasion that he runs forward which is going unpunished by the referee, who you know that in a few minutes is going to book someone for fuck all. Crosses are coming into our box at regular intervals, due to our tactic of not trying to block them and Williams heads one well over the bar.

THB and KWP and FFS

We try and play out from the back and Shea Charles dawdles and gets tackled by Hutchinson who takes the pass back from Skate Chaplin and fires it past Baz and in off the far post. Fucking fuck off.  And again.  In mitigation, Charles was trying to find a player in midfield and waiting for someone to run but of course, no one did so he should’ve made the decision just to belt it up the pitch.

Five minutes later and we’re at it again with Bazunu knocking the ball into Aribo’s feet but with Joe playing walking football as usual, an Ipswich player nips in and Skate Chaplin chips it over Baz and sees it bounce back off the bar and Hirst slams the rebound wide. Should be 2-0, should be game over. Again though, even though Aribo was in space, there was absolutely no one for him to pass to so it was inevitable once the ball was passed to him that he would lose it.

We are still not learning anything and Charles gets caught on the ball again in the centre of midfield with Hutchison finding Burns on the left hand side but he suddenly thinks he’s got the ability to curl it in with the outside of his boot and shats it wide. How hard have Ipswich had to work for these three chances that they’ve had?  Not very hard.

Half-time and what would Russell Martin do, bearing in mind we have been completely abysmal since we went behind? Against Leicester he just made a like-for-like replacement but today he doesn’t even do that and we got the same 11 ragtag bunch of arseholes out on the pitch for the start of the second half.

With ten minutes gone in the second half, KWP brings the ball forward into midfield and slides a great ball into Che Adams who takes a touch and he has to score but it’s Che we’re talking about and he smashes it straight at the goalkeepers face and it goes for a corner. I wonder if there’s an xHitTheFuckingKeeper stat measuring how difficult it is to hit the goalkeeper from your chance and the amount of times you actually do.  Che would be league leading.

Substitution time now with Aribo, Edozie and Fraser being replaced with Bednarek, Sulemana and Stuart Armstrong. This means that Charles has gone into midfield and Smallbone has pushed forward. There is no immediate effect though and Ipswich have another chance with Skate Chaplin trying a volley from the edge of the box which Baz gets down to save easily enough.

Adams gets put away by a bad pass from Ipswich and sets up Smallbone on the edge of the box but his shot has absolutely no conviction and we are fortunate to win a corner off it. Manning’s delivery ends up at the back post with Sulemana and he gets a low cross in which finds Adam Armstrong but with a first time shot needed, he tries to control it with both his shins and so the chance goes.

Smallbone’s put out of his misery with Alcaraz coming on as we get to the last 10 minutes and more in hope than expectation, Manning tries a pot-shot from a long way out which the keeper pushes wide easily enough.

There’s just doesn’t seem to be enough urgency about us, though Alcaraz and Stuart Armstrong have certainly been a positive change and Alcaraz slots are lovely ball inside the fullback for Sulemana to run onto... down he goes and it’s given offside before we can start howling for the Ipswich player to be sent off.  As time ticks by we are getting more and more desperate and Stuart Armstrong puts in a cross from the right which Alcaraz heads over and that is going to be that.

Well there you have it. What an absolute pile of shit again. It was a different strain of shit from the Leicester game but it was still shit nonetheless.

... with Will and Joe

Who could’ve predicted that the worst midfield three ever named in Southampton FC history would be absolute garbage?  Featuring as it did, three players who should not be near the starting 11. We persevered with those three in midfield for far too long. They eventually all got substituted but far too late. At least two of them should’ve been gone at half-time because we were going to need all of the last 45 minutes to manufacture something but then in truth, we probably could’ve played all night and not scored. It was so bad that Joe Aribo was probably the best of three as at least he started the game well until Ipswich scored and then he went to pieces. Smallbone showed his lack of pace, lack of defensive awareness and lack of tackling before moving further forward where he was almost as inept but he stayed on the pitch whilst Charly Alcaraz was on the bench. Adam Armstrong was dreadful in midfield and on both wings and when he should’ve been in midfield he spent time being dreadful upfront as well. He shouldn’t be in the team but will be because Martin has elevated him to captain. His record as captain is 100%, played three, lost three.

Of the forwards, Che Adams should be bossing this division and being the big dog but he is doing fuck all apart from hitting the goalkeeper yet again, with the one chance that he gets. On the wings, Sam Edozie, easily our best wide player, has been moved to his less favoured right side to accommodate Ryan Fraser who has done absolutely fuck all in the last two matches and Sulemana managed to not get sent off this time but was absolute garbage. There is no way he should be above Sam Amo in the pecking order but he is our Nathan Tella replacement so sooner or later, I’m expecting him to start chipping in with the 15 or so goals that Tella would have got this season.

We were better defensively today which is not saying much but we still managed to gift Ipswich three chances through our own carelessness.  What improvement there was, was partly down to Ipswich not creating much on their own and partly down to the defenders staying in position. Both Ryan Manning and KWP had better games and the second half pairing of THB and Bednarek points at better things to come in that regard. Shea Charles had a decent game apart from the goal which again was down to him taking too long to clear the ball and the team looked a lot more structured when he moved into midfield, where he of course should have started.

I don’t understand Russell Martin's thinking with that team selection and I don’t understand the inactivity at half-time.  He’s a very likeable guy but you will get no patience from anybody if you make batshit mental selections. There is not a single fan or pundit who would have picked that side that he picked today – not one ... and that causes a perception problem when no one can even see what the fuck you were trying to achieve and it's predictably bad and we get beat.  Though Aribo wasn’t the worst midfielder today, parachuting him in from absolutely nowhere when you have Alcaraz and Stuart Armstrong as options, is unfathomable, as was his selection of Sekou Mara up at Sunderland. It was painfully obvious that that midfield was not going to work and it was painfully obvious that something needed changing at half-time. He literally could’ve taken off all three at half-time and he couldn’t possibly have made the team any worse.

Ok, That Midfield 3 Maybe Wasn't the Best Idea

What the fuck has happened to our attacking play? Where is the movement ahead of the ball that we saw in pre-season? One of the things I’ll remember from this game will be Taylor Harwood-Bellis in possession of the ball looking for someone to pass to and then getting really annoyed when no one presented themselves. He learned the game at Manchester City of course and played for a very fluid, attacking Burnley side last year. He must wonder what the fucking hell he’s got himself into this season.  There was one incident in the first half where he passed it forward, broke the lines and then without even trying to turn out and go forward, Will Smallbone knocked it straight back to him and brought the three Ipswich players that had been taken out of the game, back into it.

You also have to look at the intensity of our play without the ball. Basically, there was none. A common feature in both the Leicester and Ipswich games has been how much quicker the opposition has got to us when we have the ball than the opposite way round. When you pick a midfield three were two of them can’t run and one is miles out of position all the time, what do you expect?

Lack of running power in midfield also extends to tracking runners. When you are in midfield and your opposite number runs past you, you have to sprint back to cover the run that’s been made. Have you ever seen Joe Aribo sprint? Have you ever seen Will Smallbone sprint? Can they even do it?  Do you remember a guy called Jermaine Wright who we, ironically, signed from Ipswich years ago?  I was reminded of him today - midfielders who can't run.

Despite winning six of their first seven games, Ipswich really weren’t anything special and we basically gifted them the three points. The winning goal was scored by Omari Hutchinson and it was a good finish but the most notable thing about his performance was how he managed to commit at least three fouls that should all have been bookings and he didn’t even get one. Twice he scythed down KWP in full flight and once he was literally dragging a shirt off a Saints players’ back after he’d gone past him.  Ipswich and their supporters will see this as the perfect away performance in that they got their goal and then soaked up our very limited threat without too many alarms. Like with Leicester on Friday though, they didn’t really have to do much to get over the line. Just being organised and not making any stupid mistakes was enough but fair play to them.  Should have been 0-0 really but we made the mistake and they didn’t.  Neither team worked the keeper much but once ahead, Ipswich didn’t have to.

So, three defeats in a row including two at home and now we go to bottom team Middlesbrough on Saturday. Patience is wearing thin already and lose that game and it will certainly be in short supply. If Russell Martin puts a proper team out on the pitch and recognizes that the midfield has to be able to run and be defensively disciplined, then we might have a chance.