| Saints fans debating what result they wanted last night 11:13 - Jan 23 with 2565 views | hatch |
https://www.saintsweb.co.uk/topic/60649-leicester-vs-ipswich/
It has a touch of the Darren Moores about it in my view when he was asked ‘if you could be guaranteed 2nd now would you take it’ this time last year.
They majority seem to be wanting a draw as it gives them the best chance of chasing down both Leicester and us. Surely the sensible approach would be to want us to lose to solidify second and then just focus on getting promoted - regardless of 1st or 2nd?
I work with a lot of saints fans who have been mostly pragmatic through the season but this thread seems very arrogant from them and would give me more pleasure to see them slip up now. Don’t get me wrong, they’re in flying form and their fans should be full of confidence but seems to be a little bit ahead of themselves to worrying about Leicester?
I also note that Ipswich still seem to be viewed as woeful/lucky by Leicester and Saints fans with one or two mentioning our fight. Clearly we don’t have the prem quality their teams have but remarkable that they’re still writing us off when we sit 2nd at this point in the season. Still a huge ask for us of course but show us a little more respect! |  | | |  |
| Saints fans debating what result they wanted last night on 11:17 - Jan 23 with 2493 views | TrumptonBlue |
If they feel they can still catch Leicester - and why wouldn't they given their form? - I think a draw is obviously the preferred result for them, as it means a point has disappeared into the ether rather than going to us or Leicester. |  | | |
| Saints fans debating what result they wanted last night on 11:25 - Jan 23 with 2383 views | Weekender |
Keeping Leicester in touch is better for us/saints/leeds. 4 into 2 is better than 3 into 1. |  |
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| Saints fans debating what result they wanted last night on 11:40 - Jan 23 with 2278 views | Herbivore |
Interesting that they have their eyes set on overhauling Leicester. There's no doubt they are on a good run and have picked up a few big wins in recent weeks but the fixture list has been relatively kind to them for some time now and that will change. If they sustain this form then fair play to them, they'll deserve to go up, but the fixtures they have left are a lot trickier than the ones they've had during their current unbeaten run.
Below are all the results from their current run, the most eye catching is the first but it came at a time when Leeds were yet to hit their stride away from Elland Road. It's notable they've not played us or Leicester and their away game at Coventry (which they drew) came just before Coventry's recent impressive run. People have already pointed out they still have to travel to all of the other sides in the top 5. Not taking anything away from how good and how consistent they've been, but no away trips to sides in the top 6 (at the time they played them) makes it much easier to stay unbeaten. Our only losses over the same period have come in precisely those fixtures, coupled with a draw at Leicester last night. A much tougher series of games overall for us.
Southampton 3 - 1 Leeds United
Stoke City 0 - 1 Southampton
Southampton 1 - 1 Rotherham United
Hull City 1 - 2 Southampton
Preston North End 2 - 2 Southampton
Southampton 3 - 1 Birmingham City
Millwall 0 - 1 Southampton
Southampton 2 - 1 West Bromwich Albion
Huddersfield Town 1 - 1 Southampton
Southampton 1 - 0 Bristol City
Southampton 2 - 0 Cardiff City
Watford 1 - 1 Southampton
Coventry City 1 - 1 Southampton
Southampton 4 - 0 Blackburn Rovers
Queens Park Rangers 0 - 1 Southampton
Southampton 5 - 0 Swansea
Southampton 2 - 1 Plymouth Argyle
Norwich City 1 - 1 Southampton
Southampton 4 - 0 Sheffield Wednesday
Swansea City 1 - 3 Southampton |  |
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| Saints fans debating what result they wanted last night on 11:55 - Jan 23 with 2156 views | Alberto_the_frog |
| Saints fans debating what result they wanted last night on 11:40 - Jan 23 by Herbivore |
Interesting that they have their eyes set on overhauling Leicester. There's no doubt they are on a good run and have picked up a few big wins in recent weeks but the fixture list has been relatively kind to them for some time now and that will change. If they sustain this form then fair play to them, they'll deserve to go up, but the fixtures they have left are a lot trickier than the ones they've had during their current unbeaten run.
Below are all the results from their current run, the most eye catching is the first but it came at a time when Leeds were yet to hit their stride away from Elland Road. It's notable they've not played us or Leicester and their away game at Coventry (which they drew) came just before Coventry's recent impressive run. People have already pointed out they still have to travel to all of the other sides in the top 5. Not taking anything away from how good and how consistent they've been, but no away trips to sides in the top 6 (at the time they played them) makes it much easier to stay unbeaten. Our only losses over the same period have come in precisely those fixtures, coupled with a draw at Leicester last night. A much tougher series of games overall for us.
Southampton 3 - 1 Leeds United
Stoke City 0 - 1 Southampton
Southampton 1 - 1 Rotherham United
Hull City 1 - 2 Southampton
Preston North End 2 - 2 Southampton
Southampton 3 - 1 Birmingham City
Millwall 0 - 1 Southampton
Southampton 2 - 1 West Bromwich Albion
Huddersfield Town 1 - 1 Southampton
Southampton 1 - 0 Bristol City
Southampton 2 - 0 Cardiff City
Watford 1 - 1 Southampton
Coventry City 1 - 1 Southampton
Southampton 4 - 0 Blackburn Rovers
Queens Park Rangers 0 - 1 Southampton
Southampton 5 - 0 Swansea
Southampton 2 - 1 Plymouth Argyle
Norwich City 1 - 1 Southampton
Southampton 4 - 0 Sheffield Wednesday
Swansea City 1 - 3 Southampton |
Draws against Rotherham and Huddersfield are certainly nothing to crow over. |  | | |
| Saints fans debating what result they wanted last night on 12:13 - Jan 23 with 2027 views | Herbivore |
| Saints fans debating what result they wanted last night on 11:55 - Jan 23 by Alberto_the_frog |
Draws against Rotherham and Huddersfield are certainly nothing to crow over. |
No issue with drawing at Rotherham as they are pretty hard to beat at home, but failing to beat them at home is not great. Of the like for like fixtures, think we've bettered their result in one (Watford away) and they've bettered our result in two (Leeds at home and Stoke away) but that is solely focusing on this run of games, if you go back further we bettered their results at home to Leicester and away to Sunderland and Middlesbrough. So in terms of like for like fixtures, we're ahead of them by a decent margin and they've yet to mirror some of our tougher fixtures, like trips to Leicester, Leeds, and West Brom.
Edit - Of the 20 games in that run, 13 have been against sides currently in the bottom half (due to playing Swansea twice). By contrast, we've played sides currently in the top half 11 times over the same period, including Leicester twice and Leeds and West Brom away. 8 of our last 10 games have been against sides currently in the top half versus 3 out of 10 for Saints. It's little wonder they've closed the gap really. [Post edited 23 Jan 12:23]
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| Saints fans debating what result they wanted last night on 12:18 - Jan 23 with 1976 views | _clive_baker_ |
| Saints fans debating what result they wanted last night on 12:13 - Jan 23 by Herbivore |
No issue with drawing at Rotherham as they are pretty hard to beat at home, but failing to beat them at home is not great. Of the like for like fixtures, think we've bettered their result in one (Watford away) and they've bettered our result in two (Leeds at home and Stoke away) but that is solely focusing on this run of games, if you go back further we bettered their results at home to Leicester and away to Sunderland and Middlesbrough. So in terms of like for like fixtures, we're ahead of them by a decent margin and they've yet to mirror some of our tougher fixtures, like trips to Leicester, Leeds, and West Brom.
Edit - Of the 20 games in that run, 13 have been against sides currently in the bottom half (due to playing Swansea twice). By contrast, we've played sides currently in the top half 11 times over the same period, including Leicester twice and Leeds and West Brom away. 8 of our last 10 games have been against sides currently in the top half versus 3 out of 10 for Saints. It's little wonder they've closed the gap really. [Post edited 23 Jan 12:23]
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That's their next game, Rotherham away. They then have Huddersfield at home which should be a cake walk for them, but Bristol City away midweek followed by WBA away 3 days later isn't straight forward. I can see a world where we're still above them after we play Swansea, certainly hope so. Then we see out Feb with back to back home games against Rotherham and Brum (trickier customer now than they looked a few weeks back). |  | | |
| Saints fans debating what result they wanted last night on 12:28 - Jan 23 with 1890 views | NthQldITFC |
| Saints fans debating what result they wanted last night on 11:55 - Jan 23 by Alberto_the_frog |
Draws against Rotherham and Huddersfield are certainly nothing to crow over. |
Let alone Norwich! |  |
| # WE ARE STEALING THE FUTURE FROM OUR CHILDREN --- WE MUST CHANGE COURSE # | | Poll: | It's driving me nuts |
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| Saints fans debating what result they wanted last night on 12:47 - Jan 23 with 1795 views | hatch |
| Saints fans debating what result they wanted last night on 12:18 - Jan 23 by _clive_baker_ |
That's their next game, Rotherham away. They then have Huddersfield at home which should be a cake walk for them, but Bristol City away midweek followed by WBA away 3 days later isn't straight forward. I can see a world where we're still above them after we play Swansea, certainly hope so. Then we see out Feb with back to back home games against Rotherham and Brum (trickier customer now than they looked a few weeks back). |
Not capitalising on Birmingham away was a tricky one to stomach given their form at the time - they looked awful in the games before and after us. But it all balances out in the end, can't knock a 2-0 comeback and had we won that game we may have lost to Leicester twice in a twist of fate.
I think fixtures aside we're going to have a really battle to cling onto 2nd place but I am hopeful that our 'blip' was the Christmas period and as blips go it wasn't too bad. That second half performance away at Leicester gave signs of our early season form in terms of attacking fluidity, feels like it has been lacking a bit but play like we did second half in most games the remainder of the season and we should have odds on chance of 3 points in most games. | | | |
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| Saints fans debating what result they wanted last night on 12:54 - Jan 23 with 1723 views | TractorCam |
I'm happy for everyone to keep undermining us and let us just go about our business. Also a lot of our fans did the same with Plymouth last season. |  |
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| Saints fans debating what result they wanted last night on 13:00 - Jan 23 with 1683 views | hoppy |
| Saints fans debating what result they wanted last night on 11:40 - Jan 23 by Herbivore |
Interesting that they have their eyes set on overhauling Leicester. There's no doubt they are on a good run and have picked up a few big wins in recent weeks but the fixture list has been relatively kind to them for some time now and that will change. If they sustain this form then fair play to them, they'll deserve to go up, but the fixtures they have left are a lot trickier than the ones they've had during their current unbeaten run.
Below are all the results from their current run, the most eye catching is the first but it came at a time when Leeds were yet to hit their stride away from Elland Road. It's notable they've not played us or Leicester and their away game at Coventry (which they drew) came just before Coventry's recent impressive run. People have already pointed out they still have to travel to all of the other sides in the top 5. Not taking anything away from how good and how consistent they've been, but no away trips to sides in the top 6 (at the time they played them) makes it much easier to stay unbeaten. Our only losses over the same period have come in precisely those fixtures, coupled with a draw at Leicester last night. A much tougher series of games overall for us.
Southampton 3 - 1 Leeds United
Stoke City 0 - 1 Southampton
Southampton 1 - 1 Rotherham United
Hull City 1 - 2 Southampton
Preston North End 2 - 2 Southampton
Southampton 3 - 1 Birmingham City
Millwall 0 - 1 Southampton
Southampton 2 - 1 West Bromwich Albion
Huddersfield Town 1 - 1 Southampton
Southampton 1 - 0 Bristol City
Southampton 2 - 0 Cardiff City
Watford 1 - 1 Southampton
Coventry City 1 - 1 Southampton
Southampton 4 - 0 Blackburn Rovers
Queens Park Rangers 0 - 1 Southampton
Southampton 5 - 0 Swansea
Southampton 2 - 1 Plymouth Argyle
Norwich City 1 - 1 Southampton
Southampton 4 - 0 Sheffield Wednesday
Swansea City 1 - 3 Southampton |
They've had 6 draws and 14 wins in their last 20 games, we've had 8 draws and 10 wins but we've also had those 2 defeats. They've closed the gap, but haven't got ahead of us, which just shows our season as a whole, and not just over a 20 game stretch has us where we deserve to be after 28 games. |  |
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| Saints fans debating what result they wanted last night on 13:22 - Jan 23 with 1577 views | Herbivore |
| Saints fans debating what result they wanted last night on 13:00 - Jan 23 by hoppy |
They've had 6 draws and 14 wins in their last 20 games, we've had 8 draws and 10 wins but we've also had those 2 defeats. They've closed the gap, but haven't got ahead of us, which just shows our season as a whole, and not just over a 20 game stretch has us where we deserve to be after 28 games. |
I think it's quite interesting to compare how we've done in like for like fixtures as well as looking at the season as a whole as it's good to get an idea of how sides are doing in the same games:
Watford (A) - +2 to Town
Leeds (H) - +3 to Saints
Stoke (A) - +2 to Saints
Huddersfield (A) same
Cardiff (H) same
Plymouth (H) same
Blackburn (H) same
Sunderland (A) +3 to Town
Boro (A) +3 to Town
Leicester (H) +1 to Town
QPR (H) +2 to Saints
Norwich (H) same
QPR (A) same
Sheff Wed (A) same
Swansea (H) same
So if we take a direct head to head comparison, we are 2 points better off when comparing like for like games. We also beat them, so effectively 5 points better off on a pure head to head basis. They may well go and win at Leicester, Leeds, West Brom, and at Portman Road, and if they do then fair play to them, but I do feel some context needs to be added to their current run as it's been an unusually benign set of fixtures. Still very impressive to do as well as they've done but will they sustain it when things start to get more taxing? We'll see. | |
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| Saints fans debating what result they wanted last night on 13:49 - Jan 23 with 1412 views | itfcjoe |
| Saints fans debating what result they wanted last night on 13:22 - Jan 23 by Herbivore |
I think it's quite interesting to compare how we've done in like for like fixtures as well as looking at the season as a whole as it's good to get an idea of how sides are doing in the same games:
Watford (A) - +2 to Town
Leeds (H) - +3 to Saints
Stoke (A) - +2 to Saints
Huddersfield (A) same
Cardiff (H) same
Plymouth (H) same
Blackburn (H) same
Sunderland (A) +3 to Town
Boro (A) +3 to Town
Leicester (H) +1 to Town
QPR (H) +2 to Saints
Norwich (H) same
QPR (A) same
Sheff Wed (A) same
Swansea (H) same
So if we take a direct head to head comparison, we are 2 points better off when comparing like for like games. We also beat them, so effectively 5 points better off on a pure head to head basis. They may well go and win at Leicester, Leeds, West Brom, and at Portman Road, and if they do then fair play to them, but I do feel some context needs to be added to their current run as it's been an unusually benign set of fixtures. Still very impressive to do as well as they've done but will they sustain it when things start to get more taxing? We'll see. |
I think one thing that is forgotten, is that our manager and team have navigated a season where it took 98 points to get promoted - that will help when it gets to the nitty gritty end of the season and points are dropped unexpectedly.
Martin has never finished anywhere bar mid table in the league, he's not had to deal with the pressure of expectation - their players don't have many promotions under their belts with a cursory look at them.
That's not to say they won't cope, they clearly have a huge amount of quality and more than us in that regard - but we've got a greater mental strength in our squad, and are proving that week in week out by just still being in a ludicrously fast paced race with teams with budgets and squad quality that dwarves ours....will our mental strength and fortitud be enough? Who knows, but it will get us close at the very least. |  |
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| Saints fans debating what result they wanted last night on 13:54 - Jan 23 with 1382 views | Herbivore |
| Saints fans debating what result they wanted last night on 13:49 - Jan 23 by itfcjoe |
I think one thing that is forgotten, is that our manager and team have navigated a season where it took 98 points to get promoted - that will help when it gets to the nitty gritty end of the season and points are dropped unexpectedly.
Martin has never finished anywhere bar mid table in the league, he's not had to deal with the pressure of expectation - their players don't have many promotions under their belts with a cursory look at them.
That's not to say they won't cope, they clearly have a huge amount of quality and more than us in that regard - but we've got a greater mental strength in our squad, and are proving that week in week out by just still being in a ludicrously fast paced race with teams with budgets and squad quality that dwarves ours....will our mental strength and fortitud be enough? Who knows, but it will get us close at the very least. |
We've also just navigated two very tough fixtures without the spine of our side and we've found a way to pick up 4 points. Feels like we're having/have partially had our tough spell with injuries and suspensions and we've found a way through with minimal damage. That also speaks to our mental strength. Be interesting to see how Saints respond to adversity when it comes. Going 5 unbeaten since the humbling defeat at Leeds when two of those games have been against Leicester is no mean feat. | |
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| Saints fans debating what result they wanted last night on 14:05 - Jan 23 with 1312 views | TRUE_BLUE123 |
| Saints fans debating what result they wanted last night on 13:49 - Jan 23 by itfcjoe |
I think one thing that is forgotten, is that our manager and team have navigated a season where it took 98 points to get promoted - that will help when it gets to the nitty gritty end of the season and points are dropped unexpectedly.
Martin has never finished anywhere bar mid table in the league, he's not had to deal with the pressure of expectation - their players don't have many promotions under their belts with a cursory look at them.
That's not to say they won't cope, they clearly have a huge amount of quality and more than us in that regard - but we've got a greater mental strength in our squad, and are proving that week in week out by just still being in a ludicrously fast paced race with teams with budgets and squad quality that dwarves ours....will our mental strength and fortitud be enough? Who knows, but it will get us close at the very least. |
Good point.
One thing that is making me feel good is that there are quite a lot of parallels with this season and last. We have proven before we can go on a run. Lets hope for one more. |  |
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| Saints fans debating what result they wanted last night on 15:13 - Jan 23 with 1151 views | BlueNomad |
Each game they play takes them closer to the end of that run...................... |  | | |
| Saints fans debating what result they wanted last night on 15:52 - Jan 23 with 1026 views | itfcjoe |
It amazes me that in neither forum have they realised that maybe the reason they weren't impressed with us or Leicester is that we were both playing one of the very toughest teams in the league | |
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| Saints fans debating what result they wanted last night on 16:19 - Jan 23 with 957 views | Herbivore |
| Saints fans debating what result they wanted last night on 15:52 - Jan 23 by itfcjoe |
It amazes me that in neither forum have they realised that maybe the reason they weren't impressed with us or Leicester is that we were both playing one of the very toughest teams in the league |
They've had a lengthy run of games against sides that either can't or don't stop them from playing, they haven't been used to seeing two sides on the same pitch who are capable of both playing good football and making life very hard for their opponent. | |
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| Saints fans debating what result they wanted last night on 16:29 - Jan 23 with 914 views | BiGDonnie |
| Saints fans debating what result they wanted last night on 12:13 - Jan 23 by Herbivore |
No issue with drawing at Rotherham as they are pretty hard to beat at home, but failing to beat them at home is not great. Of the like for like fixtures, think we've bettered their result in one (Watford away) and they've bettered our result in two (Leeds at home and Stoke away) but that is solely focusing on this run of games, if you go back further we bettered their results at home to Leicester and away to Sunderland and Middlesbrough. So in terms of like for like fixtures, we're ahead of them by a decent margin and they've yet to mirror some of our tougher fixtures, like trips to Leicester, Leeds, and West Brom.
Edit - Of the 20 games in that run, 13 have been against sides currently in the bottom half (due to playing Swansea twice). By contrast, we've played sides currently in the top half 11 times over the same period, including Leicester twice and Leeds and West Brom away. 8 of our last 10 games have been against sides currently in the top half versus 3 out of 10 for Saints. It's little wonder they've closed the gap really. [Post edited 23 Jan 12:23]
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Love this. Nicely put.
I think it really will go to the wire and I'm still very confident we'll be a success and finish in the top two. |  |
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