West
Brom at home in a game that we have to win if we want to have anything
approaching a decent home record this year. So far of course, we have 100%
record in the negative, having been thrashed by Tottenham. West Brom should
provide a threat to that record being a newly promoted side who so far, only
picked up one point.

Slaven
Bilic is their manager now, trying to rebuild his reputation having most
recently, managed at the shit show that is West Ham. Whenever I think of Bilic,
I think of what a horrible bastard he was as a player, legendarily feigning
injury to get Laurent Blanc sent off in the World Cup semi-final, which meant
he missed the final in his own country. That sort of shit should never be
forgotten. As a manager and as a pundit however, I’ve always quite liked the
guy and he is certainly one who I hope does relatively well. I do think he is
on a hiding to nothing this season though as the team at his disposal doesn’t
appear to have any particularly strong areas of the pitch. He did make one good
decision this summer and it’s one that we saw coming a mile off. As soon as
West Brom got promoted then he obviously decided that the piss taker that is
Charlie Austin, was not going to play a minute in the Premier League and so far
the fat lard has been conspicuously absent from the match day 18. I fully
expect him to be on his way to a desperate Championship club before that
particular transfer window ends because there’s bound to be a club out there
that doesn’t do its research and thinks that they are getting prime Charlie
Austin from when he was at QPR.  He’s
earned a lot of money off the back of that one season with both Saints and West
Brom are falling for that one in the not too recent past. 

It’s
been more upbeat around Saints since the win against Burnley. It looks like we
have another midfielder coming in through the door in the form of Ibrahima
Diallo, a 21-year-old Frenchman who plays for Brest (insert your own joke
here).  I am waiting for the sweepstake
to start on when someone will say “he was always our first choice”. Like
Mohammed Salisu, this is another young player with not a huge amount of
experience so we should not expect him to pull up trees straight away. For me,
I can see him playing this season when either JWP or Romeu are unavailable for
whatever reason and other than that, being restricted to substitute
appearances, usually when we want to avoid Oriol launching someone and being
sent off. 

Talking
of JWP – along with Danny Ings he has retained his place in the England squad.
Gareth Southgate has at least picked a left back this time but needless to say,
it’s not Ryan Bertrand but Ben Chilwell who has proved his fitness playing
about 12 minutes for Chelsea. I expect that even Ryan himself knows but that
ship has sailed. 

There
was a time of course in the not too distant past, when this game was looking
like the one that might have fans back in the ground but that has all gone to
shit because of the spike in Covid cases, mainly up north. There is a lot of
talk a while ago about independence from Scotland. Can we just bring the Border
down south and declare independence from the north. I wonder if they might open
up Grounds in areas that are not in covid hotspots before they open up the
rest. Maybe it would encourage all those fucking idiots in the street at 10 pm
in Liverpool to actually follow some of the guidelines, no matter how stupid
they appear to be.  It should be about
getting as many businesses open as soon as possible and if it’s in the South then
so be it.  Won’t happen though. 

Team
news and as you were.  Vestergaard
deservedly kept his place and Redmond was predictably on the bench with Djenepo
given another chance on the left.  Fat
shit Austin didn’t make the bench – he was sat at his hairdressers playing
monopoly. 

Saints
carve out a decent chance with their first real attack with the ball being
worked to Bertrand and though he never really looked confident, he got the shot
away but it was at a comfortable height for the keeper to parry.

After a decent bit of possession, Vestergaard pings a
superb crossfield ball over to KWP who produces a first touch which takes him past
the full back and he tries to find Ings with the pass but a defender gets a toe
to it and it looks for all the world like an own goal but Johnstone pulls have
a great save and the ball drops to Adams about 6 yards out.  He tries to get it past the goalkeeper but
once more, the force field that goes up in front of goal whenever Adams has the
ball is there again and we get a corner.

West Brom do manage to get in our half
for the first time in so it allows us break it up and hit them on the break and
Adams is absolutely cynically taken out by Livermore as cynically as you like.  The free kick is eventually delivered by JWP
and Ings get up ahead of the defence and flicks it goalwards and Johnstone gets
down to his right to pull off a really good save.  I do hope isn’t going to be one of those games
with a bastard in goal saves everything. 

One of the features of the way Ralph
wants the team to play is illustrated next as the ball is with the West Brom
keeper and the Saints forwards have dropped off but as soon as he throws the
ball into Sawyers in midfield then Ings, JWP and Adams are all over him.  The first two combine to nick the ball and it eventually
breaks to Adams who gets to the edge of the box before hitting the force field
again and dragging his shot wide of the left-hand post. 

A Saints attack breaks down with Romeu
playing a poor pass and West Brom try to go forward which just gives us the
opportunity to win the ball back which we duly do through Bednarek.  One pass from JWP breaks the midfield lines
and Adams, Ings and Djenepo are 3v3 with Adams on the ball.  He tries to play a 1-2 with Ings but the ball
back to him deflects off the defender and goes to Djenepo on the edge of the
box.  The box of tricks produces a Cruyff
turn totally sends Livermore out of the stadium before firing into the net past
the keeper with his left foot.  Brilliant
bit of skill by the man from Mali and we have the lead that we deserve. 

It’s disappointing to get to half-time only
being 1-0 up but if we start the second half right then the second shouldn’t be
too long in coming and then it should be plain sailing.  However, Bilic makes a sub at half time and
West Brom are much more aggressive, rather than just sitting there waiting to
get beat. We struggle for 10 minutes and West Brom have a shout for a penalty
which probably would’ve been given last week but there are more common sense
attached the rules now and Parreira’s freekick clearly hits Bertrand’s arm but as
it was flicked on right in front of him, today this is just a corner which we
survive. 

Djenepo appears to be limping so he comes
off for Redmond which was probably in the plan anyway.  Saints are playing very patiently and keeping
the ball very well having survived this initial 10 minutes of West Brom
pressure and then it’s over. Virtually the whole team is involved in the build
up with KWP featuring strongly before Bertrand and Redmond combine to find
Armstrong who has made a run from right to left and his cross is met on the
edge of the box by of all people, Oriel Romeu who crashes a hip high volley
into the net, giving Johnstone no chance at all. What the fuck has happened
here.  What a goal.  It is the kind of goal that would be drooled
over for all eternity if a big club scored it.

To be honest, the referee could have
blown the whistle at that point because there was no way that West Brom would get
back into the game. It is not often that we are this comfortable. We content
ourselves with playing ball around really nicely which brings a good chance to
the superb KWP but he side foots it wide.  Shane Long comes on for Adams for the last 10
minutes and the only real chance it’s a JWP freekick from the left which
Bednarek flicks goalwards and the ball hits Johnstone (who looked like he was
just trying to protect his face) and flies narrowly over the bar narrowly over
the bar.  It’s handy as a keeper if you
can be lucky as well as good.  The End,
job done, 3 points. 

In
summary, that was a pretty perfect performance for this type of game against
this type of opposition. A nice comfortable 2-0 win, scoring in the first half,
putting it to bed in the second half and then having no alarms as the game is
played out. There was a brief 10 minute spell after half time when West Brom
was suddenly more aggressive and it took us a while to get to grips with that
but once we did, it was as comfortable as any home winning the Premier League
for us is ever going to be. 

It
was a day that was full of positives than a clean sheet, goals from other
sources other than Danny Ings and even the news that we have managed to sign
another player with the Ibrahim Diallo deal confirmed by Ralph straight after
the game. All in all, an excellent days work which Ralph was visibly delighted
with. 

West
Brom were more or less exactly as I expected them to be, not much potency up front,
nothing but hard work in midfield and a dodgy defence and if it hadn’t been for
Sam Johnstone in goal who pulled of several notable slaves, we could’ve been
out of sight at half-time. The save he made from Ings header was right out of
the top drawer. 

Though
there will be tougher tests ahead, the Bednarek and Vestergaard central defensive
partnership looked good once more and KWP again proved what an absolute snip he
is looking like at £12 million quid. This is the same fee that we paid for Diallo
so hopefully he will prove to be the same. 

As
I said earlier, having different goalscorers was a great thing.  Djenepo took his goal superbly with a
wonderful bit of skill which threw everybody, including the West Brom keeper. Romeu’s
goal was unbelievable, purely because it was him.  Oriol usually reserves kicking things that
hard to opposition players but fair play to the man.  It would’ve been a fantastic moment if the fans
have been in the ground. 

Elsewhere,
the forwards could both have scored but as said, Ings was denied by the keeper
and Adams was denied by the invisible forcefield which seems to spring up in
front of the goal every time he has a shot. 
It’ll come.  Djenepo was lively
though he did appear to limp off which is hopefully not a problem that’ll keep
him out of the next game in a couple of weeks. 

International
break now and we have 6 points from 4 games which is better than our usual starts.  When we come back though, hopefully with a
clean bill of health, we have a difficult trip to Chelsea who have
unsurprisingly, not been firing on all cylinders so far as they bed in their
team of Galacticos.  Oh for a repeat of
last year.