We return from another painfully long international break and we have an international match of sorts with Swansea visiting us from across the Severn Bridge. The last two times they visited St Mary, they went back home with their tails between their legs, having been beaten 5-0 in the Championship two years ago and 3-0 in the FA Cup last year. Last years’ cup win was probably the high point at St Mary’s during the reign of Ivan Juric, who is of course currently lording it near the top of Serie A with Atalanta. It’s a strange old world.

Like they were in the FA Cup game last year, Swansea are managed by Alan Sheehan, who was a coach of ours for a very short period of time. There is another Welsh connection because Sheehan was, of course, a coach attached to the legend from the Welsh mining village himself, Mr. Nathan Jones.

Swansea have been a pretty underwhelming team in the Championship for the last four years. The first two of those, of course, were under Russell Martin, where they finished in lower mid-table. Since Russell Martin left and the compensation argument became a thing, Swansea hasn’t really improved that much and have not looked like bothering the playoff situation, nor the line above the bottom three. Another connection between the clubs is, of course, three players in the current Saints squad with Ryan Manning, Flynn Downes, and Nathan Wood, all having played for Swansea at some point in time. Since we last played them, Swansea have had their equivalent of a Wrexham-style Hollywood takeover with Luka Modrić now a part owner, along with Snoop Dogg. Over the years, Snoop Dogg’s music has kind of passed me by, but I’ll always remember the Live 8 concert, which was being broadcast live on British television, and Snoop was on at 6pm. In full view of every kid in the country and at peak viewing time, he walked on stage, started waving at the crowd, and led them all in a chorus of “put your motherfucking hands in the air, put your motherfucking hands in the air.” There was clearly no delay on the live feed in what was quite a memorable moment.

Anyway, I digress. One question arising from the international break is that Josh Q has picked up a knock and didn’t actually play for Germany under-21s in either of their fixtures, so that may open the door for either Jack Stephens or THB to reclaim a place in the starting XI. A back three or back four is another question.

So, we need to score goals obviously. Do we reckon we’ve still spent the last two weeks successfully coming up with a plan to cater for the fact that our one serviceable centre-forward is out for the next three months?

Still’s main challenge today is to replace Ross Stewart, who got injured against Derby and had to wait a few days before finding out that his hamstring tear was, of course, more or less as bad as it could possibly be, ruling him out for three months at least. I find it absolutely infuriating that with sports science being so prevalent these days at professional clubs, no one could have somehow predicted that three games in eight days would be too much for a player who has been chronically injured for the last three years. It was always going to end like this. Before sports science, we had this thing called common sense, which would’ve told you that three games in eight days would be pushing it.

You can’t help but have seen the little packs that players wear to collect data on certain markers while they’re playing, which sometimes means we get these baffling substitutions on the hour mark when the player’s been playing well. We are that scientific about things now, but still, we thought it was a good idea to play Ross Stewart for three games in eight days. Absolutely mental, and I hope someone is having to answer some very probing questions about it all. Stewart should basically not be playing midweek games and while we’re all glad he did play against Sheffield United because he scored two goals, having got away with that, he should never have played against Derby, who we should’ve been good enough to beat without him. It’s frustrating from Will Still’s point of view because he had found a combination that looked like it was going to terrorise Championship defenses with Stewart flanked by Armstrong and Scienza, but now he’s back to square one with no natural replacement for the big man, if you don’t count Damien Downs – and I think you can safely not count Damion Downs.

Most importantly, at the centre of all this is the player himself who is now back into rehab yet again for another few months, from which he will emerge just three months from the end of his contract. Not an ideal situation and one that certainly could’ve been prevented. Someone in their wisdom probably thought that we could get him through the Derby game and then we’d have the international break for him to recover, but we took a gamble that we should not have taken with the player’s health, and look at where it’s got us. Good luck to Ross in his recovery.

It could simply be a case of slotting Cameron Archer into the team, or it could be moving Armstrong to a central position where he has always failed, but the hope would be that with three goals in three games, he would take that form and make a better fist of it. Failing that, it could be trying something from left field, and I note with interest Finn Azaz played as a False 9 for Ireland during the international break. I guess there is also the possibility of Joe Aribo being pressed into service. It is remarkable how many people think Aribo was regularly centre forward for Rangers when that wasn’t really the case, but he did happen to score a goal in a Europa League final while he was there. One option that surely won’t be used is to play Damion Downs, who surely cannot be risked until he has a degree of confidence that he’s not going to embarrass himself like he did at Liverpool and Derby. Being terrible in an away game is one thing, but don’t do it at home in front of nearly 30,000 Saints fans.

The importance of this game can’t really be underestimated because Saints need a performance at home. One home win in the league this season and none of the performances have been decent, and when you add that to one home win in the league for the entirety of last season, entertainment for our season ticket holders has been pretty thin on the ground. Our last decent home performance was against West Brom in the playoff semi-final, and that was getting on for 18 months ago. Saints still need a win and a performance today. And if we score one, we need to keep going and try and score a second and then try and score a third and not ever sit back into passive meandering bollocks football, which is what we’ve been playing for the majority of this season.

Team news and there’s a few surprises with Jelert and Welington at wing-backs and THB has been given the nod to replace Josh Q. The Crock Ness injury has given yet another chance to Cameron Archer. I’m guessing that Manning has been left out after his shitshow with the linesman at Derby and maybe for having played two games with Ireland.

Saints are lively from the start with Scienza showing his talent for getting chopped down and the ref plays a good advantage as the ball breaks to Jander and Armstrong picks it up on the edge of the box and it’s a decent effort but straight down the goalkeeper’s throat. Scienza is howing what he’s all about with a neat little reverse ball to send Charles galloping into the penalty area and he lashes his shot into the side netting.

Jelert has made a lively start at right back as well, breaking down the right and getting a dangerous looking cross in and it’s headed up in the air by a defender before Adam Armstrong turns and fired just wide via a deflection. From the resulting corner, Ronnie Edwards gets up at the back post and heads across but Swansea do enough to get it away. It’s looking like a matter of time now and Swansea don’t look like they have any sort of idea of how to deal with us.

Archer controls an aerial ball from Jander and plays a 1-2 with Charles and he works a space on his right foot and lashes into the crowd. That was actually really good centre forward play by Archer but the final shot was disappointing, having got into the position to shoot. Armstrong puts another effort wide following more good service from Jelert before Armstrong finds Scienza on the left and his low shot from the edge of the box, bounces past the goalkeeper and onto the post and comes back out to Archer and all he can do is shin it into the crowd. Has to score there really.

Unpeturbed, we continue to dominate the chances created and Charles tries to chip it into Archer in the penalty area but it goes over everybody and the Scienza picks it up by the corner flag and instead of playing backwards like we’ve been doing for the last five years, he turns and runs at right-back Key, nutmegs him and makes his way on the goal line and tries to pick out Armstrong, who gets bodied off of the ball by a defender and the chance goes. Back we come again a few minutes later with Scienza once again pissing past the right back and this time he decides to not trust anyone else and shoots for a narrow angle and it’s parried by a Vigouroux and it hits Armstrong at the back post and goes out for a goal kick.

It’s fully the Scienza show now and he breaks away down the left-hand side goes past Cabango who then takes a chunk out of him and gives away a free kick about 25 yards out and gets booked. The funny thing is he complains about getting booked when he has literally booted him up in the air, nowhere near the ball. Scienza is of course taking the free kick and whips towards the back post and it’s on target but Vigouroux gets up to tip it over the bar.

Scienza corner from the right is met at full pelt by Nathan Wood about 6 yards out and I’m up screaming “GOAAAAAAA…fuck” and it’s straight of the goalkeeper and parried away and cleared. We recycle the rebound out to Scienza on the right again and he beats another player before his cross is cleared away. How the fuck are we not winning this?

The second half starts in much the same way with Saints creating chances. Jelert gets his head up right back and plays a good ball for over the top of the defence for Scienza to run onto but his first time effort flies narrowly over the bar. Swansea seem to change their tactics a bit and are dropping deeper as we’ve found it very easy to play through them so far. In possession we’re not so good when confronted with this and the chances per minute slows right down.

Archer has fallen away badly in the second half and an injury to Jelert means that those two are the ones replaced, with Jay Robinson and Tom Fellows coming on. Both of the new arrivals looks lively, especially Robinson and he burrows into the box before finding Jander and he perfectly picks out Armstrong, whose low shot is parried out by Vigouroux and Jander has followed it in and reaches it first, pokes it over the goalkeeper and the fucker hits the inside of the post, rolls along the line and beats Jander’s desperate lunge to turn it into the net at the second attempt. Fucking fucks sake. How has he missed that?

With time now running out, Shea Charles has a low effort saved by the keeper before Still decides that more subs are necessary with the tiring Scienza and Welington coming off to be replaced with Wee Man and Azaz. Seven minutes of injury time start with us going nowhere for three of them before Swansea win a free kick roughly on halfway out on the left. It’s hard to believe we’re going to get the ultimate kick in the nuts and lose the fucking game after missing all these chances, so we are somewhat grateful that when the freekick comes in and Swansea inevitably win the header, that McCarthy catches it under the crossbar easily enough.

97 minutes and Nathan Wood wins a free kick out on the right as Swansea desperately chop him down and the ball is crossed in by Wee Man, headed out as far as Jander and the game ends as his shot is blocked. Fucks sake.

Well, that was an incredible performance to manage to not win that. It’s hard to lay too much blame at the manager’s door when your two strikers, lauded for their ability to score goals against Championship defenders, managed to miss the target or tamely hit the ball at the goalkeeper with every opportunity that was presented to them. On top of that, you need other players to chip in as well, and Nathan Wood has to score with his header, and Caspar Jander has to score in the second half rather than hit the post from three yards out with the goalkeeper on his arse. The creativity was there today, mainly thanks to Leo Scienza, who was absolutely outstanding throughout. He proved what else was missing today, namely that bit of good fortune, when Scienza’s shot in the first half bounced off the post. That chance or any number of other chances goes in, in that first half and we run out comfortable 3-0 winners. Didn’t happen, of course and Alan Sheehan and Swansea won’t be able to believe that they escaped with a point. They weren’t particularly tight defensively and had no attack whatsoever, but still managed to get away with a point.

Will Still won’t believe it either and it’s tough to pin anything on him. I did wonder if we needed three at the back at all times against such limited opposition but the bottom line is that if we had someone who could stick the ball in the fucking net, no one would be even thinking about the formation.

Defensively, we will looked good today against a limited threat, and it was nice to see THB back to something approaching his best. Elias Jelert was promising at right back as well but I wonder if he would be too lightweight to play in a back four, should we go with that formation in the future. The star of the show was Leo Scienza, who led Swansea in a merry dance, particularly in that first half, and it’s scandalous that his work did not result in a goal.

So, the strikers, the AA, Archer and Armstrong. Archer showed flashes of decent play but it’s the same old story with him. He has ten minutes where you think “oh here we go” and then it’s “where’s he gone” as he does a disappearing act. I don’t think he got anything on target all game and his best chance was a contradiction of expectations. Everyone’s opinion of Archer’s actual play is that his link play is not great but he’s a good finisher. His link play on his first half chance was excellent as he made something of Jander’s pass, knocking it down to Charles. His run was good off the back of that but then having worked a clear sight of goal, the finish was poor.

Adam Armstrong had one of those games – loads of shots, all scuffed, mostly blarted at the defender in front of him or ir if not, straight at the keeper for him to pick up. His role in the Jander miss will be overlooked by some but he had a free shot from ten yards which he scuffed, allowing the keeper to save when he shouldn’t have had a prayer. I even found myself thinking that maybe Damion Downs could’ve had 10 minutes at the end because he couldn’t possibly have been any worse and you never know, he may have bundled one in off his arse that got him up and running. The fact that he wasn’t used when we needed a goal, makes me wonder why on earth he was even on the bench.

Just looking at results and I’ve heard people say that it’s now four games unbeaten, but I would counter that by saying that it’s only one win in nine and it’s difficult to win many when you need ten big chances to score a goal. We are stuck with what we have at the top end of the pitch however, unless we want to delve into the free agent market, but that’s not as easy as it sounds because there’s no way that any free agent is going to step in and play next week and start putting the ball in the net. Luckily, we don’t have too long to dwell on the missed opportunity today as we go to Ashton Gate on Tuesday for what is a very tricky fixture against a decent side.

Up the fucking frustrating Saints.