Saints 3 – 2 West Ham: Forever Blowing His Whistle

I had kind of hoped the first game I’d blog about would be a subdued affair with few talking points, to ease me in to this format. And having gone 6 home games without scoring, that was what I was expecting. However, as we know, what transpired was 90 minutes of ups and downs, drama, passion, emotion, anxiety, frustration, relief, jubilation, basically everything football has to offer. So here goes, this could be fun.

It’s very easy to over analyse matches. Very often matches get lost in contexts of other matches, league tables, issues surrounding both clubs… It becomes a bit part in a bigger story. Therefore, before I begin trying to break down what happened on Saturday, I just want to say Saints V West Ham was simply a great game in isolation. Ignoring the Chinese investors, the van Dijk saga, transfers yet to take place, whatever was happening elsewhere in the league at the time… None of that mattered. The passion from the fans, the commitment and aggression from the battling players, the drama and fluctuating nature of the game… This is how I picture pure football, the working man’s sport. This is what I imagine it being like in The Dell’s heyday and it was a great atmosphere to be a part of, a far cry from the majority of matches last season.

Saturday started off positively when my Dad and I unexpectedly encountered no traffic on the way to the game, despite having cruise ships descending on the city as if we were under attack from some sort of luxury armada.

For the first time, I found myself in Block 40 of the Northam; I’ve often found myself up the other end of the stadium due to who I’ve watched games with. What a great experience that was, stood for the whole game, chanting, cheering, jumping, it would be amazing to have that replicated in the Chapel. Of course, the first controversial decision of the day was the return of the clapper things. I personally didn’t use mine as I have something called hands instead… It will make a nice decoration in my room though. Personally, I’m not sold on them, but it’s hard to argue against the fact they’ve made the atmosphere better for the first two games of this season. They’ve clearly been introduced because the club deem the atmosphere too quiet in the stadium, which is a little bit embarrassing, though I do think Pellegrino is restoring it without the needs for these crappy happy clappy things.

The team sheet threw no real surprises at us, it is nice to have a settled team that’s building cohesion and understanding with every game. Of course, the main news was the Pellegrino handed a debut to former Juventus midfielder Mario Lemina. So how did he do? The first 15 minutes was unconvincing shall we say. A couple of passes went horribly wrong, but he soon bedded in, had a positive impact and it was a very strong debut performance. He played deeper than Romeu surprisingly but that freed up Romeu, and you could tell he appreciated having an effective partner to relieve pressure. Lemina doesn’t shy away from a tackle. He even came away from his first game with a battle scar down his shin after a horror tackle from Mark Noble, who won West Ham a free kick for it… Hopefully retrospective action will be taken as it was a dangerous studs up challenge.

It was a rare miss by referee Lee Mason, who stole the show with a string of big calls, for once all in our favour, though it has to be said we weren’t lucky, West Ham were just plain bullies, inevitably born out of frustration. An embarrassing 4-0 loss to Man United at Old Trafford was not how Slaven Bilić planned to start the season, and they suffered a further setback when Winston Reid had to be stretchered off during the warmup. The game didn’t get off to the greatest start for them when déjà vu struck.

In this fixture last season, debutant Gabbiadini beat newly departed Fonte in the 12^th minute to score one of our goals of the season up the Northam end to put us 1-0 up (before losing 3-1 but that’s not the point.). This time Gabbiadini beat Fonte in the 11^th minute to score a scuffed shot that rolled past Joe Hart in the Northam goal to put us 1-0 up. Not quite as spectacular, but the celebration was huge as finally we had ended our nine hour and fifteen minute run without a home goal!

How did West Ham respond? Well after offering nothing for the first third of the game, new signing Marko Arnautović just felt like clattering his elbow into Jack Stephens’ neck. It was reckless, intentional and rightly saw red with no complaints from the Hammers. Not really the way to win over the fans of your new club is it? But it’s ok, he wrote an apology on his Instagram story…

‘I WANT TO APOLOGISE TO ALL THE WEST HAM FANS JUST WANT TO LET U KNOW I DIDNT WANT TO LET MY TEAM DOWN AND U FANS SO PLEASE SORRY COYIS A BIG APOLOGIE TO YOU ALL’

You’d think with all the alone time in the changing room he could have put some effort into checking spelling, punctuation and grammar.

Five minutes later and another West Ham foul. Davis pulls away with the ball from Fonte in the box, so Southampton’s former skipper who’s been receiving the pantomime boos all game, decides to earn some cheers from the home faithful and pulls down Davis. Penalty.

The initial excitement at being awarded a penalty suddenly becomes anxiety when Dušan Tadić stands over it. Why is he still on penalties? Genuine question. His penalties are weak and even the ones he scores are unconvincing. I didn’t make many games last season thanks to my first year at Kingston University, but I still made enough to see him miss two… Inter Milan and Hull City. Those aren’t the only ones he’s missed either.

In fairness, he converted to put us 2-0 up. It was in no way emphatic. Straight down the middle, clipping Joe Hart’s legs, very close to rebounding back out. But it’s another goal and we’ll take that. 2-0 up before halftime, comfortable lead, everyone’s thinking we can get a few more before the final whistle to collect our first 3 points in style.

What were we thinking? This is Saints and we never make things easy for ourselves. Romeu manages to lose Antonio on the edge of the box, Forster parries away the shot but it falls to Hernandez who fires in. 2-1. People are blaming Forster, maybe he could’ve been better with the parry but it was a deflected shot he was reacting to. In truth, Bertrand was slow to react to the rebound.

Halftime. 2-1. Entertaining game but frustrating to have conceded our first goal of the campaign against 10 men in a match we were cruising.

The second half starts and I don’t know what Pellegrino has said but we’re not good. It honestly looked like they had the man advantage. A very distinct repetitive pattern formed. We pass the ball around, tika-taka, around the edge of West Ham’s box until we lose possession and they hit us on the counter. It was like watching Puel’s reign all over again. In this poor spell, Saints were lucky not to concede a penalty when the ball struck Stephens’ raised arm.

Eventually, the inevitable happens and West Ham equalise. A Cresswell cross finds Sakho who’s volley draws a world class reflex save from Forster, who tips it onto the bar, only for it to fall to Hernandez again. 2-2.

How have we let this happen? We were all over them, eased into the lead, and they were down to ten men. Now they’ve pulled themselves level. We throw on Ward-Prowse, Long and Austin to try and regain our advantage. Gabbiadini and Redmond have both hit the crossbar from distance in this half but as the clock ticks to 90 minutes it’s still 2-2. Typical Saints. Letting an advantage slip. Not making the most of opportunities. Still we plucked away, the crowd roaring with encouragement.

Here we go, another Ward Prowse cross into the box that we won’t win, oh wait Yoshida’s there, Zabaleta has bundled him over, the ref points to the spot, penalty!

This never happens to Saints. Two penalties in one game? A chance to score a last minute winner? What was I witnessing? My hands were behind my head, anxious. Joe Hart was doing his best to intimidate Austin, he reminded me of the cocky kid in the half time relay who then skied his shot.

It was always going in, Austin is just so cool and calm with how he takes them. 3-2. Helps that Joe Hart dived completely the wrong way. Austin later said how Mark Noble had told him that Joe Hart knew what way to go, so he stuck it the other side. That’s embarrassing for the Hammers.

The stadium erupts with the loudest cheer, people jumping around, screaming, crying. What a game. What a win. But it really needn’t have been that intense at the end. We should’ve had it wrapped up before half time. We don’t care though. Final whistle goes and everyone’s still celebrating, people are even singing along to that ‘Our Way’ song. And to top off a great day, we’re first on Match of the Day, even if they do focus on West Ham…

The feel good factor is back at St Mary’s. The excitement is back at St Mary’s. The goals are back at St Mary’s. 4 points from 6 is not a bad start and Pellegrino is definitely increasing our attacking intent, even if we do have a tendency to return to old habits. We do lack an aerial presence, but with Hoedt reportedly passing his medical and van Dijk training with the Under 23’s, maybe that will be rectified soon enough. Our midfield is certainly more balanced with the addition of Lemina and we can finally go to a home match expecting to score again.

A busy week lay ahead for Saints now, with our third home match in a row seeing us take on Wolves in the Carabao Cup, before we hit the road to Huddersfield who come off the back of winning their first two ever Premier League games. Two difficult tests. I’ve just sorted my ticket for tomorrow night so I look forward to blogging about it. I hope you’ve enjoyed this first effort and I’d really appreciate any feedback!

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Since I started writing this post news has broken that Southampton FC’s Senior Recruitment Officer, Bill Green, had died, aged 66. I’d like to express my condolences to his family, friends and colleagues, and to thank Bill for his contribution to the club. He has played a massive part of our rise through the leagues and is responsible for a lot of the gems we’ve scouted and signed. A popular figure at Staplewood who will be missed.

Bill Green

22.12.1950 – 21.08.2017