As the week progressed, the euphoria of last week’s win started to fade away. The atmosphere and celebrations at St Mary’s were special, a combination of relief, pride and excitement. The belief and optimism was back, and another Saints Great Escape had just begun. However, as the dust settled on the victory against Bournemouth, the permutations started arising, clarifying our job was far from being over, and we still might have started it all too late.
It was a difficult week for me, having to say goodbye to my girlfriend on Friday for essentially 4.5 months, I won’t go into that, but I was looking forward to my trip to Merseyside to cheer me up. Except my ticket didn’t turn up, and as 90Min had purchased it on my behalf, I was going to be unable to provide the ID required for a duplicate. I therefore apologise for the lack of 90Min vlog and upload on my YouTube Channel. I may be going to Swansea, though won’t know until I head back to my uni flat tomorrow to see if my ticket has been delivered.
It helped raise my spirits that the day’s results went favourably, though it was sad to see Stoke become the first team officially relegated. The worst team in the league, and yet they still managed to beat us 2-1 and hold us to a 0-0 draw this season. West Brom continued their remarkable revival with a 1-0 win against Spurs, but thankfully Bournemouth did their job for us for a second consecutive week, beating Swansea 1-0. We knew then, going into the game, that a draw or win would lift us out of the relegation zone above Swansea, going into Tuesday’s crunch clash.
I was gutted to not be in the crowd cheering us on, but our fans came over loud and proud on BT Sport. Especially compared to Everton, a club in turmoil with tensions building around Sam Allardyce’s position. I’m sure some of their fans were hoping for a loss yesterday, just to strengthen their point. I could moan about that, but frankly I felt that way going into the reverse fixture which we uncharacteristically won 4-1. Had Unsworth’s Everton resembled a team that day, they would have won, Pellegrino would have been sacked in November and we would most likely be in mid table security by now. I was inwardly disappointed when we won that game – retrospectively justifiably – so can understand the mindset.
The first half was very dull, especially for such a pivotal game. It wasn’t a surprise with the teams put out. Everton were without Rooney and Walcott, while we went conservative and brought in Højbjerg for Redmond. Having said that, we fashioned the best chances with Pickford saving an Austin volley and a Romeu deflected effort. All Everton could muster was a Davies shot wide and a Tosun header over. We were by far the better team, we had control and confidence. The game was there for the taking, Hughes recognising this at half time and bringing on Redmond.
Redmond has faced a lot of criticism this season, especially at Spurs away when he was subjected to chants of ‘you’re not fit to wear the shirt’. Recently he has looked brighter, and I was disappointed not to see him start. His second half performance though was sublime, and exactly the type of thing Pep Guardiola was reminding him he was capable of at the Etihad. He ran at players, took his man on, used great footwork, had the confidence to shoot, and his header was very well taken for his first goal of the season. The patience and awareness showed real quality, as did Tadić waiting for Cédric’s overlap, and the right back’s pin point cross to the far post.
You know, at half time I put out this tweet:
Well guess what, we added pace with Redmond, Cédric finally managed a cross and we scored first. Exactly what we needed. The Saints fans erupted, I even spotted Gabbiadini celebrating which was a surprise. A massive goal that lifted us up to 16th above Huddersfield. We were doing it. Everton didn’t look like scoring, they didn’t even look like they wanted to. 1-0 to the Saints, and our first two consecutive victories for a year was on the cards. As was our first win at Goodison for over 20 years.
Everton improved marginally, with Niasse firing a cross just over everybody, but we still looked a class above with Pickford tipping away a Bertrand cross. The warning signs were there though when Yoshida went into the book for a high boot, a needless mistake, especially up that end of the pitch. Worse was to come. Following a saved Ward-Prowse freekick, the ball was cleared up to Niasse, who was then up-ended by Yoshida. Another needless foul, and one that unsurprisingly saw him booked and off. You could see the pain in his face as he went off, knowing what he’d done. Rumours have been rife this week of him leaving in the summer, and he’ll hope that that won’t be his last involvement with a club he clearly holds close to his heart. He will of course miss Swansea away though, which is a worry.
With the clock running down, Saints started to defend valiantly, and Redmond even had a better chance than the home team could create. However, a late needless tackle by Hoedt on Coleman gifted Everton a freekick in prime Leighton Baines territory. It was a great hit, but an even better save from Alex McCarthy, who tipped it over with his out-stretched left arm. He made a vital save against Bournemouth 7 days earlier, and he did it again yesterday. In the week I voted for him in the Daily Echo’s Player of the Season Award, and quite frankly it’d be a disgrace if he didn’t win. To have come in and got on with his job, making no errors and pulling off game-defining and potentially season defining saves game after game…
He made another important punch away from the resultant corner, a passage of play which saw Højbjerg run it down to the corner flag. We thought it was all over at that point, but Cédric’s injury at the start of the additional 4 minutes meant there was still more time for Jon Moss to add on. This gave him time to award a free kick to the Toffees from a Redmond non-foul, which he allowed to be taken yards ahead of where the alleged foul happened.
The ball found its way along the left wing to Niasse, who’s cross was punched away by McCarthy to be met by Bertrand. Now, everyone knows that ball should be going out to Row Z, even he does looking back. But instead, his clearance/pass went straight to Gueye, who squared it to Davies… The first time shot was deflected off an attempted block from Hoedt, which sent the ball in the opposite direction to the one McCarthy had covered. 1-1. Absolute heartbreak.
I can’t quite describe the emotion felt at that point; if I’d have been vlogging, it wouldn’t have been a pretty sight. This tweet seconds after full time sums up how it felt.
The fact is we would’ve taken a point before the game. We go into Tuesday’s game above Swansea and out of the relegation zone. It was more than I expected, but less than we deserved. We can moan about referees, we have no doubt been hard done by at Man City, Watford, vs Chelsea at home, and yesterday, but we can’t blame them if we do go down. Over the course of the season we have struggled to see a game out and failed on so many occasions. Our concentration levels seem to drop before the whistle, and we make mistakes that cost us. The luck hasn’t been on our side, but really we only have ourselves to blame.
Having said that, for all our hard work yesterday, we deserved a win, and more importantly three points. So though we still gained a point, which is good by our standards at Everton, it felt like the most painful of defeats. That was the hardest to take goal since Ibra’s in the cup final last year.
But what can you do? Now we just have to turn our heads towards Tuesday night, and hope that the goal hasn’t damaged our confidence. We need to take that anger and frustration to the Liberty, and go hard at Swansea. I can’t see a point being enough for us, as Swansea are more likely to beat Stoke than we are Man City. Yes Huddersfield have just held them to a draw, but that has probably ruled the Terriers out of the fight, and City still have records to break. I can’t quite believe the size of our next match – essentially a relegation play-off. I’m praying my ticket will have turned up and I’ll be there to cheer us on, if not I might try and make it to the St Mary’s screening; failing that, the pub. Even the thought of it makes me anxious and nervous, this wait and Tuesday especially is going to drag. At least my finger nails will have time to grow back before I chew them down again during the next 90. A week today we’ll know our fate, hopefully we’ll be all but safe come Tuesday night.
I’ll be back in midweek with another blog post.
GAMES IN WHICH WE’VE THROWN A WIN AWAY (UPDATED LIST)
- Brighton (A)
- Arsenal (H)
- Huddersfield (H)
- Palace (H)
- Watford (A)
- Spurs (H)
- Arsenal (A)
- Chelsea (H)
- Everton (A)
Points dropped = 21. Do we have the bottle to not throw away our Premier League status?
Owen The Saints 