Driving to the match the rain was splashing against the windscreen and the general atmosphere was miserable; little did I know it would be the theme for the rest of the afternoon. Southampton are a good footballing side and have many good players, with the exception of a certain Mr Davis, which meant it was always going to be difficult. As most of our key players have returned from injuries I felt we’d do well today and were due a good fluent performance. Keane had been saying all the right things through the week regarding how the players should be playing and that we need a bit more guile, I thought he’d have hammered these thoughts home and have the lads fired up to come out and entertain us. How wrong I was.
There was a one minute silence before the match in remembrance for the men and women who lost their lives in World War 2 fighting for our freedom, which was impeccably observed. I remember thinking at the time that this silence seems to fill everybody with passion and a sense of pride I thought that it might influence the players to work that little bit harder than other weeks. However, the first half was absolutely atrocious; it was so poor a fella sitting near me decided to get the Shields Gazette out however the crossword must have been too tricky for him so he put it away. Words can’t describe how poor the first half was and I can’t think of too many positives to be taken from the first forty-five.
Wallace looked lively when he got the ball and Connolly was working hard but far too many players were having an off day. To add insult to the first half Nyron the nugget had the ball down the right wing and in typical Nyron fashion he lost control of the ball and it went to a Southampton player. To be fair to Nyron he did close him down but I was slightly disappointed that he was cheered for this, if he had been a half decent footballer he wouldn’t have lost the ball in the first place therefore that challenge wouldn’t have come about.
Surely the second half couldn’t be any worse and it didn’t get any worse in fact it stayed exactly how it was, a horrible spectacle. The players weren’t able to complete simple passes we were all over the place. Key players like Kavanagh and Yorke should have just stayed at home because they had no influence on the game at all. Darryl Murphy was another of these players however; Murphy wasn’t having an off day as afore mentioned players were, he is just a very poor excuse for a footballer. I can’t see whatever it is that Keane sees in this lad, Murphy never seems to care, he doesn’t work hard for the team and for being over six foot the lad can’t win the ball in the air. It would help if he jumped off the ground though!
Half an hour left and we didn’t really look like scoring, then Kavanagh gets clattered just outside the box. Up steps Ross Wallace, with Davis in goal Wallace would just need to hit the target and he’d have a very good chance of scoring. He emphatically got the ball over the wall and out of the reach of Davis. Fantastic 1-0! It was the first time I’d seen Wallace score and not get a booking. Southampton piled the forwards on and to combat this Keano brought Leadbitter on to tighten up our midfield. However, the plan didn’t work out too well. We sat back and invited the pressure, it was only a matter of time until they scored and that was exactly what they did with a minute of normal time to go. A shot from Bale deflected off Caldwell and past Ward, Ward had made some fantastic saves to keep us in the game, one of which was a great save onto the post which rolled back across the line and Collins was able to hook it clear.
At the end of the match those fickle fans among us, who must have thought Roy Keane would come in wave his magic wand and have us up the top, booed the players off. I know all to well that the players were rubbish but booing them off at this stage is not going to solve anything.
MOTM – Darren Ward. It says a lot about our performance when the goalkeeper is man of the match.