Smal

Well if he’s useless we’d have to pay his wages for 4 years I guess. Maybe that kind of thing doesn’t matter post-takeover like.

Can’t see the Wood’s for the trees’s

That’s surprising tbh but Howe obviously knows something we don’t

I like it a lot but ASM is going to have to actually press Matip and Van Dijk or they’ll control the game easily.

Wonder who’ll be up front for us. If you don’t press Liverpool’s CBs you’re asking for an absolute pasting.

Think we'll give this a good go but Liverpool will be clinical as fuck. 1-4.

I know Man U have just scored but… Can say what you want about the players but tactically this is so bad as well from them. Chelsea wing backs have been in acres of space all night with no attempt to do anything about it. Absolutely no surprise that one has crossed it for the other to score.

Reece James is so good.

This Real midfield is awful

Seems like a bit of a MOTD player to me.

JWP would be very good in the role Longstaff was occupying yesterday, but from the right rather than left. Given how garbage our crossing in open play is him linking up with Trippier on the right side would improve that no end. He’s not a particularly progressive player in terms of his passing or carries (we already have Bruno, Willock and Joelinton who are very good at that anyway) but he ranks ridiculously high in shot-creating actions and xA for a poor team like Southampton. It’s something we’re missing.

ASM will come good with coaching. Whilst he can improve in this regard I don’t think he’s particularly unfit. The main reason he’s often blowing out his arse is because he attempts so many sprints in a game. Good coaching is what will see him start to pick his chances to do these full sprints more. Take the low opportunity sprints out of his game and you’ll get more out of him defensively and offensively I think. Whilst not everything came off you could tangibly see this yesterday and I thought he was excellent when we moved him from left wing to striker after 30 minutes.

Watching the highlights again and it’s really noticeable that we had lots of willing forward runners yesterday; especially when Bruno gets on the ball. We really lacked this for a long time and just relied on Wilson and ASM instead. I think Willock is a must for us at the moment. The one who needs upgrading is Longstaff, but you can just play Joelinton there when Wilson is back. Bruno at the base of midfield in a high press makes so much sense. There’s no need for Shelvey to be a starter at all. He can be a decent rotation option.

I actually think he’s all right and is getting better; just not at the rate he’d need to in order to be a squad player here next season.

He does but doing it there is just scandalous. Anyone else in our squad falls over trying that and he did it 1 v 1 vs the keeper

Did he really do a ball roll with his studs with the touch before his finish? He's ludicrous.

I'm not crying

is this love

Norwich are an embarrassment to the sky bet.

Love Miggy's attitude.

It is. We're throwing players forward from midfield and it's great. No need for Shelvey to come back into this team at all. Longstaff has been reasonably poor but he makes runs and makes a lot more sense in this team imo.

ASM's been decent up top imo Much more comfortable with this than playing Chris Wood.

That is a disgusting finish

He literally got an assist for the first and then helped set up the second by dropping deep (“wandering all over the place” lol) and spinning his man. Dwight Gayle or Chris Wood would fall over trying to do that.

Really good play though . Norwich are appalling.