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Wednesday
26th December 2001, 12.00pm |
FA Premiership, The St
Mary’s Stadium |
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SOUTHAMPTON 1 (Beattie 56)
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Jones P, Bridge, Dodd,
Williams, Lundekvam, Delap, Telfer, A Svensson, Marsden, Beattie, Pahars (Ormerod 81) |
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Sheringham |
Ferdinand |
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Poyet (Rebrov 86) |
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Ziege |
Anderton
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Freund (Sherwood 71) |
Taricco |
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Gardner (Davies 75) |
Richards |
King
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Sullivan
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Subs not
used: Keller, Mr Ed |
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TOTTENHAM HOTSPUR 0 |
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Referee: - Peter Jones
(Leicester) |
Attendance: - |
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The dismal festive period continued with a poor display at the relegation haunted Southampton, who were just about the worst team we have played this season. It is now three defeats in four league matches, and the great one needs to work his magic over the team soon to stop the slump that is threatening to destroy all the hope generated by our good displays and results early in the season. It is too early to panic, but we need something better than this, and soon.
While the Goons entertained Chelsea on what should have been our Local Derby day “and we will fight for ever more because of Boxing Day” and all that, we had the early morning schlep down to the South Coast and that big club down there – you know the one, that one who has a solitary FA Cup win nearly 30 years ago to show for their efforts over the last 100 odd years.
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Fortunately message board regular “Jacob Goldberg” – he of Jacob’s wall at the Northumberland Arms - offered a lift and saved me from having to get to WHL for 7.45am and the WallyBus. The new ground is nothing special – cold and characterless, cast no doubt in the image of their repulsive Chairman Wupert & Jacob kept claiming that bits of the roof kept falling on him. The ground can best be described as a poor man’s Pride Park. |
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Spurs started with the team that finished the match against Ipswich – Les in for Rebrov up front, Poyet in for Davies in the advanced midfield role and Ant Gardner keeping Mr Ed from grazing at the back.
Southampton lined up with a load of crap that would find difficulty getting into most first division teams, and have our saviour Hoddle to thank for keeping them afloat last season, although I don’t imagine it will be long before they find their real level. The ungrateful mongrels did not share this view of Hoddle’s contribution to them having one last season in the top flight and they managed to slag the great man, along with Richards at every opportunity. This made for a cup-tie atmosphere, where they treated this as their cup final. It is with pity rather than animosity that I view Southampton.
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Ted did well to win the toss so that the sun was in the eyes of Welsh midget Jones in the Saints goal in the first half and Spurs attacked the Northam Stand, behind which the Spurs fans were gathered. The game was quite open in the first few minutes – Spurs
building well through Sheringham and Anderton, while Southampton were content
to kick the ball into touch trying to find wide players. |
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Our refereeing nightmares looked to be showing no signs of going away. Gardner tracked Pahars back and the little Latvian fell over as Ant outpaced him. The ref who was 10 yards behind waved play on, but for some reason the lino who was 30 yards ahead decided to flag for a foul, and the ref went from not thinking it was a foul to booking Gardner. As per my previous observations on referees – this one was short and balding, so it was probably only to be expected.
Another baldie – Deodorant headed Marsden is one of my least favourite players in the league – being a nasty dirty bastard & a talentless Muppet. Marsden did one of his special late tackles on Treacle in the first 10 minutes, and only received a talking to from the ref. Deodorant head was at it again later in the match, and the confrontation sparked some angry exchanges between Strachan and Gorman.
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Southampton did not manage one shot on target in the whole of the first half – a dismal effort even for them. Despite not playing with the fluency that characterised our play earlier in the season, Spurs were very much in the driving seat in the first half, without creating the number of clear-cut chances our possession merited. Much of the game was tight and scrappy in the midfield, but what football that was played, was played by Spurs. Poyet had a good effort that was blocked for a corner, and Anderton should have done better than prod the ball over the bar when set up by Sheringham 8 yards out. Shaggy combined well again with Sheringham, to find himself through to the left-hand by-line, but he disappointingly squared to no one. |
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Sheringham was also played in with plenty of time on the ball, but unfortunately he took too long and too many touches and Southampton defenders managed to block his effort when he really should have done better.
As the half came to a close, Ferdinand had our best chance. A Poyet header from a corner was only half cleared to him, but although he hit his shot well, he only found the side netting when he should have scored.
At half time, while it was disappointing not to be in the lead, there did not appear to be any obvious danger from Southampton. Sully and Gorman came out early to practice dealing with high balls with the sun now in Sully’s eyes for the second half & although Sully thought about wearing a cup, he later disposed of it.
The second half started with chances at either end as the game appeared to open up. Sully, who it is fair to say has not looked as good has he did last season, did a brilliant save from Svensson after he was put through the middle of the Spurs defence with a great pass from Pahars.
Spurs should have taken the lead a minute or so later when Freund who’d found himself over on the right wing, delivered a perfect cross which Ferdinand met well at the near post and many of us at the other end thought that the ball had gone in, but unfortunately for us, the ball went inches wide. Two very presentable chances for the great man, which in his current excellent form you would have expected him to have scored from.
An intelligent bit of play by Gardner saw him chase what seemed a ball that was going out up the left wing, he raced on to the ball and hooked it back in play as their keeper clattered into him. He found Sheringham inside the box, but Ted could not get enough power on his effort towards the keeper-less goal and a defender cleared off the line. Three great chances, four if you include Anderton’s shot over – and we really should have been well in front and clear, but it was not to be.
Southampton had a corner that was hooked out of the danger area to the halfway line. Tubby defender Williams ooofed the ball up into the air to the edge of the box. Sully went to claim what seemed a routine ball, but Beattie without a defender with him, jumped with Sully and headed the ball through his hands and into the net. We looked at the ref hoping he would blow for a foul, which is given more often than not when forwards jump with keepers but the whistle never came.
In hindsight, Sully should probably have punched the ball but whether he should have had a covering defender jumping with Beattie or whether he was unsighted by the sun – he did n’t and we were a goal down.
Minutes later, Sully was at his best to keep us in the match when he saved low down to his right from Pahars and it must be said that although he was at fault for the goal, he was excellent otherwise.
In attempting to get back in the match, Spurs did not show much fluency or cohesion – simple balls were being misplaced and runners were not being found, although Jones was at his best to tip over an excellent 20 yarder from Anderton.
Like Charlton the other week, Southampton treated this match like a cup final and their fans next to us were very vocal throughout the match, while the Spurs support which was good throughout the first half, seemed to fall away with the team as we sat and contemplated the horror of losing to crap like Southampton as it unfolded in front of us.
If there is one element of Hoddle’s management that I’m not entirely happy with (although I trust the great man knows what he is doing) is his use of substitutes. With 20 minutes to go, on came Timmah complete with his oversized wooden head in place of Freund. I can’t imagine Southampton were shitting themselves at that. Our record signing and scorer & creator of goals in recent weeks Rebrov remained on the bench, as he did a couple of minutes later when Gardner made way for Davies and we re-jigged things to a 4-4-2. Davies, fair enough. But I don’t think anyone else within the Spurs end would have used Sherwood in place of Rebrov. Rebrov is not the player to take Tottenham to the promised land, but 1-0 down with 20 minutes at Southampton, he is a better option than Deadwood.
Spurs huffed and puffed to try and get an equaliser, but it was more in hope than expectation – a few goal mouth scrambles and corners but nothing really close. Many people left before the end, which was again disappointing. Sully had further chance to shine when a stretched Tottenham allowed Delap a 20 yarder, which Sully tipped round at full stretch.
The ref put us out of our misery, and the record crowd at the new stadium roared like it was a cup final win. All the abuse hurled at Hoddle, Richards and to a lesser extent Anderton this time could not be thrown back at them with a win and we trudged off to our traffic jams in a despondent mood. The season feels like it is in danger of falling apart with three defeats in matches we should have won, and games like the Coventry cup match and the Chelsea semi seem a lot trickier.
Hod needs to be at his brilliant best to turn these disappointing performances around starting with something at Villa Park and then a win against Blackburn to start the new year as we mean to continue & who ever controls Tottenham, need to pull their finger out and back the brilliance of Hoddle with real money to give him a couple of central midfielders who can control matches like this and a forward like Clive Allen who will put away the chances…….but was n’t I writing the same at the start of the season and even throughout our winning run. Time for action and not empty promises.
The
Word of Hod
Hoddle added: 'That was the key to the game for us. We have not
dominated a game like that for 45 minutes this season and it was an eerie
feeling to come off 0-0 at half-time. I felt that they could not play as poorly
and not getting the goal was always going to be a problem to us. 'If we had
scored I think we would have gone on and won the game.'
'Dean responded with an excellent performance,' said Hoddle. 'He was left a little bit vulnerable at the end as we pushed forward but I thought he was first class and showed a lot of character - and I knew he would.'
Sullivan (6/10) – Three fantastic saves. One bad error. Without the mistake which ended up costing us the match, Sully was our best player.
Gardner (5/10) – Did ok without looking special and nearly set Ted up with a goal in the second half after chasing a lost cause to the by-line and going in bravely with the keeper.
Richards (6/10) – Compared to some of his recent efforts, Richards did ok today with solid heading and decent defending, but a couple of times Southampton burst thro the middle with no one to stop them and that’s meant to be his job.
King (6/10) – A solid match for Ledders where he did most things right without having to do anything special
Ziege (5/10)
– For a player of his undoubted talent, he can be frustratingly ordinary at
times, poor use of dead balls and a tendency to dive in rather than track back.
Looked dangerous when he had the ball going forward, but sometimes we need more
than that from the wingback
Taricco (5/10) – Did ok, but his reluctance to take the ball on down the by-line often slowed down our attacks & while Treacle is a good player and has had a good season, the return of Carr cannot come too soon to give everyone in the team a boost
Freund (5/10) – Not the best of matches for the Nutter who along with Anderton did not win the midfield for Spurs and too often the defenders were left exposed to Southampton.
Anderton (6/10) – Ran and tried his best, but did not command the midfield which is essential to winning matches like this. Not the worst player on the pitch, but we needed more from the key position of central midfield.
Poyet (5/10) – When he does not score vital goals (which he has been excellent in doing all season), it is sometimes difficult to see what he does in the match. Anonymous for too long when we needed some presence in the midfield.
Sheringham (5/10) – Not in prime form again, and when Ted is off, everyone else is off unfortunately.
Ferdinand (6/10) – Ran his arse off and had a decent match without getting much support, although he did miss the two best chances we had, which if taken, could have meant a completely different result
Subs:
Deadwood
(6/10) – Not too bad when he came on, but he is still a
twat
Rebrov (6/10) – Given 4 minutes at the end – not the greatest use of our most expensive signing.
Davies (6/10) – Given only a few minutes at the end and did ok
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