AFTER-MATCH ANALYSIS: SWINDON

At the end of each month I intend to hold a poll to vote on members' posts commenting on Saints' League and Cup matches. Please get in the habit of giving us a detailed post after each match saying what you thought of the performance, who played best, who didn't, who should have been playing, what you would have done if you were manager etc., etc.
It doesn't matter if you weren't there.....you can still say what you think.

If you are impressed by a particular member's post please let me know so that I will be sure to include the post in the poll.

Your analysis of Swindon-Saints should go on this thread please. There is a separate thread in the Amusement Section's Competition League where the table showing the points gained for the analysis will be shown.

That was absolutely fooking awful. AP has really got his work cut out. Let's hope he gets some new faces in before Saturday (as well as Hammond) and replaces the dross that we currently have. Wotton, Lallana and Lancashire sounded woeful and if they left the club tomorrow I'd be happy.

I know it's hard to have an objective view of things after just listening on the radio, but the team sounded lightweight and bereft of ideas. The team were bloody awful until AP finally made some changes; only once these changes were made did Saints actually show anything. The main criticism I have of Pardew this evening was that he left the subs far too late to be effective.
There can only be one Man Of The Match and that's Kelvin Davis, he pulled off some fantastic saves which kept us from a total humiliation and that is the only positive I can take from this evening's shambles. If ever a team were thrashed 1-0, it was Saints this evening

I refuse to panic yet, unlike some on SW who are shrieking 'AP out' (Jeeez ) and getting the razor blades and lengths of ropes out, but the turnaround has to start Saturday or we will soon be so far adrift we'll be out of sight.

It will sound arrogant but without going to the game I know exactly what happened because we have seen it so many times and until we get in a couple of decent midfielders and a commanding centre back then we will concede goals from corners away from home and we will not score away from home. It was Huddersfield all over again but against a less prolific team. It happened last season as well in every away game that we didn't win.

Pardew is new to the job and still getting to know his players but the decision to drop Perry and replace him with Lancashire was obviously wrong and that was for all fans to see. Perry is by far our most consistent and reliable player and has been ever since we got him in on loan in April 2008. What happened the last time the manager decided to drop him for Lancashire. We lost 4-1 and Lancashire got sent off. I don't want to be too harsh on Lancashire himself because he is committed to the team but he is just not good enough. Whenever he plays we look like conceding and the defence is shaky. Wotton has been picked in every game by Pardew but has nothing good about him at all. Gillett and even Gobern are much better options in the centre of midfield. Wotton keeps playing bad games but stays in the team. What message does that send out to the other players? Lallana has done absolutely nothing while playing on the left and Pardew must realise very quickly that he is a central player. Holmes is a left winger who can cross the ball and works hard for the team which is what we need. The substitutions came far too late but the change in tempo from Saints once Saga and Gobern were on almost got us a late equaliser. If they played from the start with Lallana in the centre or at the least on the right then I feel sure we would have scored at least once.

Lambert has shown that without the midfield making an effort to get the ball to him he gets lost and may as well be sitting on the bench. Saga is by far our most versatile striker and could be worth a go alongside Lambert. Paterson runs around a lot but is not great on the ball and doesn't make enough intelligent runs to play off a big man like Lambert. I think he would be far more useful to bring on late in the game to chase down the ball and hassle defenders when we need to hold onto some points. The signing of Hammond will do a lot to add some bite to the midfield and help Morgan play his game. As far as I can remember Morgan has never played well in an away game so unless we show a more positive attitude in future away matches there is no point in him being on the pitch. Mellis sounds like an exciting player but what his best position is not many of us seem to know.

I still fancy us to beat Brentford because we have played well in all of Pardew's home games and Brentford will be expecting us to come at them which will take a bit of pressure off the defense and allow us to use our more creative midfielders. The short green turf of St. Mary's suits some of our ball players and if we play well then we could easily dish out some thrashings this season with 3 proven goalscorers to choose from up front. With an attacking line up of something like this I'm certain we could score goals.

Lambert Saga
Holmes Hammond Morgan Mellis

Yes that means no Lallana but if he wants to be in the team then he should have played better .

The evening started well enough with Twizzle and me only having to leave the car in the street next to the ground. We had some chips from the chippie opposite and they were by far the best thing that we had all night. The mood as the game began was good and the saints fans were quite vocal. It didn't last long as we soon realised that the Swindon boys were more up for it than we were. The team when read out over the tannoy had left us scratching our heads in disbelief. We know we are bad but someone better than paterson and Lallana must have been ready for a game surely.
Swindon scored their early goal and the ease with which they scored left us worried that there were going to be a lot more. Kelvin again showed his skill at stopping shots though I do wish he would command his box. Probably scared of our defence scoring own goals or just getting in the way. We held on and at half time were waiting for the arrival of the subs.
The subs didn't arrive until too late and the second half was even worse than the first. Paterson wasted a chance and the game drifted on until the end with us grateful that Swindon hadn't added to our woes by scoring more.
There were not many plusses for us as the overall team performance was so poor. Kelvin and Harding were the stars of a poor performance and Mellis showed some nice touches at times. Lambert looks like a player that needs to be given the chances as he doesn't run far. Wotton is just a slow old thug who can't even do that properly. The rest just failed miserably to produce.
Not a good night and thankfully AP has already found 2 more to help fight the cause. So, even after such a poor game I am still hopeful for the Brentford game. We have now added Murty,Harding,Mellis,Hammond,Trotman and Lambert to the squad and soon we will be looking at an AP squad. Now we will need to unload some of the chaff and loan out some of our kids as we did with Fish last season. We will improve of that I am sure.