FA Cup 6th Round - Wigan 0 Southampton 2

Well There's a Shock - We Attack, We Win

Sunday lunchtime and live on the BBC for Manchester City versus Southampton. Oh no, City fucked it up and lost to Wigan, causing all the TV executives to gnash their teeth and wonder how can they can go about actually rigging the matches as well as the draw for the next round in future. If Saints had of been playing Manchester City then you could be sure that the impartial TV commentary would be completely biased towards the big club. As we are now playing Wigan, you can be sure that the TV commentary will be completely biased towards the small club. Such is life.

No sooner had Mauricio Pellegrino and his faceless, nameless coaching staff exited the building, then the rumours that Mark Hughes was taking over started. It took a  couple of days but then the man who had a brilliant career as a player and a decent but not spectacular career as a manager took over. Brilliant player and unspectacular as a manager - reminds me of Ronald Koeman who of course did pretty well as our manager.  Hughes is of course a former Saints player, playing a couple of years at The Dell as his career was winding down.  In his first season, we played him upfront and his legs had gone so he struggled to have much of an impact but in the second season he played in the central midfield area with Chris Marsden Football Genius and played as if his life depended on it. That particular season culminated in the Dellhurst Park game where he and Marsden covered every blade of grass.

Many don’t have any fond memories of his time as a player with Saints but if you had a career playing for Manchester United, Chelsea, Bayern Munich and Barcelona and you rocked up at the Dell in the later 90s with Dave Jones as your manager, you might think you’d find it pretty hard to be motivated but Hughes wasn’t like that. The good news is that I can’t imagine he will tolerate any shit attitudes from the players currently wearing the red and white shirt. He may not be everyone’s first choice as manager but we are in a shit position and in that shit position, we are not going to be able to attract anyone obviously better. So to be perfectly honest, I am pretty pleased with the appointment and though he has only signed a contract for the rest of the season, I cannot imagine for a second that if we stay up, he won’t be our manager next season. To be fair, he will have earned it.

Before he was appointed, I was asked a question on Twitter about naming a quality that you want from a new Saints manager. I somewhat flippantly replied that I wanted a manager who could speak English to a standard that didn’t send me to fucking sleep. I didn’t realise what a breath of fresh air listening to his first interview would be. It was about 14 minutes long and I listened to the whole lot, first time, without wanting to punch the screen in or kick the cat or punch a wall. The cat is very pleased with the appointment

So, Wigan away and a team that has already knocked out Manchester City, West Ham and Bournemouth so this really isn’t going to be easy.  With a 1.30pm kick off, the team was due to be announced at 12.30pm.  One hour before kick off was a time of dread for Saints fans as you prepared for the latest nonsense from Pellegrino – would Hughes be any different – here it comes – McCarthy…. Usual back 4…. Hojbjerg and Lemina… no Romeu… interesting…. Tadic… again…sigh!... Boufal, Gabbiadini, Carrillo.  Fucking hell, 2 strikers AND Boufal.  What the fuck is this?  A strange sensation – I feel happy.  There is an hour to go before kick off and I feel happy.  I like this – it’s strange but I like it.  Even if Gabbi plays in midfield, I like it.

Wigan have some ex-Pompey connections with Gary Roberts up front and Paul Cook as the manager.  Whisper it quietly but I used to enjoy listening to Cook’s interviews when he was Skates manager – he seemed likeable and a ‘no bullshit’ decent guy which is some trick to pull when you’re managing the Fish Fuckers.  Wigan also have Will Grigg up front who scored the winner against Manchester City but is more famous for having a song adapted for him which caught on when he was part of the Northern Ireland squad that went to Euro 2016.  Hopefully he will not be ‘on fire’.

Away we go on a bitterly cold, snowy day on a cabbage patch for a pitch and the conditions are perfect for a cup upset.  Don’t get me started on clubs that share grounds with rugby teams.  We are playing 4-4-2 and no question about it with Carrillo and Gabbiadini right up the pitch and Tadic on the right and Boufal on the left looking to get forward as well.

And then reality hits.  We look very very dodgy as Wigan dominate possession and look far more confident than we do as you may expect given that they are winning most weeks.  The spaces between our players look huge and the defending is ropey.  Cedric and Stephens are struggling hugely and Boufal is not helping out Bertrand on his wing at all.  For all Wigan’s possession and intent, they don’t create many chances but some are inevitable.  The first big let off is after a run by Byrne the right back, he shoots and it deflects off of one Hoedt and squirts across the goal where Dunckley goes got it with the wrong foot and fortunately misses it and the danger passes.

Gary Roberts is not getting too much stick for being an ex-Skate and that’s because we don’t really know who any of their players are anymore.  Anyway, he has a great chance when a cross from Massey is headed out right back into the danger area by Stephens and Roberts can’t get his feet right and spoons it over the bar.

We don’t really create anything in the first half, spending all our time defending corners.  Some are made easy by Wigan pissing about with short corners but on the others, we look well organized and there are no alarms.  Going forward though we’ve been pretty ropey so the half time whistle is welcome.  I heard myself say ‘get to half time at 0-0 and the manager will sort ‘em out for the second half’.  This is not something I’ve heard myself say for two seasons.

The change is immediate.  We are getting on the ball and pinning Wigan back a bit and not looking like we’re just waiting for the inevitable goal against.  Wigan’s right back Byrne has been playing very well (and the commentators on the BBC have been creaming themselves every time he gets it) but he has a shocker when he pokes a pass beyond his centre back and straight to Gabbi about 15 yards out, one touch, bang, great save by the keeper.  Gabbi looks distraught and it’s a bad miss.  The only possible mitigation is that he can’t possibly be expecting to receive the ball at that point.

Now we look like the most likely and from pretty much our first corner, Tadic picks out Hojbjerg and his header is well saved by Walton but it’s a warning that Wigan don’t pay attention to.  Another corner from Tadic on the left and this time, Hojbjerg loses his man and his left foot cushion volley goes trough the crowd and hits the net.  Get the fuck in and finally, the Great Dane has scored and amusingly, he has managed to kick Jack Stephens in the bollocks as part of the celebration.  I can’t imagine many other players willing to do that celebration.

The Lesser Known Danish Bollock Kicking Dance.

The first sub sees Redmond on for Boufal which is probably because Boufal is still not doing much to help out Bertrand defensively.  Redmond’s first contribution is to give the ball away in a dangerous area but we get away with that and his second contribution is to slide and superb through ball to Gabbi, in behind the centre backs.  Gabbi is though and as he goes to shoot, he’s absolutely wiped out by Dan Burn.  Penalty and a red card? Oh no, of course they’ve changed to rules now – if he makes an attempt to play the ball then it’s yellow only.  That’s all very well as long as the penalty hits the net.  Up steps Gabbi and smashes it but Walton goes the right way, flings out an arm and it flies off his wrist and away.  Brilliant save.  Gabbi holds his hands out in a ‘What the fuck?’ kind of way and it’s still only 1-0.  From Gabbi’s point of view it’s a bit unlucky because if it hits the keepers hand it goes in.  Great save though.

The next sub is Long on for Carrillo.  Whilst I’ll always debate the usefulness of Shane Long coming on, I can’t moan about Carrillo coming off because he’s been pretty average, not winning much in the air or linking up with Gabbi at all.  Long immediately proves his worth by winning a couple of free kicks and injecting more energy into the attack.  87 minutes and Romeu is on for Gabbiadini, still shaking his head and wondering how he hasn’t scored today.

Wigan are always going to have another chance and it falls to Noel Hunt who can’t direct a volley goalwards and from a Wigan corner, we clear our lines out to Redmond who works himself some space and then gets a bit lucky as his cross field ball deflects off a defender and down the left wing.  What the fuck is Cedric doing there?  He nods it past the least defender and goes straight for goal, drawing the keeper and then calm as fuck, slotting it into the far corner.  2-0, game over.  No one gets wellied in the bollocks this time but I repeat, what the fuck was Cedric doing on the left wing?  Final whistle and on we go.

All of this has to be put into some sort of context because we were playing League 1 side and we can’t possibly know if this next bit is true or not but I reckon that we would’ve lost that game with Pellegrino in charge.  We’d have just sat back and there wouldn’t have been the intensity too keep them out in the first half and we wouldn’t have got on the front foot at the start of the second.

The first thing I noticed is that we actually look like we knew what we were doing regarding marking at corners and Wigan didn’t threaten from any of the 10 or so that they had in the first half. Whilst the first half was ropey in terms of keeping possession and structure and we just didn’t play particularly well, something obviously changed at half-time because in the second half there was really only one team in it. Wigan huffed and puffed but didn’t bring a save out of McCarthy whereas we scored twice, missed a penalty and brought a couple of decent saves out of Christian Walton in the Wigan goal.

So, what a difference when a decent half-time team talk is made. We had so much more intent and control in the second half, all the time (until the 88^th minute) keeping two players upfront and keeping the wingers pushed on. What ever happened at half-time improve the performance of so many players. Cedric and Stephens in particular were dreadful in the first half but much improved in the second and Hojbjerg and Lemina really got to grips with being a midfield two as opposed to part of a midfield three. Even Tadic showed signs of life in the second-half and began linking well with Cedric, when Cedric was playing in his right position and not bombing down the left wing. Just imagine for a second what Pellegrino would’ve made of Cedric attacking down the wrong flank in the 92nd minute of a game when we were 1-0 up. He would’ve been doing his best Basil Fawlty impression in the technical area go shitting on about how we have to remember our defensive responsibilities when we attack. Thank fuck that way of thinking is over, at least in the main.  I think Cedric’s run shows that the players feel that the shackles are off, that individuality is now not frowned on and ingrained fear and caution has been replaced with the licence to take a few risks.  One of the main complaints has been a lack of goals from unusual sources and today we get two goals from two players who had never scored before.

Also, the substitutions were spot on as well. I grumbled a bit when Boufal was removed instead of Tadic but it turned out to be absolutely spot on. Redmond did very well when he came on, setting up a second goal and putting the pass through when Gabbiadini was fouled for the penalty.  Even Shane Bloody Long did a decent job when he came on for the struggling Carrillo with 15 minutes to as well. Carrillo is a bit of a worry – I was prepared to give him the benefit of the doubt when playing as a lone striker in a Pellegrino team but he had a lot of support today and was pretty crap.  The loaning out of Sam Gallagher annoys me more and more every time I think about it.  Just maybe we should have had Sam in the squad for the first half of the season and if he wasn’t up to it, loaned him out for the second half and signed a striker in January.  Doing this may well have saved us £19 million.

I don’t usually bother commenting too much on other teams and their managers but I have to say I was very impressed with Paul Cook in his interview after the game – very magnanimous and despite the pressure Wigan had, he acknowledged that they didn’t work the keeper and can have no complaints.  Good man. So, despite being an ex-Pompey manager and a Scouser, I wish him well and hope that we can manage to get promoted to the Championship. He did after all get Pompey promoted and then left them to go to a much bigger club so what’s not to like about that.

So well done Saints and well done Mark Hughes, Mark Bowen and Eddie Niedzwiecki. Brilliant start. In just one game and in a couple of days, you’ve given us a day out at Wembley to look forward to and more important than that, it’s given us hope for decent end of the season.

After the Saints game, Chelsea eventually knocked out Leicester after extra time and so the four semi-finalists are Spurs, Chelsea, Man United and ourselves.  A quick Twitter poll revealed Man United as our preferred opponents (67%) and Spurs as the least preferred (8%), seeing as it’s at their home ground of course.  I didn’t check but I assume a poll amongst the three other fanbases would have Southampton hitting 95% plus.  Two Chelsea legends are making the draw in Cech and Zola (whose hair has remarkably regrown)…. Manchester United …. Versus Tottenham.  Tottenham get the away dressing room which I’m sure will make Jose happy…  Chelsea versus Southampton.  Cech and Zola can’t help but smile… let’s hope Chelsea go into it thinking it’s a bye.