First off, it has to be said, Southampton are a fucking tough side to play against. Outside of ManC they are the hardest pressing team in the PL - at least for the first 45 minutes of games. Outside of City they are the side I least enjoy playing against right now.
They do tend to run out of puff a bit second halves, but they are still are really tricky opponent, and if they had better quality footballers all over the pitch they would be duking it out up the 3-6th place IMO.
Everyone's bitching and whining about our defenders (me included), but tactically we should expect better from Conte than that first half - it's not like they didn't do exactly the same in the away game before they lost a man.
Generally speaking Conte's has improved what we are doing without the ball, but tonight we were shoddy and his selections and tactics didn't help. He should have started us in the 352, given us more ability to play out and pressure them when trying to play through us, he could then switch to 343 later of needed.
Second half they ran out puff, as the tend to do, and we got on top, scored a great goal, and then pissed it away with some really fucking lazy play, allowing JWP time and space twice to chuck in decent balls into our box, but we should be able to defend "crosses" better - generally we have been under Conte. All three goals our defenders - all of them - were fucking about.
I think on the balance of the chances/game a draw would have been fair (the X/G's agree 1.74 us v 1.73 them) but I can't grumble at losing either, the manner in which we lost control after taking the lead was piss poor.
Romero's great at charging out but I was less than impressed by some of his defending in our box. Davies, Sanchez, Emerson and Reguilon all did plenty of sloppy shit. So many times I see our defenders marking "space" not people in dangerous situations (and Dier's even worse for this). but make no mistake this is not just about defenders - it's about how we defended as a team.
Good post in general. Although I would say Southampton deserved the result. They did more to try and win.
Some points which may solve our problems.
I sit in the upper tier about near halfway line, from this angle you can see clearly how deep our defensive line is. Worse yet we have the midfield line practically sitting 5 yards away from the defence, which makes it impossible to pass through midfield.
A team like Southampton who press will gobble up that. Its too easy for them when there is no distance between the defensive and midfield lines.
You can't see it on TV camera, but from where I sit of you look up the pitch to Kane who is 40 yards up, surrounded by 3 defenders.
So when we get the ball, we can't pass through midfield because they are too close to the defenders and being blanketed by the Southampton press. So we pump it long to Kane, but he can't hold it as he had 3 defenders around him. So we turnover possession and its relentless pattern like this.
Conte needs to either fuck this 5 at the back off, or ditch one of the wingers for an extra CM.
We need to stop inviting every team onto us by playing so deep. Just stepping up the line by 10 yards, then the midfield up to the halfway line and Kane in the opposition half would help us to pass through as there is now space between players.
We totally played into their hands tactically.
It was pissing down yesterday, but I noticed loads of our players slipping. Wrong studs I don't know but I don't recall many Southampton players slipping. Fucking home pitch and you don't have correct footwear. And this isn't the first game I've seen our players lose footing at home.
The marking space is spot on too. Playing with so many defenders you just buck responsibility and think another defender will deal with it.
We have deficient defenders and Conte has tried to hide this by playing 5 with 2 DMs. But the loss of the extra man in midfield is costing us possession and any attacking threat or control in games.
Once Dier is fit, we could play 4 and use Romero and Dier at CB. Move the extra man into midfield.
