Early August is way too early to start the season, thanks again FIFA and your stupid winter World Cup! Expectations are certainly raised with a fruitful transfer window and Conte talking about staying long term. Many pundits predicting us to finish 3rd or 4th this season, some even higher. As always the hype just makes me nervous. Still, hopes are high in N17. Skipp is out, fitness doubts over Bissouma, Perisic and Doherty. Richarlison suspended. So likely a similar starting XI to the one that finished last season. Haven't seen any news about Davies recently after he got hurt a couple of weeks ago. Here we go again! COYS!!
I had to do a double take - Saints have only finished above 15th once in the last 5 seasons and finished last season with just 1 win in their final 13 games (that may have been the 3-2 against us if I remember correctly). Of course, Warde-Prowse (11 goals, 8 assists last season) always seems to play a stormer against us. Most of the time I see them, they look terrible, but they seem to come up with back-to-the-walls performances against us for some reason (they took 4 points off us last campaign).
Who would have predicted that the plan to air condition all the outdoor stadiums wouldn't work out? I'm expecting to see Lloris, Romero, Dier, Lenglet, Royal, Hojbjerg, Bentancur, Sessegnon, Son, Kane, Kulu. Maybe Perisic instead of Sess.
I'll be working, which I feel might be for the best. Loads of optimism around and about the club at the moment, which of course makes me nervous. A disappointing performance and result would not surprise me in the slightest ... but, then, I said the same going into the season finale v Norwich, and that one turned out ok. Prediction? #8 will play. I can feel it in my water. Here we go again, indeed.
Davies is fit instead of Lenglet, otherwise correct. No room on the bench for Winks, sorry pook. And no surprise when it's - Forster, Lenglet, Sanchez, Doherty, Perisic, Spence, Bissouma, Bryan, Lucas
Who needs Kane & Son when you have Dier and Sessegnon? Davies has come close too, he's having a great game. Son wasted a great chance instead of passing to Kane. More goals in this one I think.
Walker-Peters and Sessegnon having a real battle. This Southampton kit feels like it could be an internet meme. Is it black? Is it green?
4-1 final. Late subs Bissouma, Lenglet, Doherty, Lucas, some looked a bit rusty. Good win, especially with Kane & Son not their best, others stepped up.
I have confidence in this team, so I watched (as much as I could). Missed the first half. Spurs looked like they were intentionally attacking Walker-Peters and Sessegnon looked good out there from what I saw. Terrible own goal. Bissouma had some heavy touches and didn't look like he was fully understanding of others in the team. How did Romero not get a yellow? Weird having 4 subs come on at once, along with the earlier sub.
It was pretty much perfect ... I was too busy to think about the match, and it wasn't until just before noon that it popped into my head. I took just a couple minutes to check the result, and having seen it, went about the rest of my workday in a not insignificantly better mood. I've only seen the brief highlights but will have a look at the more extended footage a bit later on. I'm off work tomorrow, the new issue of WSC (the season preview!) just showed up in my mail, I have a couple of really good cigars left over from a mate's visit last week, and my local (Hop River Brewing) has put on a Czech Pils that is about as well-suited to my tastes as any beer can be. That's my evening more or less sorted, then. Well, it's underway. Not a bad start - even without Winksy. How we look away to Chelsea (who didn't particularly impress today) next week will tell us a lot. A decent performance there and it'll be tough to suppress the optimism. Come on you Spurs, and all that.
All of the starters played really well. Chelsea killed us 3 times in 3 weeks, so I think our guys might be looking for a bit of revenge.
Romero is a ticking time bomb with some of his rash challenges. Fortunately, we were playing Southampton at home, but if he had done that away to any of the top sides, he would have been sent off.
It'll be interesting to see how this new sub rule works out. Having a large number of new guys all coming in at once can be disruptive - we saw a little of that. Conte's purpose I'm sure was to blood a lot of the new signings. Didn't matter for us as we were seeing out a comfortable lead, but I'm not sure how effective such changes will be when a game is in the balance. Maybe coaches will do this more at half-time when a tactical change is needed.
On the feed I was watching, it was also pointed out that due to the number of subs, there shouldn't be a huge complaint about tired players.