Nottingham Forest Home Lost 0 – 1
Nottingham Forest‘s away scoring record coming into the new year consisted of just one goal, and we know Saints hardly ever score anywhere, so 0-0 was on the cards for this encounter. We know how other teams’ poor streaks tend to come to an end at St. Mary’s but Forest aren’t much cop and they needed a helping hand with their (inevitable?) goal – that was provided by Lyanco who managed to pass to Johnson and Awonyl was able to convert a low Johnson cross from close range. And that’s it as far as shots on target were concerned, from both sides! There were a couple of other opportunities worthy of note, and they came early on: Adams disgraced himself by shooting wide when a simple ball over the top gave him an oh-so-tempting volley, while at the other end, Johnson managed to hit the bar when typical Southampton defending left him unmarked. No surprise that a sixth successive league defeat was met with an increasingly toxic atmosphere, including a particularly nasty chant directed at manager Jones. It’s not his fault that he was given a job without possessing the necessary qualifications, but a go-to strategy that involves the centre backs playing the ball around amongst themselves before lumping it forward is never going to be pretty. With the right staff, it might well work, however the Forest goal shows that our defenders aren’t good enough to carry it out, while Adams’ scoring record shows that he’s no Danny Ings. Maybe the January transfer window will enable Jones to acquire the players to execute the tactic better, but at the moment, the ones we have don’t look as though they believe in what they’re being asked to do anyway… then Jones will still need to win over the fans, and the only way he can do that is with results – something he totally failed to do in his brief time at Stoke City.
LSSC Man of the Match:
2. Kyle Walker-Peters. The five defenders ploy gives him plenty of licence to get forward, and he at least managed to do that with some effect.
Anyone else? Not really, with even the classy Lavia looking confused on his return.
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