Mauricio Pellegrino goes into a crucial week in his short career as Saints manager, by the end of it he will either be looking like he could steady the ship or he could be staring at the out door.

Mauricio Pellegrino's team selections of late have been puzzling, just as he appeared to have turned a corner after the debacle at Anfield, he seems to have taken more steps backward than he took forward in the past three games.

He seemd to have got some continuity in the side with some solid performances and suddenly it looked like he might be the man for the jon after all, but then came the Arsenal game and some strange selection decisions.

When a manager starts to bring in players who have played no part for a long period and injury is not a factor then there is clearly something wrong and if it is not blind panic, then it is usually something more serious.

For the Arsenal game the dropping of Hoedt and the strange decision to leave Lemina on the bench was something that puzzled most Saints supporters I spoke to and the subsequent changes for both the Leicester and Chelsea games were just as baffling and meant that apart from anything else the players themselves didn't seem to know what formation they should be playing

Ironically this suited us better against both Arsenal and Chelsea in that both sides pushed us back to a rearguard action that meant that everyone was camped on our own penalty area so that didn't leave much thinking to do, however against Leicester when we had more of the ball in the attacking third, we had no cohesion and Leicester just tore us apart on the break.

But are these selections being forced upon Pellegrino by circumstance, are their issues in the dressing room that are not apparent in general.

Virgil Van Dijk on the bench at Chelsea surely could not have been for tactical reasons, whilst most will say that Van Dijk is not the player he was and that is at least part due to the fact that he does not seem to be playing with much enthusiasm, he is still a better player than both Yoshida and Stephens at 75% effort.

No disrespect to either player but that is why Liverpool wre desperately trying to sign Van Dijk rather than them, it is a fact of life in any football squad.

This perhaps gives some indication of just where Pellegrino's problems lie, he seems torn between showing loyalty to some of his squad players whereas he probably senses that Van Dijk is not committed, certainly the squad seemed more committed despite Van Dijk being on the bench than they had been on Wednesday evening.

But it seems that these problems have been allowed to fester and have not been dealt with by the manager ad in doing so he has appeared to have hacked off several other squad members who have been upset by being inexplicably dropped.

Pierre Emile Hojbjerg was ignored for 3 months at the start of the season, but is now showing his class, Mario Lemina is the club record signing and the player who most Saints fans would have put forward as the best player of the season so far up to his injury, he has been in and out, Wesley Hoedt has formed a solid partnership with Van Dijk yet was dropped, this was not the first time either.

These are the man cases, Charlie Austin, Shane Long, Manolo Gabbiadini are three more who could feel the manager has not given them a fair crack of the whip either, this is a big number of players with potential grievances against the manager.

Professional players know when something is right or wrong in football, they know when something is fair or not, they will accept being left out when it is tactically neccessary or they are out of form, but not when there is no good reason behind it and it is just rotation for rotations sake.

Likewise professionals can accept Virgil Van Dijk back into the team as they know he is the best man for the job and they would know that Jack Stephens is the 4th choice central defender, Stephens himself will know that, his professional price will mean that he will be agreived that he has been overlooked for three months and he will feel that he should be above Yoshida, but he will know that Hoedt and Van Dijk are better, although he will probably feel that the manager should pick the players loyal to the club rather than those who want away.

That appears to be the case at the moment, Pellegrino is changing his side on a weekly basis and it has affected morale, but the problems are of his own making, he has failed to provide a foundation for players to know what the pecking order is, players like stability, they need to know where they stand and that the manager is consistent in his team selections.

That is now not the case and Pellegrino now has to show he has the strength to overcome issues althouh not entirely of his own making, certainly ones that he has made worse rather than better in the past couple of months.

This is why it is a crucial week for the manager, he has to beat Huddersfield Town on Saturday and he has to beat them well, anything less than a win will leave us looking uncomfortably over our shoulders at least into the new year when we have some winnable games again.

If he fails to win then his position is looking untenable, but the problem is who do we replace him with, the club needs a boost, the appointment of Pellegrino was a left field one, he was a manager who few really knew much about, he was very much like Claude Puel, if Les Reed should have done one thing better he should have gone for a charasmatic appointment after Puel.

Three years ago Ronald Koeman was the right man for the job, he was high profile and respected in football, he restored the morale after the departure of Pochettino, but after sacking Puel with only a season gone of his contract, Reed should have seen the need for someone who could revitalise not only the playing squad but the supporter base when he replaced the Frenchman.

On Saturday Saints fans need to be right behind the team, we need to remember what we want from our club, we want this season if not as succesful as the last ones, to at least be nothing more than a slight blip, sometimes you have to be patient and accept that every season cannot be great, the measure of a football supporter is that they stick behind their club when times are tough as well as when they are good.

This week that is needed lets beat Huddersfield and then we can worry about the next few days.

Photo: Action Images

saintjf added 12:11 - Dec 18 I could hear and see Van Dijk shouting and getting annoyed in the Leicester game. I know he is going soon but he was acting as a professional so not sure why MP dropped him for the Chelsea game. We really do have a good team of players and with Austin scoring we should not be a couple of points above above the relegation zone. Palace are only 1 point behind us and they were relegation certainties at the start of the season. We are going backwards at the moment.

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helpineedsomebody added 12:24 - Dec 18 louis van gaal please
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brownk added 13:00 - Dec 18 Jack Stephens is every bit as good as Yoshida and Hoedt, and potentially better than 'Billy Big Time' VVD who is grossly overrated! Sell him and reinvest and stay loyal to the players that want to be at the club!
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Sanguin added 13:17 - Dec 18 You’d expect some rotation with three games in seven days. Lemina hasn’t looked back at his best since he came back from injury, albeit he was played out of position away to Chelsea. I thought Yoshi was better than Hoedt in the Chelsea game and was one of the few players to emerge from the Leicester game with any kind of credit. I don’t think there’s a conspiracy, we just have more players than we have positions. I’m really against sacking Pellegrino. We sacked Puel for failing to get the team scoring and those same problems remained into the new season with a new manager. Sacking two managers in six months will make it nearly impossible to attract a manager of similar or better pedigree, why would they risk moving to such an unstable position? We need to give Pellegrino time and to buy a striker in January.

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davej added 13:29 - Dec 18 In the premier league its all about the consistency of the players unfortunately over last season and this we have only getting levels of 6/7 out of 10 rather than the 7/8 and 9 out of 10, Over this period none of our squad have put in the higher levels over a period of weeks, Both of the last two managers have suffered this problem, Therefore when the team is picked it is not known what level the players will play at. We as fans expect to see a good level from all the team ,do we get it ? no we might occasionaly get a couple of 8 out of 10 then the rest at a 6 not good enough for the premier league. There is no doubt we have talented players but they do not have the consistency required.

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landerwal added 13:40 - Dec 18 The man for the job Koeman" in the eight games Saints played from November 25th to January 2nd 2016, won 1 , lost 6 and drew 1 (at home) against the worst team ever to play in the Premiership, Aston Villa, plus a 6-1 drubbing at home in the League Cup. After that we were almost unbeatable. Hopefully, these changes will do the same for our fortunes in the New Year, otherwise we will be in trouble.

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qnehl1 added 13:45 - Dec 18 A couple of observations: We sold Wanyama, Pelle and Mane in one summer and there replacements are not on the same standard (yet). A managers job is to motivate the players. Does anyone think our players are motivated at the moment?
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saintwizzler added 14:01 - Dec 18 Lemina tweeted that his ankle still wasn’t right. If so why is he even on the subs bench?
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patred added 14:03 - Dec 18 the closer we get to January the more the 'Van Dijk factor' will affect our squad. He needs to go, and needs to go quickly to beneifit team spirit. Hoedt is his obvious replacement in situ. The manager needs to get a partner settled in with Hoedt ASAP. We have little attacking options, and little creativity in midfield. Davis is close to his sell by date, and the prospect of him returning to Rangers for his swansong is fast approaching. This position is probably the most important to fill, our usual young up and coming, yet unproved targets should be ignored for quality. For without that quality we will struggle to score goals no matter who we get up front.

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roamer added 14:39 - Dec 18 Mo Pe won Everton's crucial game. Now he is facing another one. Huddersfield is a significantly worse side than Everton, but in the same time they are running and fighting a lot. If the players deicide to sack in Saturday Mo Pe they will do it and they will lose the game. If they want to keep it-they will win. It is easy. What is more curious is what happen actually in the squad and I think there is a "Burried a dead donkey". VVD saga has ruined the morale. The Board made a misstake to not sell him in the summer and streghten the squad. Mo Pe came with an idea to be the same profile as Puel but to acchieve more as a concrete results. If we going back we will see that Puel was in the "silent and hidden conflict" with some main players - Tadic, Redmond, Bertrand, Forster, etc. Now, Mo Pe is in my opinion in the conflict with more players than before: VVD, Davis, Tadic, Redmond, Hoedt, Gabiadini, Long, etc. With respect to that there are two ways: 1. If Mo Pe stabilized the squad, to perform significant changes in the squad at the summer /which is unlikely/. 2. If Mo Pe failed and he get fired than we need very carefully to look for some with more experience and good name in English Footbal then to hire someone who will be a "perfect stranger". But I cannot agree with the statement that Saturday game will give more clarity iver the future of the team. The players looking generally demotivated and lost confident in their abilities. They need to be somehow shaken and wake up. This could be done by a manager like Van Gaal or someone with this calibre, I afraid...

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BoondockSaint added 15:20 - Dec 18 When will we see the head line: "A Crucial Week For Reed & the Board. But Are Their Problems of Their Own Making?" ?? Watching the ManCitehad game listening to the pundits rave about Pep, such a genius! They never mention the money spent on players. Put him in charge of Saints and he would be in the same boat as Puel and now Pellegrino. Puel is doing better at Leiscester simple because he has better players. This is the second season of this and yet it's always the managers under pressure to keep their jobs-never Les and his crew.

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SanMarco added 15:26 - Dec 18 " anything less than a win will leave us looking uncomfortably over our shoulders" Lose to Huddersfield and by the New Year sideways glances will be the best we can hope for. As for Pellegrino - I've no more idea than any one else about dressing room issues (where do people get all of these 'lost the dressing room' facts from?) but he needs to play his best players NOW. They should think long and hard before sacking him but if they do (sack him) there must certainly be a high quality replacement lined up to take over at once...

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underweststand added 16:05 - Dec 18 NOT Selling VvD in the summer was as much a "punishment " for Liverpool as for VvD. The tapping up was so blatant that The Board obviously took them both to task whilst having sacked Puel didn't want to welcome a new manager by selling our "best " player. Many Saints fans might agree that VvD isn't a patch on his form from of a year ago, but with several Prem. clubs panicking to finish in the top four, a player of his class would be best playing at " a higher level" than 12th. and would command the type of fee we are demanding. Let's face it, we aren't likely to sell a player for £70 million in the next few years, and the money could be best spent elsewhere. In the worst scenrio - IMHO relegation wouldn't be the fault of a defence without VvD, but the likes of Long, Redmond, Boufal and Gabbiadini who can't hit the preverbial barn door, and their goal drought is more dangerous than conceding the odd goal. I think there are at least 3 teams worse than Saints , but if the worst were to happen (!) players would want to move, and /or see their salaries halved (surely in some contract clauses) and VvD's eventual selling price would drop dramatically if we were to go down. If we are going to sell him..it should be now....

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LordDZLucan added 16:18 - Dec 18 It’s got nothing to do with changing the team around. Footballers know what their job is on the pitch whether they’ve been playing regularly or not. Match fitness is the only issue when someone has been out of the side. The Arsenal performance was acceptable. To a degree so was the Chelsea performance. But what wasn’t acceptable was the performance against Leicester. That wasn’t even worthy of a Sunday league side and I personally think that one or two (or maybe three or four!) players were making a statement. We can’t have that. We need every player to be 100% committed. Commitment is so much more important that ability. Just look at Burnley for evidence of that. Dyche wouldn’t be able to buy a point if he had some of our prima donnas.

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skiptonsaint added 16:54 - Dec 18 With Cedric out over Christmas I think think Bertrands fitness Is massive for Saturday and to ensure we will not be royally thumped in the 2 difficult aways When he has played well so have we this season
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Whatsforpud added 17:45 - Dec 18 I agree with Sanguin. Can't keeping sacking managers. The advantage of rotating is that the whole squad feels they belong. The disadvantage is that a player who has had a good game can still be dropped ( or rested as the manager would have it). Re the VVD situation, the club was determined to not be criticised for being a selling club any more by keeping him to his contract (or a bit more of it). Now, do you keep him playing at less than 100%, or reduce his value by not playing him at all. His playing style has always been of graceful elegance, and in view of what went on in the summer, maybe it just looks like he is giving less than 100%. He wasn't perfect before, anyway.

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A_Saint_in_Stoke added 03:08 - Dec 19 In my view, the opening " A Crucial Week For Pellegrino " article is full of good observations on MP's very strange and baffling team selections - no I can not see any thought or any sensible reasoning behind such selections either, and would be interested in learning IF anyone understands them, and would they like to give some valid explanations? so I and a host of other fans could try and follow his thought patterns and reasoning.

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TeamCortese added 07:26 - Dec 19 A lot of people are scapegoating VVD for the toxic dressing room and to an extent they are right. The problem is people will never address why he wants to leave in the first place and the simple answer is..THE CLUB HAS NO AMBITION! Our ambition has been completely destroyed by Katerina Liebherr! The sooner she leaves and the sooner we have an owner (clearly not Mr Gao!) that wants to invest in our team then things will change. Players like Davis, JWP, Forster, Redmond and Tadic would be shipped off tomorrow. Why the board kept VVD yet persisted with the same transfer strategy is beyond me. How can you expect VVD to be motivated if you're not going to bring in a quality manager and invest in the squad to compete for trophies? ALSO HAS ANYONE NOTICED NICK'S BEEN VERY QUIET ABOUT THE 'BUY LOW, SELL HIGH' strategy? We're now seeing the long-term results of it. Personally I don't blame VVD wanting to leave I just hate it when he's not committed on the pitch when called upon. That annoys me so much because it's a privilege to play as professional footballer and be paid large sums of money, and I find it insulting as a fan who's paid a lot of money to watch him player to not see him putting in the effort on the pitch as a minimum. Anyway I hope we have a decent replacement in line for MoPe. I'm becoming increasingly impatient with his management style.

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IanRC added 09:21 - Dec 19 Personally I think VVD has appeared committed and relatively error free with the possible exception of losing Giroud for the Arsenal equalizer, it has been others who made mistakes
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SaintBrock added 19:55 - Dec 19 We will be out of the country over Christmas and it will be quite a relief to miss three or four matches and not to have to follow the will he / won't he frustrations typified here in Nick's essay which looks remarkably similar to the one he wrote last week. I'm not bothered about the Fulham match either and judging by the availability of tickets many feel the same way. After that we'll see, the club will not be going into liquidation because of the loss of a few quid from me but they should be mindful of the fact that a dripping tap rarely fixes itself and support will slowly drift away if nothing changes. Relying on other teams being worse than us is not a very good strategy for the hired hands upstairs.

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