It was deja vu at West Ham on Sunday afternoon both in terms of what seems to be the obligatory 3 goals conceded, but also the season where once again we lost because of poor defending in a game where we could have got something out of it if we had been tight at the back.

I have mentioned 2 deja vu's up at the London Stadium , now I am going to mention a third, I have written this review on numerous occasions this season, I could almost have a template and cut and paste it each week and just change the names a little, since Xmas it could have been used for the defeats at Leicester City, Everton, West Brom and a host of other defeats where we have thrown the game away due to poor defending and poor goalkeeping.

Before I get going I am going to get the Nathan Redmond issue out of the way, whilst no one not even his mother could claim he had a good game and he was poor, the truth is that he was not to blame for this defeat, it wasn't him who pushed a tame shot straight into the danger area instead of getting it out of harms was, it wasn't he that was caught napping yet again and was 3 yards off his man for the second goal, football is a team game, Redmond was poor but he wasn't alone in that.

But he is the scapegoat for some and they have to rant as if Redmond had scored a hat trick for West Ham of own goals, I think his time is up at this club, if only for the fact that he needs a new start somewhere else, he needs to go somewhere where the fans are not on his back and I for one will thank him for the many good things he has done for this club in five seasons service.

Enough of that lets look at the game and why we lost it, to be honest looking back at it there was little to choose between the two sides aside from West Ham could defend and we couldn't, for the first half an hour we were the dominant side, we could easily have been 2-0 up in that time, Minamino played through and putting a glorious chance just inches wide and Kyle Walker Peters also seeing a good chance well saved by the keeper.

But just as we thought this might be a good day at the office we did what we always do, make mistakes at the back.

Ralph Hasenhuttl went for Alex McCarthy in goal and this was a big mistake, in the past month or so Forster has been the in form keeper and McCarthy out of sorts, I would go as far as saying that he had been found wanting in the 3 goals conceded before this game and sadly he would be found wanting again.

The warning signs were there long before the goal when he came for a cross and completely missed it, luckily we cleared the ball, West Ham's opener was a tame shot, but he parried the ball back into the danger area, when he really should have got it away from the goal, even if he had to concede a corner.

But if that goal came out of nowhere the second 3 minutes later truly found us lacking in concentration, a cross came in and Jannik Vestergaard was completely lost, he wasn't aware of where he should have been and where his man was and it was a simple goal again for Fornals.

Again McCarthy didn't make an attempt to save it, that meant that out of the last 5 goals he had conceded, he had stood and watched 4 of them go past him, only in the second West Ham goal did he make a despairing effort.

So we had gone in the space of 30 minutes from looking good to handing the game to the Hammers.

In the second half we had our chances and Fabianski had to save well again, that was the difference between the two sides, their goalkeeper did his job and so did their defence at vital moments and ours didn't.

Was this a 3-0 game ? no based on the last hour we deserved to lose, based on the first 30 minutes we deserved to win, overall we had 17 attempts on goal with 5 on target, they had 14 but got half of those on target and we let 3 of them in.

That is a recurring theme this season and it needs to be dealt with.

But there were plus points, Mohamed Salisu will become a great defender at St Mary's, he can read a game and he has fast feet and can get himself out of trouble, Ibrahima Diallo showed he will have a part to play next season and played a great through ball for Kyle Walker Peters to put him through on goal.

The return of Oriol Romeu was also good to see.

Saints can look forward to next season as long as they sort out the issues, we have lost games due to the fact that we lose concentration at the back all the time, at this level an International player like Vestrgaard should not be stood on his own in the penalty area, he should be aware of where he needs to be and who needs to be marked, he was stood like a rabbit in the headlights.

As I said this verdict sadly could be written for any number of games since the New Year, Ralph Hasenhuttl must be tearing his hair out when time and time again the same players make the same mistakes, in the case of the back line he perhaps had no one else to play up in East London on Sunday, but in goal McCarthy has been clearly out of form and Forster clearly in it, I don't get that selection.

Was Nathan Redmond the worst player on the pitch for Saints, I would say it was actually Danny Ings, he wasn't playing badly for a lack of trying, but when he got the ball he was too often let down by poor control and couldn't seem to beat his man when he got the ball, no one can berate him for a bad game every now he has been a big part of this success, but lets put this game into perspective.

Also needing to be put into perspective is where we stand in the League table, take a look at the 15 clubs above us, Crystal Palace excepted they all have stadiums that are bigger than ours, average crowds that are bigger than ours in normal times, they all have greater resources and i'm not talking about an owner who pumps money in here.

When the final whistles went around the country, normality had returned to League positions, gone where the early days of the season where Saints could top the League, when the top 8 positions were sorted, they all went to the Big Six plus Leicester and this season's surprise club West Ham United.

We have underperformed this season, but only by one place, this is the reality of the Premier League, when we kicked out the European Super league project all we did was maintain the status quo , the rich getting richer and the bulk of us getting poorer in comparison.

Anyway thank God this season is over and we can get on and plan the next one, there are many things to look forward to, we can see our problems and in that case we should be able to deal with them, if we do then there is no reason why we should not once again become the club that surprises a few people as we did in 2014/15 & 2015/16 , but and it is a big BUT, I leave you with this thought, back then we did so not by spending big money, but by finding the likes of Sadio Mane, Virgil Van Dijk etc, players who had hunger and potential and that is where our success in the future lies, not by trying to outspend the likes of Everton & Villa who have once again spent big but ultimately not got anywhere near challenging the Big Six, but by succeeding on our own terms.

Photo: Action Images

underweststand added 14:08 - May 24 Difficult to find something else to write about as most of you (above) have covered the best /or /bad points to comment on. I've really "willed " Redmond to be better this season but he does seems to be a lost cause. I wasn't alone to see the " hands on hips and standing offside " TV sequence and thought it summed up everything on the day. Playing Redmond up front with Ings (who didn't have a good day either) leaves Danny on his own as Redmond always ends up on the wing and rarely ventures forward in attack. We started like a train and just prior to Wham's first goal we'd had 8 shots to their one, and although it's easy to blame the defence for goals conceded it's apparent that in the final two games we'd had 35 shots and the majority of possession without scoring once. Looking at stats. we may have expected more from our strikers all season. I can see Ralph slaughtering the first team squad in the summer. For whatever we did right in the last year, now we have been sussed out and found wanting. Another season with this same squad (with or without Danny Ings) means ..." we 'ain't gonna make it " . NOTE: Both Walcott and Minamino have infinitely better goals stats. than anyone else on the books. IF they stay, we should play them up front to convert chances and not leave them to wandering around in midfield waiting to get chopped down / or rugby-tackled.

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dirk_doone added 14:11 - May 24 Reading through the match report and the comments, one conclusion we can draw is that if we have both McCarthy and Vestergaard in our startiung lineup again next season, we are going to continue conceding lots of soft goals. Our last clean sheets were our 3-0 win v Bournemouth, 2-0 win v Sheffield United, 2-0 win v Wolves, 1-0 win v Arsenal, 2-0 win v Shrewsbury and 1-0 win v Liverpool and Forster was in goal for all of them. Vestergaard didn't play in the Wolves, Arsenal, Shrewsbury and Liverpool games. It just goes to show tthat as long as McCarthy and Vestergaard aren't playing, our defence can be good, even against top sides like Liverpool and Arsenal. In fact when Vestergaard went off after 10 minutes against Leicester and we were down to 10 men our defence improved a lot.

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Colburn added 14:56 - May 24 Deja vu sums things up in a nutshell. Ralph picks the wrong team, with lightweight underperforming wingers and possibly our best centre back at left back when he should be learning his trade in the correct position. This against a physically strong and quick opposition who are playing with the necessary heart to win games of football. The result was obvious to most before a ball was kicked. Nevertheless, we started the better team, as usual, and KWP got through a couple of times and should have squared for Ings to put us one up. We were quickly punished through poor goalkeeping and then the standard Redmond attempt to clear the ball and then stop his opponent from crossing the ball. From this point on it was clear that we would get nothing out of the game. We can blame individual centre backs but that's three goals I can think of immediately caused by Redmonds lack of interest in his defensive duties. Leicester home and Chelsea away spring to mind. This is the second reason I think he has to go. If he were creating chances, not being so greedy, wasteful and showed the right desire, then fair enough, you can forgive the defensive shortcomings. But his attitude is appalling, he is selfish and wasteful and pretends to derei. The instant of him stood still, hands on hips, 5 yards offside looking along the line just about summed him up. Aside from a few individual moments, I don't have the same memory as you Nick when it comes to his input over the declining seasons. I agree with you on Mccarthy, it is a strange decision and Forster should have been in goal but I'm not sure why you still have faith that Ralph is the man. I too remember your 5 points from 3 game batches and our early success did not depend on 2 players, it was the freshness of our tactics and game management. When we somehow found ourselves in top spot for a night, we then changed the game management tactics when we were winning games, now handing initiative to opposing teams as we stopped attacking. This, together with teams working out our ways of playing, saw us plummet and Ralph changed nothing. He has now signed a has been winger who does not improve the squad and has talked about Minamino possibly heading here. All these additions have done is to block the progress of young hungry and potentially better players from coming through. Continually playing the same failures whilst lads sit on the bench frustrated, after being in a bubble for a year. I think the man management has been woeful and to spend half or a third of our budget on one player who isn't even ready to play his role when required is plain stupid. I like Diallo but we really needed a ready replacement for Romeu or JWP if they got injured. Instead, Ralph then took our most important attacker in Armstrong, the heartbeat, back to a number 6 role thus comprising our ability to score goals. This just seems like insanity. We sold our homegrown left back to fund this Diallo move and now we have no left backs because the aged Bertrand is off. This is nuts..... No left back, his financial replacement sits on the bench instead of playing cdm while our best no.10 is playing cdm. Obafemi looked a real threat when he came on recently and then sits on the bench as even his position will be gifted to the shocking Redmond up front. I mean seriously.... It's very sad to see more clueless decision making after another and since Danny Rohl has left, we have lost the nit of edge we did have. I can only see relegation next season as there are too many issues to resolve for the money we will be able to use and to be honest, he's throwing away what little we have on failed wingers. I hope for Ings sake that he goes this summer. If so, thank you Danny for some amazing moments and goals!

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KriSaint added 15:01 - May 24 An extraordinarily exhausting season, which went well until 2021, has finally finished. And yes, this game vs WH was deja vu. We played reasonably well and could have scored two before WH got their first goal, but went on to concede three soft goals. Call me naive, but I still think RH is a good manager. Would we - without him - have beaten EVERY big club in this country apart from Man.U. in the last 2 years? I think he needs better assistance, and I'm sure he has learned from his 2½ years in the PL, and I erally hope he gets the ressources to bring the team forward. Players from our current squad I look forward to see play for Saints again. Un-mentioned players I'm unsure about. JWP KWP Armstrong Ings Adams Obafemi Vestergaard Salisu Bednarek Walcott Romeu Have a good summer all Saints supporters.

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KriSaint added 15:04 - May 24 Sorry, I forgot Tella in the above mentioned group <3
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ItchenNorth added 18:32 - May 24 Ralph isn't the problem, it's the owners and lack of investment. If you change managers again, who are you going to get, that won't do the same thing; a burst of improved performances followed back back to the same old issues we face. He's managing with his hands tired. It's a big summer ahead. We must keep Ings, JWP and Armstrong and invest in a full back, centre back and a first choice keeper.

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AmericanSaint added 20:25 - May 24 So I was waiting to be able to reply and many of you summed many of my feelings. So I am going to take a 25,000ft view of our team. (1) With our current owner, things will not get any better as even Les Reed stated that Goa can't take any money out of China to invest in the club. We need a new owner or at least partial owners to have a chance to improve. (2) I am a Ralph fan, but think he needs to change his philosophy of passing out from the back as it has caught us too many times and cost us goals and points. Sometimes on a goal kick, you just kick it up field - period. (3) I think Ingsy will leave and hand in a transfer request after yesterday. The look on his face was WTF am I doing here. I saw him run the channel 3 times in the 2nd half and nobody sent him through. (4) We need older experienced players. We are too young and do not have the steel needed to comeback or hold games. Don't care about the club's or RH young player philosophy on this, we need some veterans to teach the other players. (5) Only the following players would I consider safe from a transfer or dismissal: Ings, Che, JWP, RWP, JB, Salisu, Armstrong, Djenepo (one more season), Diallo, FF, Tella, Obifemi, OR, JV (one more season). (6) We need the following types players: GK, LB, (2) RB, CM Attacking : This could increase if we get rid of a lot of the dead weight and bloated salaries. It could/should increase to 4 more players if possible. (7) Stop the 4-2-2-2 formation. I know he says its a 4-4-2, but that is a lie. Either stick to a real 4-4-2 or go to a 3-5-3 or a 4-3-3 or even a 4-3-2-1. I think this is where Ralph needs to work on a Plan B. (8) If RH is not provided any real funds or players, then I think he could walk away and/or he will not last til Christmas. Our current players and lack of depth will not allow his idea of high-press football. And since he doesnt seem to have a Plan b, it it will be the end. (9) If a manager change is needed, who will we get as everyone knows that we do not have deep pockets. I dont want another half-wit old manager who is looking for a paycheck (i.e. Mark Hughes). (10) Owning a football team is a rich man/woman's game. It is a hobby at best and surely a folly at worst. But none-the-less, if you are an owner and want to succeed, you need to spend your own money to make that happen. Finally, someone made a comment a month or so back about wanting us to be relegated so they could enjoy the football more. After this season and feeling like we will not get many players in (or get rid of any of the deadwood), I think this might not such a horrible idea for 1 reason only - Goa will then have to sell the team for a loss and then we might be able to rebuild. I know this sounds drastic and a bit loony, but the frustration of not being able to properly compete makes watching the game not much fun. Now we wait to see what the summer brings and I hope all of you have a great and happy summer - Best from America.

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sidsaint added 21:42 - May 24 Some excellent thoughtful and constructive comments. We deserve better, I hope and believe Ralph thinks so and wish he could read them to see how much we care Proud to be a member of TUI.
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