Once again abuse directed at our own players reared its ugly head during the Arsenal game, it has to stop !
For some reason football crowds take to some players whilst others are disliked for no apparent reason, but with most clubs its usually one player who is the scapegoat, however at St Mary's this season we seem to be just plain greedy and have at least four.
Guly is the first candidate for the knockers, whatever Guly does is wrong in many peoples eyes, but what has he done wrong ? its not a racist thing as some would suggest, most of those that slate Guly love Jason Puncheon, but the dichotomy of the situation is that over the past 2 1/2 seasons Guly has given us sterling service making much contribution to our back to back promotion seasons, whilst Puncheon spent most of this time at other clubs due to his own petulance and unwillingness to knuckle down and work hard for this football club. Now Im not suggesting that we should never forgive him for this, indeed most of the crowd have, but if we can forgive Puncheon for far greater misdemeanors in his Saints career than Guly, why is the Brazilian not afforded the same forgiveness.
Next obvious candidate is Artur Boruc, yes he has not made the greatest of starts for this club, in fact his opening ten minutes against Arsenal were as bad a performance I have seen from any Saints keeper, but the verbal abuse directed at him from the stands aligned with the ironic cheers when he caught the ball or even stopped a back pass did nothing to help what we were trying to do and that was to beat Arsenal, whilst he was wearing a Saints shirt we should have been trying to back him and inspire him, not trying to damage his confidence further, personally I would rather Boruc save a last minute penalty for Saints and win us points than see him drop a cross and cost us points, but from the vitriol hurled at him it seems that there are many who dont feel that way.
Danny Fox is another that can do no right, yes his defending hasnt been great this season, but he hasnt been the only culprit in that nor the worst, but again the boo boys will praise Luke Shaw to the high hills but refuse to see any good in Fox, last season his long accurate crossing both in open play and especially dead ball situations created a lot of goals for Saints and Rickie Lambert in particular, the absence of Fox has been noticeable when you look at Lambert's goal return and contribution to the games, we should be looking at how Fox could be used to bring on Luke Shaw in the way Chris Marsden helped Wayne Bridge, not slaughtering him, but there are those that think Shaw is already the finished article, I like Shaw but I know his failings and where he needs to improve, if Saints dont do that im sure Arsene Wenger will be pleased to do so.
Jay Rodriguez has received stick to a lesser extent tha the first trio, his main crime is to be considered the replacement for Rickie Lambert, that being the case some just cant accept him, his problem is that he rarely gets the chance to play in his proper position as a striker and that he is forced to play out of position, Jay Rodriguez will be a great striker for Saints if the crowd warm to him, if they dont then he will do it at another club, look a the stick Kevin Davies got in his second spell at Saints, then look at the career he had after leaving in 2003.
Paulo Gazzaniga is another who will not fulfil his potential at St Mary's if we are not careful, its nor his fault that Saints did not sign a keeper that is up to the job, at his age he should be learning his trade and getting the odd game here and there, not thrown into vital relegation clashes due to there being no one better, the amount of slagging off of Gazzaniga I heard for the goal at QPR was absurd, yet Kelvin gets no where near about a dozen crosses at Stoke and lets in a soft goal for the second and I dont think I have heard a murmur.
One think that does puzzle me though is how all of these players get abuse when they play, but no one questions the man who is selecting them, on one hand the same people who are slagging off Guly and Boruc on New Years day are praising Nigel Adkins in the same breath, if you back the manager then back him to pick the right team, there is only one reason why Guly and Boruc played against Arsenal and thats because they were selected, they cant demand to be on the pitch, some will have a different opinion of who is selecting them other than dkins but thats another matter.
So get behind these players, all I hear about is the great unity of the club etc etc, if thats so why are we berating so many members of the Saints family, we surely all have the same goal, I know I do and that is to escape relegation this season, one thing I do know though is that it helps no player to be barracked, I will give opinions of a player on here or in the pub, but when I am watching the game I back them all, I have the feeling that there are those that revel in seeing some of our players fail, I am certainly not one of them, I am well aware of those that arent good enough, but it gives me nothing but pleasure when I see one of those players come in and do a good job.
Im fed up with defending players and then being accused of having favourites, people will say that I prefer Fox to Shaw, thats not the case, but do know why I feel that both should be in the team and the failings for both rather than blind faith that Luke Shaw should be in the first team purely because Arsenal and Chelsea may want him, Luke Shaw will have a long Premier career of that im Shaw ( I meant this typo lol) but unless he is nurtured he may take a lot longer to be the player he will become and that is my worry.