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Southampton V Bournemouth The Verdict

This was going to be the day that Saints hauled themselves back into the fight to avoid relegation, but it turned out to be a leaderless performance that saw the home fans streaming towards the exits even before the latest VAR shambles.

Ruben Selles tweaked the side before the game, out went Gavin Bazunu and in came Alex McCarthy and in came Caleta Car for Armando Bella Kotchap, only God knows why these changes were made, with the former presumably to add experience to a shambolic defence and the latter an injury.

The hope was that the team would continue the spirited display at Arsenal and for a short period they did, the only two shots on target during the first half were from Saints and they also saw the bar rattled, but the truth was that we had no urgency and no leadership, we were a rudderless ship and no one seemed to know what anyone else was supposed to be doing.

The visitors took a grip on the game, although they created little that troubled Alex McCarthy.

But after that initial burst we had barely troubled the Bournemouth goal either and the team was booed off at half time.

The second half saw the surprise news that James Ward Prowse would miss his first Premier League minutes of the season, but his replacement was not a midfielder but a defender in Lyanco with Ainsley Maitland- Niles moving into midfield.

It made little difference and Bournemouth were ahead within 5 minutes of the restart, it was another poorly defended goal, Tavernier picking up the ball on the corner of the 6 yard box, going away from goal and then with no one challenging him, hitting a weak shot which took a slight deflection and nestled in the corner.

For a while it looked like the visitors would double the lead, but they had plenty of bluster but rarely looked like getting anything on target.

Even the arrival of Che Adams and Stuart Armstrong initially failed to start a fightback of any sorts and the game looked to be petering out as it approached the final 5 minutes, a fair proportion of Saints fans heading for the exits with 10 minutes left.

But then came the drama, with only a few minutes remaining of normal time Stuart Armstrong suddenly produced the sort of run that used to be his trademark and Che Adams fired home from close range.

The fans still there erupted, surely now we could find some fight, but no despite the fact that Bournemouth players themselves saw no hint of offside, someone was going to draw some lines in a room far from the ground, after two minutes he had managed to find Che Adams toe was offside and the goal was offside.

This was potentially a game changing moment, but it had gone.

Perhaps it would spur Saints on, this week has seen games with 8-10 minutes of injury time after the referee's were instructed to cut down on time wasting, but referee Darren England had not got that memo, despite 2 minutes for the VAR & 4 separate substitutions that should have added up to 4 minutes alone, plus much timewasting from Bournemouth, Mr England could only find 5 minutes of injury time.

Even the most optimistic Saints supporter can now feel that we can get out of this, relegation wasn't about tonight it was about a plethora of events across the season.

Not buying a proven striker in the summer, sacking Ralph Hasenhuttl, appointing Nathan Jones, a poor January transfer window, appointing a manager in Ruben Selles who had never actually managed a side and then instead of giving him an experienced head to assist him gave him the B team coach.

The time for saying whose fault it is will come later, but last night saw all the chickens come home to roost, if we had won we would have been only three points off safety with a fighting chance.

I still maintain this squad is not as bad as some would have you believe, it just lacks two key players and leadership.

Last word to an unknown Saints fan who i briefly sat next to, as I moved near an exit to watch the final minutes, "why are they all leaving in the last 5 minutes when there is still a chance, don't they care ? If they were watching a game on TV at home they wouldn't leave the house with 5 minutes to go "

He was right they would have switched off the TV, but he had a point, I can empathise with people's frustrations and see why they would leave, but this was last chance saloon, football sometimes throws up unlikely moments that change a season, it almost did last night when Che Adams fired home, literally thousands of Saints fans missed that moment and may have missed a pivotal moment in the season.

Perhaps the reason they didn't is the reason why football is dying !

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