This won't be a popular viewpoint, but I believe that now is the time to keep faith with Gavin Bazunu and back him to make the number 1 jersey at Southampton undisputed come the end of the season.
If you want to put a youngster into the Premier League, whatever his position, then you have to make sure that he has quality and experience around him to help him progress, this is perhaps even more pertinent for a goalkeeper.
But from the very start of his Southampton career, Gavin Bazunu has had a car crash of a defence in front of him and more to the point it has been one that has never been settled or consistent in terms of those who were in it week to week.
That being the case then it should come as no surprise that Bazunu has struggled a little to show his quality.
He is not the first Saints goalkeeper to suffer this fate, when he joined Southampton in 1982 Peter Shilton was the undisputed best goalkeeper not just in England, but the whole World, yet he had a torrid time in his first months at the club, a 4-1 defeat at home to newly promoted Watford was followed by a 6-0 defeat at Spurs and that soon saw another drubbing, this time 5-0 at Liverpool.
In his first 7 League games Shilton conceded 18 goals, yet things were turned around and in the remaining 35 games of the season we would concede just 40.
Perhaps a more direct comparison though would be Tim Flowers, he was 20 when he arrived at the Dell, he too had played in the lower leagues in this case for Wolves, his debut would see him concede 5 goals at Old Trafford, his second game in for the injured Shilton saw Saints beaten 4-0, although he did not concede any of them having fractured in cheekbone on the hour mark conceding a penalty for the opener.
At the end of that season he got into the side and although his progress was slow and he shared duties with John Burridge at one point, he eventually became the undisputed number one and became a veteran of over 200 games for the club and an England goalkeeper.
Goalkeepers are all about confidence and self belief , they more than any other position in the team can be destroyed by the crowd on their back.
In his first season Gavin Bazunu was exposed a lot more than he should have been, his critics will point to the shots on target/goals against ratio, but that is a simplistic viewpoint, read back on my reviews of last season and they tell the tale of goals continually conceded from unmarked players from dead ball situations, many of these goals could not be put down to Bazunu's inability to stop a free header from 6 yards out.
When he was dropped, the situation remained the same, in total Saints conceded 73 goals a ratio of 1.92 a game, Bazunu played in 32 of those games and conceded 56 goals at a ratio of 1.75 per game , whilst Alex McCarthy played in 6 games, conceding 17 goals a ratio of 2.83 per game, things did not get better when Bazunu was replaced, in fact they got worse.
That tells you the problem was not the goalkeeper but the defence, nothing improved, we still left people unmarked and we still conceded soft goals, we just conceded more than the.
So dropping Bazunu last season was not the answer and it is not the answer this season.
I will not stand up and say Bazunu has been outstanding, but he has not been as bad as some would have you believe, yes there have been some goals that he should have stopped, but these are a small fraction of those conceded, the issue again has been poor defending, at Sunderland he could do little with 4 of the goals, he should perhaps have done better with one of them, but then again he made several crucial saves to ensure that the situation was not a lot worse.
Indeed he started to look the part, his ability to play the ball out from the back is a vital part of the game, certainly not a part of the game that Alex McCarthy excels in, against QPR he made a couple of vital saves that ensured that we won the game.
Yet at Sunderland he was exposed again by his defence and he gets the blame.
But before we demand he be dropped, we should look at the alternatives, Alex McCarthy as mentioned is not suited to our style this season, that style is not going to change as long as Russell Martin is in charge so we have to live with that and accept it.
Joe Lumley arrived on a free transfer and has now overtaken McCarthy in the pecking order, but I doubt whether there is a Saints supporter that knows much about him, let alone seen him play, a journeyman keeper whose main job has been as a solid back up, only our coaching staff know whether this is a viable option.
So in my opinion and this is my viewpoint and I appreciate it is not going to be shared by a large proportion of those who read this article, we have to accept the situation and in doing so back all of our players to succeed, not just Gavin Bazunu.
However it is Bazunu who needs that backing more than most, he needs to be judged on his displays this season and not on the last one, then he was a 19 year old behind perhaps the worst back four in living memory and more to point one without a leader or organiser in it.
So far this season little has changed in the centre of our defence, a new men came in against Sunderland and Mason Holgate endured a nightmare debut, that is done and dusted now, going forward we have to hope that Holgate shows the form he did for several seasons at Everton and that Tyler Harwood-Bellis is the talent that many think he is.
We have to back our players and not turn some of them into scapegoats, again some out there will froth at the mouth and say how dare he tell me what to think, I am not telling anyone to do anything, I am not demanding that anyone unequivocally support the team, all I am doing is offering my opinion and asking people to think a little about the overall situation.