Let’s get the main bit out of the way: Southampton’s winning goal.
First of all, I’m not too sure where seven minutes of injury time came from in the first place. There was one injury, and both teams made triple subs so it’s not like the second half was being constantly held up due to changes being made.
But whatever, that’s what was decided so okay.
Bang on 97 minutes, the referee gives what looks a rather soft free kick for a foul by Mileta Rajovic.
Annoying, but defend this and we come away with a point.
We did defend it, only the referee gives a corner when it should have been a goal kick.
This is getting a bit ridiculous, but defend this and we come away with a point.
We didn’t defend it, but on-loan West Ham flop Flynn Downes blatantly controls it with his arm before smashing it in from close range. No handball given, that’s pretty much the last kick of the game, and we’ve had our point wrongfully stolen from us.
So in summary: soft free kick, incorrect corner, somehow being given time to take the corner (I can think of at least two occasions this season alone we’ve had a corner right at the death, chasing a winning goal and NOT been allowed to take it), handball, goal. An absolute injustice.
And to top it all off, the referee responsible for such an outrageous sequence of events is Josh Smith, from… Bedfordshire.
Now, I wonder which notoriously bitter rivals of ours hail from that neck of the woods? The last time he refereed one of our games was when we lost 2-0 at at Kenilworth Road last season, by the way.
Please make it make sense.
Tons of Saints fans, including the club’s official Twitter admin, have hilariously been trying to claim some sort of moral high ground by reminding us of Abdoulaye Doucoure’s handball equaliser against them in January 2018.
Okay, sure. They’ve quite clearly forgotten about Moussa Djenepo’s little scoop which led to a goal which ultimately caused our then boss Quique Sanchez Flores to lose his job 18 months later.
That’s twice in a row I’ve gone to St Mary’s and seen us lose out on points as a direct consequence of the home side being allowed to play basketball in our penalty area. It’s quite frankly not good enough.
Leicester and Leeds are doing their absolute best to screw it up, but honestly the best thing that can happen is them two and Southampton just f*** off back to the Premier League.
They’re all clearly too big and important to be stuck in the little old Championship, the decisions at the end yesterday utterly reeked of giving the bigger club whatever they want and so the division would be a fairer place without them.
That’s not to say we were blameless for coming away empty handed here.
The first 20 minutes were an absolute abomination, the worst I’ve seen from us all season and we deservedly got punished.
Their cringeworthy marching brass band that plays just before kick-off had barely had time to put away their trumpets when Will Smallbone headed in unmarked from five yards out to give the home side the lead, which triggered some equally naff goal celebration music.
Some car crash defending gifted Che Adams his third goal against us this season, as Tom Dele-Bashiru sliced what should have been a routine clearance straight to David Brooks who cut back for the plastic Scot to tap home.
It was almost like we’d never seen a football before. There were shanks, mis-kicks, failing to complete the simplest of passes; it was so bad it was almost funny.
Then we finally kicked into gear, and for a ten minute spell had them well and truly rattled.
Firstly Yaser Asprilla saw a shot go agonisingly wide after a good jinking run, before Ryan Porteous got us back into the game as his shot from the edge of the box found the net via a slight deflection.
Both Southampton’s goals had come down Porteous’s side with him playing in an unfamiliar right back position, so it felt as though he owed us that one, but from there he did knuckle down and had a very decent remainder of the match.
For the next five minutes or so we had the home side on the ropes, and had we been able to capitalise on our momentum and equalise in that mini spell, I genuinely think we might well have gone on to win the game.
The Saints were there for the taking, but we let them off the hook and a couple of daft fouls from us helped them slow the game down. After 20 minutes I’d have bitten your hands off if you’d offered me being 2-1 down at half time though, so just still being in the game felt like a bonus.
The dismal Dele-Bashiru (I will take this moment to say he was our best player against West Brom and Ipswich in recent games, so hopefully this was just a blip) was hauled off at the break, with Ismael Kone his replacement.
Having weathered the early storm and wrestled a decent level of control, we carried on playing on the front foot but just didn’t quite have the quality to make it count when in decent positions.
Giorgi Chakvetadze volleyed what looked a very presentable chance wide, only minutes after Porteous had come desperately close to his second goal of the afternoon with a header cleared off the line.
That’s not to say it was all one way traffic though, as the Saints had two goals disallowed.
The first saw Daniel Bachmann slightly fortunate to get away with giving the ball to a Southampton player on the edge of his own box, although he was wiped out by Ryan Fraser in a challenge reminiscent of some his snide antics from his Bournemouth days.
Curiously the extended highlights on the Southampton YouTube page don’t show this, which suggests some people’s comments that Fraser might have seen red for his challenge might have some merit to them.
The other saw Fraser flagged offside when through on goal. I can’t lie it looked desperately tight real time and still does watching the highlights back, but on this occasion we got the rub of the green.
Having come on at half time, Kone had done virtually nothing for 40 minutes and looked miles off the pace again, but with only five minutes remaining he drove brilliantly into the box and slotted into the bottom corner to give us a deserved equaliser.
That’s exactly what Kone was so good at so often when he had a purple patch for a couple of months under Valerien Ismael; hopefully using his ability to such great effect there will give him some much needed confidence and help him end the season well. When he’s on it he’s such an asset, but it’s been far more cold than hot for a while.
Then came the nonsense at the end, which I won’t go into again but will describe as the worst sequence of officiating I’ve seen since Stuart Attwell and Nigel Bannister colluded to give Reading the infamous ghost goal back in 2008.
Interim head coach Tom Cleverley picked up a yellow card for his protests at the end, which along with another impressive showing against one of the big guns adds another string to his bow in terms of getting the job full time, as far as I’m concerned.
It’s disappointing that late goals have cost us an even better haul of points, but he’s definitely got us playing with a lot more hunger and determination, which had been features of our games under Ismael before disappearing long before he was put out of his misery.
Three games left then, including two goes at finally ending our winless run at home. It’s a shame we are where we are given how things were looking at Christmas, but if you’d offered me 15th in the table with three matches remaining before the season started I’d have probably taken it given how much I expected us to struggle.
Let’s try and end things on a high.
PLAYER RATINGS
Bachmann – not at fault for any of the goals, didn’t make any saves of note. 5
Porteous – bad start, but goal kick started a good showing in new position. 7
Pollock – battled hard but not his most convincing display. 6
Hoedt – shocking first 20 minutes as he was trying too hard, but excellent thereafter in St Mary’s return. 6
Lewis – ball watching for first goal, and still plays it too safe going forward. 5
Dele-Bashiru – a deer in headlights, worst half of football from a Watford player this season. 2
Kayembe – back to his best under Cleverley, dominated the midfield. 8
Asprilla – lots of nearly moments again but it’s not quite coming off. 6
Chakvetadze – carried the ball well and was a constant threat, should have done better with second half chance though. 7
Dennis – lost the ball far too cheaply far too often, a disappointment. 4
Bayo – ran his socks off with his pressing, absolutely no goal threat though. 6
SUBSTITUTES
Kone (for Dele-Bashiru, 46) – anonymous before moment of brilliance ought to have rescued a point. 6
Morris (for Lewis, 61) – a big improvement on the man he replaced. 7
Martins (for Dennis, 62) – looked as dangerous as he has in a long time. 7
Andrews (for Pollock, 62) – got up and down the right well, some important defensive contributions too. 7
Rajovic (for Bayo, 78) – unlucky to concede foul that ultimately led to winner, did little else. 5
Man of the Match: Edo Kayembe
MATCH DAY RATING
5/10 – last gasp cheating ruined what had otherwise been a very enjoyable day.
Goodbye Yellow Brick Road 