Watching the MOTD highlights I can see why blaming JSL for their goal would look odd, as you don’t see him in the frame at all. At the game you see him stationary as the CB simply comes around him to walk off with the ball. If that somehow got missed off the live coverage and replays too I can see how he gets let off - but it’s not what I saw.
We’ve all been to some games with a worrying atmosphere this season. Often there has been an additional excuse beyond the standard of play being served up: midweek games at dispiriting times of the year / payday schedule. Given the lack of that additional context, yesterday was the worst atmosphere for me in years. The start of the second half it felt like most of the crowd were there on sufferance. Warm sunny day, plenty of time to get ready for the game, pressure off with the rest of the crap already defeated… yet real apathy rolling down the terraces. It did perk up noticeably around the 68th minute when we enjoyed a (‘the’) period of possession and applied a form of pressure. Overall though a damning indictment of the combination of product and the ticketing policy. Suspect the majority in attendance know we deserve to go down on our own merits, simply the structure of the PL has come to our rescue by serving up three horrific teams to take our place.
I did enjoy watching Sarabia in the second half, if only as it was nice to watch the sort of basic quality you might expect in ‘the best league in the world’. He worked hard off the ball to drop into spaces to receive the ball, a quality strikingly missing from others, and it immediately made us better. His inability to impose himself on the game for whichever of the good reasons long catalogued on here though was apparent as he gradually faded out of the 45 minutes. As I’ve got stuck into JSL, rightly so, I will also say you could see glimpses of how he might be more effective when appearing inside Sarabia to take the ball in channels opened up by an overlapping player. That could be something to build on in the games ahead, but I’m equally pessimistic as others that starting Sarabia or any other ‘creative’ actually works out.
Seems the only available strategy is to stay in a game of attrition for 65 minutes by playing stodgeball and then try to get a tune out of the lightweights coming off the bench. Can’t see anything other than that at Soton next week - level at 65 mins would be the objective I imagine.
