Saints fans need to create a siege mentality tonight.

There are many things to wish for in life, but tonight at 7.45pm I will be hoping for only one thing in the following 90 minutes or so and that is a Saints win, sadly I dont feel that every Saints supporter will feel the same.

The nearest i can liken the situation to in Saints terms is 1993/94 season when Saints were abysmal under Ian Branfoot,back then however the fans got behind the team during the game and saved the protests for after, it may re a romantic view of the situation back then, but the fans by supporting the team, if not the manager and board, played a big part in getting the team through a tough time and ultimately helping them get points that kept them up at the end of the season, for anyone that says that a crowd has nothing to do with the team, then I would say they werent at the Newcastle game at the Dell that year.

What we need now is more of the same, its demoralising for the fans to see rows of empty seats so i can only imagine what effect that it had on the players, at the moment their seems to be 15,000 fans all claiming that they are only staying away because of Lowe and all claiming to have been supporters since year dot,  in 93/94 it was no different, that Newcastle game in which Matty scored two cracking goals ironically 14 years ago last Friday was watched by 13,804, some 6,000 short of capacity, however those fans made a lot of noise and got behind their team, not the manager, not the Chairman, but the team.

Of course football has changed much since then and fans of all teams are more fickle, however every team has its hard core and we will see ours tonight as we once again will probably get the lowest gate at St Mary's, however this is not an appeal for lapsed fans to turn up, in fact quite the opposite, in truth I and judging by some of the conversations I had at Swansea, many others dont want you there.

Whats needed tonight is passion from the hard core, the Northam Stand need to lead the way and create a siege mentality at St Mary's as we had for many years at the Dell, if we can do that then the fight back has started, Saints fans need to rediscover their passion and love for the team, maybe not the Chairman , maybe not the manager, but the team and the Club, they need to make supporting the Club at a difficult time something to be proud of and not something to be ridiculed for as is the case now as the 15,000 "majority" pour scorn on those still going as they try to excuse their own absence.

In truth the same happened back then in 93, previous to that Newcastle game only 11,619 had turned out to see Sheff Utd at the Dell, back then though the fans stood up and were counted, they drew a line in the sand and they started a revival of the club that has survived almost to this day, its time for that to happen again.

What will be crucial though tonight is the side that the manager puts out, its easy to make excuses for the defeat but the main reason was that Jan Poortvliet made the wrong selections, up front McGoldrick was preferred to Robertson or Pekhart, it seems that McGoldrick is highly regarded at St Mary's by the manager, but the truth is he isnt suited to the system we are playing, he doesnt have the workrate required nor the strength, whether he is up front or in midfield, to be blunt if Poortvliet wants to play McGoldrick then he has to change the formation.

It would be nice to see a change at the back as well, Lloyd James needs to come out of the firing line, he was targetted by Swansea on Saturday as the weak link and they exploited him with all three goals starting down our right, if Svensson was back then perhaps push Cork to right back, if not its hard to see what to do apart from bring Wotton in the centre alongside perry to enable Cork to be pushed right, but that would leave us exposed for pace.

On a positive note though, every game is winnable for Saints, what they have to get right though is the defending as they did at Brammall Lane, the problem is the constant chopping and changing that means we rarely have a settled side, Poortvliet needs to get the side settled and then get them into winning ways, starting from tonight, and then its back to the fans, to be blunt stay behind the team and they can find the fight within them, turn against them and we are only giving them an almighty shove down the slope towards relegation from which it will be hard to recover.

So it comes down to my first words, do you want Saints to win tonight ? if the naswer is yes, Ill see you at St Mary's, if the answer is no then perhaps its better that you stayed away.                 

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