Southampton v Brighton The Verdict
Despite spending the best part of last week criticising Alex McCarthy I thought he had a decent game against the Seagulls and didn’t deserve to shoulder the blame for yet another disappointing result.
I can understand Ralph Hasenhuttl’s frustration, once a team crosses the touch line the manager can insert little influence he is reliant on the players themselves do the job they are paid to do.
In truth for most of this game they did, including Alex McCarthy who massed several saves, but the truth is what was up to the 5th minute of injury time a good performance was ruined by a failure to manage the games in injury time and a failure to keep the ball saw a silly free kick given away and a bizarre goal conceded.
Of course we should have had the game finished off but again it was a game of two halves
, but this time it looked like we could hold on as Brighton now down to 10 men and their fans starting to leave suddenly sensed nervousness in the Saints side.
What happened is now history, all we can do is move forward , we are a better side than our league position states, but we still have that fatal flaw.
It has taken me two days to get up the enthusiasm to write this piece, it absolutely flawed me this was more disappointing than any other game this season.
But now is not the time for panic, I think Ralph was wrong to single out McCarthy for the blame, managers should hold the team collectively at fault not individuals, storm at a player in the dressing room not to the media.
But it is not the end of the world, it is always about what we do next, to stay focused on what we do well and also to put right what is still going wrong.
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