Written by kirsikka
In the absence of an AFCB match to enjoy, I spent Saturday evening at the Finnish National Theatre with Mrs Kirsikka watching a production of Moulin Rouge. I mention it in passing.
And so the football was finally here. We know how desperate fans of that lot are to point out it isn’t a derby. Sometimes, the lady doth protest too much, methinks. However, as two clubs in vaguely the same geographic space, I’m sure I can come up with some other non-derby terms for it in this report. Given their oft-stated lack of enthusiasm for the match, I’ll start with The New Forest Disinterest.
Dango in for Kluivert was the only real starting surprise, but it seemed like a well-earned change to reward the performances of Ouattara. Meanwhile, they tried something funky with their formation in that scattergun approach managers do when they’re flailing. Of course, there was one other item of interest on their team sheet…
We’re still a month away from Halloween, but Russell Martin wasn’t afraid to chuck Fraser into the cauldron, little realising by doing so he was turning Dean Court into a hell-broth for the half. His appearance meant the crowd didn’t need thunder, lightning, or rain to turn feral, creating a febrile atmosphere that made it double toil and trouble for them as our fire burned and cauldron bubbled.
Sure they had a decent ten minutes whilst we simmered but then the players started to feed on the El Lyndhurstico energy from the stands and take control.
Our first goal came from a quick Tavs free kick – fantastic vision and a perfect ball – for Evanilson to latch onto with an excellent finish. Bang! Set pieces have been a bugbear of mine so far this season so this was good. Tavs said in an interview they’d been working on quick fee kicks in training this week so credit to the coaching team.
For Evanilson, it’s taken a little time to get off the mark so he can’t say anything like he scored with his first touch at AFCB. If we were to tally them, it was probably more Like A (Southampton) Virgin – touched for sixty-first time.
For the first hour, Christie and Cook were like a pair of perpetual motion machines, relentlessly hunting down their prey. Cook, in particular, fought like a dog in midfield, but to reduce his performance to merely that is to overlook the sparkle his quality on the ball also brought. A Diamond Dog, then.
The place went off like a Firework when Lewis took out Fraser, who cut an increasingly forlorn figure before slinking off at half time knowing he’d again failed to perform at Dean Court. And yes, well done to the crowd because Your Song for him came through loud and clear. Songs really, I heard several. One of them may have been Toxic.
The second came when some fantastic centre-forward play from Evanilson left their cover Rolling In The Deep, allowing Tavs to surge forward into space. He gave it to Semenyo, who, after some silky skills, laid it on for Cook to shoot, only for it to deflect off Dango and in. Given the harsh way he’s been treated with ‘goals’ in recent times, I can’t think of anyone more deserving of a slice of luck like that.
Hantsageddon looked to be decided for the night when Semenyo, who’d been itching to get a shot away every time he got the ball, finally got his chance when he sold several defenders a dummy and drilled in a great goal from the corner of the box.
It was class. Even Bruce Willis couldn’t have drilled it better, and the crowd went off like a nuclear explosion. Not in space, though, as contrary to popular Hollywood entertainment, you would barely get any sound with that due to the low density of the air particles in the vacuum. (Sidenote: Google Operation Argus and have a genuine ‘wtf?‘ moment).
Completely dominating a match in terms of play and scoreline is something I Will Always Love. You can’t help but relax and mentally ‘Olé!’ every pass and move. That first 45 went about as good as it could have done.
If you could anthropomorphise a football match half, I’d be sidling up to this to one to whisper “Voulez vous coucher avec moi, ce soir?” in its ear. It was that good.
All through the match, Tavs and Semenyo caused them problems. They were our Sparkling Diamonds of creativity, and you could see the opposition running scared when either of them got up a head of steam.
In the break, they took the novel step of bringing on a striker and it did make a difference. We also handed them a glint of hope early in the second period with some sloppiness.
Kerkez dived in to needlessly give away an attacking free kick. A good save from Kepa forced it wide and Semenyo could have cleared but tried to dribble and lost it. A second cross came it, it deflected off an AFCB player and bounced kindly for them. Not sure what was going on with the marking but the error lies with Semenyo for me. Notably, in a similar situation later in the match he absolutely hoofed it clear rather than trying to take on his man.
There were still chances either way but, if I’m honest, the second half sort of petered out. It wasn’t exactly a Demolition D…, err, Dogfight out there. More like a PG movie, with mild threat but nothing to really worry about.
Our press certainly lost its snap after about 60 minutes… more on that later. The introduction of Kluivert at least gave us more impetus so we weren’t sitting back.
As for other matters, I’ve railed against the officials many times lately. I know what you’re thinking. Don’t Speak about the ref yet again but, truth be told, there isn’t a huge amount to be said. He was fairly even-handed. Gave them some soft decisions, gave us some soft decisions. Mostly got his calls right and didn’t make himself the centre of attention. Funny how it can be done when they aren’t desperately trying to please a big club, isn’t it?
One other moment of note: the raucous cheer that reverberated around the ground when it was announced the last train to Southampton had been cancelled was cruel and funny. I’m Torn between feeling sorry for fans who make the effort to travel and watch their side and laughing at them because… well because this was the South Coastalypse. So I’ll indulge myself this one time. <Nelson> HA! HA!</Nelson>.
Before this match their fans were very fond of loudly shutting down any derby talk. I think they’re right. Derby got eleven points and based on that first half, I can’t see them getting that many. At best, they’re a sub-Derby.
To me, they look like they’ll be spending every weekend of the next seven months going down like a consumptive courtesan. The tragic ending is already set, it’s just a matter of time. Let’s hope they go the same way as the biscuit-boys, those self-styled Royals.
Meanwhile, we got the win we deserved in the Solentaclysm. Although that makes it sound dramatic when, in reality, we brushed them aside.
Man of the match against SouthamptonSemenyo
O. Dango
Cook
Evanilson
Senesi
Christie
Tavernier
Someone else
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Selected Player Watch
— Dango —
Deserved a start. It wasn’t his best performance as I felt he could have done better with some of the situations that developed, but he looked like he might make things happen, which is always the starting point for a winger. Plus, he got the goal his season deserves.
— Evanilson —
What every striker needs is a goal to get them going, and what a finish it was. Also instrumental in the build-up to the second goal and had another shot saved. The signs are looking good, and if he can score more like that first, he’ll be less Evanilson and more Evan Almighty.
— Cook —
My MotM out there. Tireless and also quality on the ball. It probably went unnoticed to most, but on one break, the ball came to Scott in the middle with Semenyo desperately shouting to be played in, but AS instead took the safe option back to Cook. He immediately ferociously pinged a perfect ball into Antoine, almost angrily showing Scott where it should have gone. A class act tonight.
— Semenyo —
He can go left, he can go right, he can batter his way through you. What a buy he’s turning out to be.
AI and Tactics Watch
I think his starting choices were fair enough. It isn’t that Kluivert has done anything wrong but sometimes you need to rotate it around and give subs who have done well a start. We seemed a little bamboozled for the first ten by their formation but once we got our foot in the door of the match we were all over them.
Christie looked absolutely spent after 70 minutes, but I think the two-goal cushion made AI nervous about taking him off, given they were putting us under a little pressure without creating much. This is the same ongoing problem we face as long as there is an Adams-shaped hole on the bench.
Hopefully, Ryan and Lewis have enough in the tank for the same again against Leicester and Tyler will finally be back after the international break.
Come What May, I still think that we can’t deny the enjoyment in watching football like this. It Roxanne every week there’s a pleasure to be taken from the experience. Long may it continue.
I’m not sure if this tells us anything more about our season than losing to Arsenal or Man City would. It wasn’t a night that called for Heroes, merely a team executing the plans put in place by our superior manager so that our superior players could let their quality tell. It worked, we take the three points and forget about that lot for a while now.
I’ll finish with two questions:
- Can you go marching down? Asking for an acquaintance.
- Can we now build on this and try to climb the table? If you ask me, yes we can-can.
PS For anyone familiar with both the movie and theatre versions of Moulin Rouge, I realise the latter also featured I Wanna Dance With Somebody by Whitney Houston, but I couldn’t think of any connection between that and AFCB, so I had to skip it from my shoehorning.
Your say…
red_house
Fraser got some serious grief tonight …
Brilliant first half, and handled the second 45 quite well considering It’s the PL and they’re 2nd from bottom on merit.
4th loudest roar was the train announcement.
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