Southampton have been very rigid in their defensive line up in the opening games of the season, but there is a reason behind that, one which has been beyond the control of Will Still.

There is a good reason why Saints are sat in the middle of the Championship and not at the top, that is the number of goals conceded from errors both forced and unforced, virtually every goal conceded in the opening 3 League games was down to poor concentration, poor organisation and just plain poor play.

We rigidly stuck to a back three and although Will Still could clearly see that it wasn't working as evidenced by the fact that each of those 4 Championship games saw either a change in personnel or a change in the position that those players were playing in that back trio, seemed to suggest that Still was desperately trying to get things right.

The problem with playing with a back three is that to do so you have to be very organised with the central player of the three being able to direct those around them, there is a lot more space to patrol and communication is important and we lacked it badly.

So why did Still continue with something that was going so badly wrong ? The answer is simple, he had absolutely no choice, he didn't have the personnel to play a back three and if he reverted to a back four he didn't have the personnel in the midfield & going forward.

To put it bluntly he didn't have any wingers, with Sam Edozie out of the squad, up till Friday and the arrival of Tom Fellows, the only genuine winger that we had was Ryan Fraser.

If you play a back four then you have to have wingers who can go at the opposition with pace, Ryan Manning to a degree can play as a winger, but he is not a specialist in that position, he can't terrorise defenders and get in behind them and leave them for dead, he is good at what he can do, so this is not a slur on his play this season or his abilities he is just not a flying winger.

So Will Still was a little constrained in what he could do to change things in terms of formation, he could go to a back four, but it would have hampered our attacking abilities.

But now with the arrival of Tom Fellows & Leo Scienza we now have 3 genuine wingers, we can revert to a back four as we have pace in front of them out wide who can get the ball and take on the opposition.

We saw this happen to us from Wrexham & Stoke at St Mary's, yet up until last week we didn't have any wingers and the one we did have had to play in the centre due to illness to Flynn Downes.

Now the transfer window is close we know just who is here and who isn't and with the new men in the squad Will Still an play a different formation and can well and truly wing it !

All Photos Via Reuters

Bowlercow added 13:21 - Sep 4 Careful Nick You may be turning into a headline writer Will made his name by playing 4-2-3-1 although it is not written in stone He will change,adapt from game to game as well as in the 90 minutes.Im not even sure he will put out what we would consider to be his best 11 to start the next game We must be patient and allow him time to experiment Even if it doesn't work from the off we must not start calling for his head It would be good to go back up this year but if it doesn't happen DON’T change the coach

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Colburn added 13:29 - Sep 4 He could have played Fraser and Robinson as wingers, Armstrong is also seen as a winger, so I disagree when you say he had no choice. 3 at the back clearly wasn’t going to work no matter the personnel, so why persist with it? It’s negative and draws other teams on to us and then the mistakes happen. Not so bad to revert to if two nil up and the oppo are putting us under pressure. Why is it better to do one thing without the right personnel and not the other anyway? Manning for me is a left back, not a ring back or winger. When he’s a wingback his positional play defensively is questionable. We could have also gone for two up top in a 4-4-2 which would have been better than 3 central defenders. Also this is the system that created the ‘trauma’ from last season that the players allegedly have, so why continue with it? Madness

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SaintPaulVW added 22:51 - Sep 4 If Still is a good manager, he will find the system that works best at any point in time with the players he has available. Choosing a system over players always ends badly.
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BigbadBarry8myboat added 23:09 - Sep 4 Nick, so you're saying Still didn't have the personnel to play a back 3, or back 4, and that to play a back 3 you need communication and organisation. Remind me what qualities Jack Stephens got his 3 year extension for? It was supposed to be communication and organisation, this is why he's captain. The issue we now have is that if we play a back 4, one of the centre backs is still going to be Stephens, so still no organisation or communication. We needed to sign a Ben Mee or Lindleoff to organise us and for someone vocal to take the armbands, but we still lack that player. My only hope for Saints is that we can play Keegan ball and score more than we let in, and we're still likely to let them in.

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Alehouse added 09:42 - Sep 5 What you have written is exactly what the manager has said to justify his selection. Like Colburn I believe it would have been possible to play 4-4-2 with Fraser and Robinson wide in midfield and prepared to go forward with 2 up front. Playing 3 centre halves leaves you short across midfield and in attack.
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Monksway added 14:56 - Sep 5 I hope you are right and that was the reason for playing 3 at the back. I'm a bit concerned that the real reason i
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Monksway added 14:58 - Sep 5 s that he doesn't know and isn't confident in a first choice pairing, so he is hedging his bets with a constantly changing three.
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