A modest but noisy and faithful number of fans made their way down from Mersey-side to Southampton for yesterday's game. It really was a game of two halves. In the first half, the predominant thing was the Referee and his whistle. He wasn't helped by an assistant who got his first few decisions 100% wrong. There was no flow to the game. Some of the Tranmere players appeared to be injury prone and at the slightest provocation would writhe in agony of such severity that the Ref was forced to stop the game only to find that they popped to their feet and were as right as rain - all without the intervention of the physio. There were some more brutal challenges that did require the physio but too much injury was feigned and more than once poor sportsmanship was exhibited at the restart.
In the second half, Saints suddenly looked like a team who knew what they were about. Dan Harding's scorcher was a beauty from 25 yards. When a defender tried volleyball to defend a corner, the resultant penalty kick gave Rickie Lambert the opportunity to increase his impressive tally. He added a further goal from a 25 yard free kick - eat your heart out Christiano Ronaldo!
All of which goes to show that Alan Pardew is indeed forging a team who play to win every game and are translating that into points. If you were to add in our 10 point deduction, we would be in the play-offs with a goal difference to match. Very impressive.
Some very difficult games lie ahead - this will be our greatest challenge so far.
COYR
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