A day in the away end

Reading 1-1 Southampton
Attendance: 21, 889 (4,203 away fans)

Yesterday I made the trip to Reading along with over 4,000 other Saints fans to see if Southampton could maintain the gap at the top of the league. After a tough 1-0 win over West Ham on Tuesday night which seen a record crowd of 32,150 at St Marys, the players would have to pick themselves up again against a Reading team who are finally starting to find some form. There was one change from the team on Tuesday with Jack Cork replacing Morgan Schneiderlin who was on the bench with Adam Lallana missing for the third game in a row.
Saints got the game underway and had the first half chance when Connolly and Chaplow created a good move down the right with Connolly's cross just getting blocked before Chaplow could get on the end of it after a good run into the area. The rest of the half was all Reading and they almost took the lead around 17 minutes when McAnuff pulled the ball back across the goal mouth which only needed somebody to tap into the net but Danny Fox was quick enough to smash the ball clear. Simon Church then tested Davis from distance but the Saints captain was there to tip around the post which was followed shortly by a superb save from Davis as Mikele Leigertwood drilled the ball from 30 yards but Davis somehow got a hand to it to turn over the bar. With Reading shooting towards us in the first half it was safe to say we seen most of the game as most of the game so far was played in Southampton's half and I was pleased when the half time whistle went to take us in 0-0!
Fonte came off for Martin at the start of the second half which was proberly a good idea seeing he was on a booking and was having a hard afternoon! Reading started strongly again with Southampton just not able to get out of first gear and almost took the lead after Alex Pearce headed narrowly wide. Against the run of play Southampton almost took the lead after being awarded a free kick just outside the area, Danny Fox whipped the ball in and Martin headed down and somehow Adam Federici getting down to save low. Saints needed something extra to get them going and they got that when Steve De Ridder came on replacing Connolly who injected an extra bit of pace and flare and instantly put Chaplow through on the right who maybe should have took it on his left but decided to cut inside and shot low but the keeper was there to make the save. Just when Southampton looked like they were starting to get into the game Hammond gave away a free kick on the edge of the area which McAnuff smashed against the post but Leigertwood got to the rebound to fire home. Things got worse a few minutes later as Dean Hammond got sent off for a second booking and it started to look like Saints were going home with nothing. However having ten men seem to wake the players up and on 81 minutes Southampton levelled after Guly flicked on a throw in down the right to De Ridder who ran into the area and hammered the ball off the cross bar to level the game to send us 4000 fans mad in the away end. The last ten minutes was frantic as both teams tried to win it but nobody really created any clear cut chances. Overall Reading will no doubt feel they deserved to win the game but dare I say it..if you want to finish at the top you have to get points when not playing very well and Southampton did just that. I was impressed with the way they stuck at it with 10 men and even went on to try and win the game at the end, cracking stuff. Oh yeah, its also safe to say the Southampton fans dominated the home fans in terms of chanting and atmosphere.. "You only sing when your winning!".

Coming soon....

So its that time of year again when there seems to be a decent game being released every week which means most of wages seem to be getting pumped into the gaming industry! There are almost too may to write about but here are a few that have caught my attention that are due to be released within the next several months....

Batman: Arkham City
Release date: 18th October

The long awaited sequel to Arkham Asylum is almost finally here and is the game that I have been really looking forward to all year! Arkham Asylum is in my top 3 games of all time on the Xbox so expecting big things as The Dark Knight now enters what seems to be the home of all the worlds worst criminals in Gotham City to again take on The Joker. It will be very interesting to see how big the city map will be compared to the first game but from what I have seen and read from it so far I dont think we are going to be disappointed with there being plenty of secret locations to discover. Batman has new weapons and upgrades making him even more of a lean mean fighting machine and you can also control Catwomen who has different skills to Batman and far more agile making climbing, gliding even quicker than with Batman. The challenge modes have been kept with combat mode which has you fighting against various enemies using combos to build up your score and the Predator mode where you sneak around using the character's abilities to take down enemies quietly. Also the game has been made compatible with stereoscopic 3D which will no doubt make the graphics even more incredible!!


Battlefield 3
Release date: 28th October

Having never really switched from Call Of Duty for my dossage of first person shooters I recently purchased Battlefield 2 due to seeing a few good reviews about it and I wasnt disappointed so there is no doubt that this game will be arriving through my letterbox in the next few weeks! In Battlefield 3, players step into the role of the elite U.S Marines where you experience action filled single player missions and also multiplayer actions all around the globe including Paris, Tehran and New York. What has impressed in previous Battlefields is that the campaign felt a lot more realistic than Call Of Duty partly due to anything around you being able to be blown to pieces and the enemies fire wasnt coming from infront of you all the time as there were times where your getting shot at from all directions. Also being able to use vehicles is added fun so the general feel of the enviroment around you in the game is pretty impressive. These are feature that they have built on in Battlefield 3 with the introduction of Frostbite 2 which is the technology that makes the animation, destruction, lighting, scale and audio even better which is designed to make the player feel immersed physically and emotionally into the environment around them. The vehicle warfare engine has also been upgraded with a fitting sonic boom as fighter jets headline an impressive lineup of land, see and air vehicles. These may seem "little" features to some people but I believe these are what give a game an edge over its rivals. Theres no doubt that it will always be in the shadow of COD but if you prefer the more tactical and realistic aspects of war then I believe you will prefer this game over COD.


UFC Undisputed 3
Release date: 13th January 2011

Now I know this isnt due to be released for some time but being a massive UFC fan and having spent far too many hours on the previous two games its safe to say I'm pretty excited so I thought I would give it a mention! The main features that impressed me with the first two games was the career modes and the way the game hypes up each fight as it is built up exactly like you would see when watching a live UFC event on the TV. For a sporting game I think its important to get the build up to a match/event right as I know it draws me right into the action and as sad as it sounds gets me pumped up like I am actually playing...now you know its a good game if it does that to you! You can tell that the guys that made this have worked on improving these aspects each time and this latest game to the series of UFC games wont be an exception as the developers have pointed out the visual improvements from broadbcast to cage-side through to new camera positions and FINALLY the introduction of fighter entrances! Now one critisism that could be made with the previous games is that it isnt too kind to new users who want to pick the game up and go straight into it as even on the easiest AI setting if you didnt know any defensive controls expecially ground controls then you would get beaten up pretty badly. To try and help improve this new gameplay accessibility has been introduced to give you a choice between traditional and simplified controls to enable all skill levels to experience the intensity of the game. Personally I believe if you want to really feel like you are in a fight take the time to learn the traditional controls as the tutorials were very good in the previous games and it feels much more satisfying when you have won a fight using the more complex moves during a fight! The amount of fighters have been increased with the introduction of Featherweight and Bantamweight divisions which were missing in the previous two games and a new Pride mode which takes you into the brutal world of Japanese MMA. This game will certainly kick the new year off in style....