Eckert still owes Southampton an answer on this Lincoln substitution
Southampton need to learn how to kill a game off. That is the whole argument, and Saturday lunchtime handed the evidence over in a single passage of play.
Scienza cut in from the left the way he always does, bent it past Wickens, and watched the ball come back off one post, run along the line and rebound off the other. Then he was gone along with Larin who had already been withdrawn on 62 mins.
Sixty-three minutes and two posts
Supporters on the r/SaintsFC match thread needed no time to reach their verdict. The anger there was aimed at the double change rather than at the lads who came on, and a recurring complaint was that removing Larin, Scienza and later Azaz while only a goal up was no way to see out an away game.
One supporter described Saints as a team that looked mid-table the moment the bench had been emptied. The Total Saints Podcast then built an entire episode around the question, which tells you how weak Eckert's substitutions actually were.
There is a small defence which deserves sharing. Scienza has started every league match this season. Birmingham was only six days earlier, and a head coach holding the fitness data knows some things the away end at Lincoln does not.
That's somewhat understandable. But a manager protecting a winger's legs nd then sending Nathan Wood on for the last six minutes was never going to work.
Wood came on for Kuryu Matsuki on 84 which handed the Imps the initiative. They didn't need a second invitation when Mikkel Ladefoged scored on 87. In between, a side that had spent most of the second half camped in the Lincoln half stopped attacking and invited a 6ft 8in striker onto them.
What the bench actually offers on Tuesday
Sam Edozie got 27 minutes and 13 touches out of them. Divin Mubama had half an hour and nothing stuck. Lewis Dobbin, all nine million quid of him, came on last of all and had a weak shot hacked off the line.
Flynn Downes put it plainly afterwards. He included himself in it, saying the lads coming on have to step up too, which is a captainish way of pointing at what went wrong without naming a soul.
Southampton have led and drawn twice inside a week. Both leads went after the changes. That is no coincidence.
Cameron Bragg dropped out to make room for Ward-Prowse, as Saints Marching flagged before kick-off, then sat unused all afternoon while Eckert reached for other options. On Tuesday, against a side that has conceded once all season, he may well need him.
Verdict: Eckert hasn't become a poor head coach inside a week. But he needs to be held accountable for taking off the one player Lincoln could not handle, at the moment Southampton were on top. The Saints fans deserve a better public answer than minutes management. Swansea will not be as generous as Lincoln.
