Everyone associated with Southampton is looking ahead to a Wembley final after the Saints beat West Brom 3-1 on Friday night.
After the first leg of the Championship play-off semi-final finished 0-0 at The Hawthorns, Southampton utilised their home advantage to the maximum as they dominated West Brom from start to finish.
Academy graduate Will Smallbone opened the scoring in the 49th minute with a fine strike from outside the area in what was one of the 24-year-old’s best games for the club, before an Adam Armstrong brace put Southampton 3-0 up.
Cedric Kipre did score a consultation goal for Carlos Corberan’s side, but it was too late to have any impact on the result.
Armstrong’s second goal came from the penalty spot following a foul on Ryan Manning, with Neil Warnock accusing the left-back of having a tendency to go down a little easily throughout his career.
Neil Warnock calls Ryan Manning a ‘diver’
Warnock was covering the game as part of the Sky Sports punditry team and spoke following the match about how he felt Manning went down a little easily to win the penalty.
The former Leeds United manager did not deny that the penalty award was correct, but suggested Manning has a history of deceiving the referee to get decisions.
Having watched the incident back, Warnock said: I’ve seen Manning dive at Swansea more than anything.”
He went on to joke that: “I used to shake his hand after the game and say ‘what a diver you are!'”
Whilst Manning will not want to get a reputation for conning referees, he will likely not care one bit about Warnock’s comments given his contribution having come off the bench.
Perhaps in future he may be best served letting the contact come rather than pre-empting it, though, particularly if Southampton earn promotion to the Premier League where VAR is in use.
Southampton could have had three penalties v West Brom
By the time Manning saw a penalty awarded after his surge into the box was ended by a combination of two West Brom defender’s challenges, Southampton had already had two penalty claims turned down.
David Brooks was central to everything the Saints did in an inspired performance and found himself goal-side of defender Conor Townsend on 11 minutes.
Townsend looked to pull the Welshman back, but Brooks went down far too theatrically for the referee to give a penalty for what would have been a soft foul.
However, not long after Smallbone put Southampton 1-0 up, Brooks was denied a stonewall penalty as Kipre went through his right leg to get to the ball in what was a really poor decision from the referee.
The Saints did get their penalty late on, though, as Jack Stephens drove forward before slipping in Manning who was then brought down.
Whilst the contact did come and it was a penalty, Manning’s intentions were clear as he looked to be already going to ground before the contact came.
