Rejuvenated Bojan adding the flair to resilient Stoke
STOKE recorded their first away win against Southampton in 35 years and have now gone 455 minutes without conceding a goal on the road.
Mark Hughes is developing a side who are tough to penetrate but punishing with their passing. With Jack Butland in goal they have not been breached away from home since playing Arsenal on September 12. It is a run stretching five matches.
A biting chill hit St Mary’s and Bojan caught Jose Fonte cold with his near-post run to score the only goal of the game after 10 minutes. It was a finish to match the wonderfully constructed five-man move which started in Stokes half.
Glenn Whelan played Xherdan Shaqiri down the right, he dribbled to the edge of the box and passed to Marko Arnautovic in the middle, who helped it on to Erik Pieters making a burst down the left. His low cross was flicked home at Maarten Stekelenburg’s near post by Bojan with the outside of his right boot.
‘I didn’t realise at the time what a good finish it was,’ said manager Mark Hughes. ‘It was not an easy finish, he did well to get in position but it still needed converting and that’s when his technical ability came to the fore. He also has that ability to drift between defenders.’
The Spaniard, who made a surprise £3million move from Barcelona last year, is looking back to full fitness after the cruciate knee injury which kept him out for seven months.
Stoke should have been two ahead seven minutes after Bojan scored. Shaqiri charged into the box and went for the left of goal, but Stekelenburg kept the effort out with his right boot.
Ronaldo Koeman put his Southampton side’s poor start down to the effect of the Paris terror attacks. ‘It’s always difficult, but it was more difficult because of what happened last week,’ said Koeman. ‘I didn’t recognise my team in the first 45 minutes, didn’t recognise the atmosphere in stadium in the first half after all that happened last week.’
Dusan Tadic dragged a shot wide of the right post from inside the box in the sixth minute and dribbled the full length of the pitch on the break only to fire wide.
It took until the hour mark for Southampton to register their first effort on goal. Tadic feinted to shoot on the edge of the box and passed across to Victor Wanyama, who shot wide.
In a rare foray forward in the second half, Arnautovic almost doubled Stoke’s lead on 77 minutes when played through by Glen Johnson, but he shot over.