Saints win the hard way in San Fran

Man I hate the 49ers. Always have always will... It's just been a while so I forgot how much!

It was like watching those old games off youth when the Saints would be in the game and then cool hand Joe would march his team down the field and snatch a win.

Well luckily for the Saints we now have a great team who stick together in tough road conditions whilst the 49ers find new ways to implode. I for one love that fact and want to take my hat off to the 49ers center for that opening snap that cost them the game.

Mike Singletary demon eyes

I sure am glad I was not in the 49er locker room after the game as some of their players literally handed the Saints keys to stay in the game at times.

What was it, 3 turnovers when they'd marched to the Saints red zone? Jeez, that is the kind of thing to make the iron man go purple with rage.

Now onto the Saints

I feared it at seasons start and now I'm worried even more. Loosing Mike Bell is going to hurt this team.

The diminuitive runner would have pounded out some hard yards in that second half to take the pressure off Pierre Thomas and give the 49ers more to think about. Instead it was left primarily to Pierre to fight for some small incremental yardage.

Clearly coach Payton didn't want to throw DeShawn Wynn into such a tough situation but the guy is going to have to get his game face on now with the loss of Reggie Bush.

Reggie Bush injured again

It pains me to see Reggie down and injured yet again especially after the week he had. The guy had his first healthy off season in a long while and looked sharp but once again lady luck has spoiled his season, a fact that could impact the Saints big time.

Without Bush we loose a lot of disguises that keep opponents on edge. It's going to result in a lot more blitz packages coming at Brees.

Drew Brees hurried too many times

Which brings me onto another concern. Brees was hurried far more times than was comfortable.

He is the undisputed leader of the team and to see him being put to the ground and under pressure so much was a concern. You could see it through the loss of his rythmn at times. Let's just hope that was a one off as our O line is made of better stuff.

The Positives

All that said there was a lot to take from the game. The team stuck together in true champion spirit coming into a hostile Monday night environment.

I thought the D played pretty well in large patches and did a great job at once again going after the ball. Vilma and Harper were once again excellent as was the entire secondary. I'd like to see more pressure from the line but they were facing a pretty good front five so let's wait and see how that front bears out in coming games.

Finally it was great to see the play of our special teams once again and especially the clutch kicks of Garrett Hartley. The young kicker held his nerve in tough circumstances to seal a Saints win and put paid to last weeks misses the only way a quality kicker can.

Great also to see some tighter defensive coverage on the return teams and a true all round effort from Courtney Roby. Oh and I best not forget Morstead as his booming kicks sure do go a long way to helping the D at times.

So in summary

A tough road win, hard fought against good opponents. The team has time now to reflect on where we were missing some connections ahead of the Falcons game. That sure is going to be a tough one but so long as our collective spirit holds true then we have a great shot.

In the meantime best wishes to Reggie. Fingers crossed for positive news in the coming days.