TWar

Good question, I'll have a look into the underlying data, it does seem like there is something fishy in the goals scored section. EDIT: It's because of rounding. Livramento scored 1 goal in 1815 minutes, that is an average of 0.049 goals per 90. This has, somewhat unfortunately for him, been rounded down to 0.0 rather than up to 0.1. KWP has also scored one goal but in 1617 minutes or 0.055 goals per 90 which has been rounded up. It is a little unfair, I'll grant you, that each of them falls either side of 0.05 so one is rounded down and one is rounded up. Cash has scored 2 goals in 2220 minutes or 0.08. This has been rounded up to 0.1. I could manually calculate goals, assists, xG and xA per 90 so they aren't rounded to the nearest significant figure but to be honest since it is just 1 or 2 goals per player it's not too impactful.

I finally got back from London and had a spare few minutes so here is a stat comparison of our three fullbacks and Cash/Digne. Also I did stuff like the colouring and the counting of final points by hand (although the data itself was scraped from FFS with underlying data from opta stats) therefore if I made a mistake apologies! I have assigned arbitrary scores so that winning a catagory gets you 5 pts, 2nd gets you 4, third gets you 3 etc. Bare in mind the stats I chose were ones I found interesting, but they are definitely weighted towards attacking stats which Tino and KWP excel at. Defensively Digne has been strong this season as has Cash and compete reasonably evenly. Either way, in my opinion the best fullback pairing of both teams is KWP - Livramento. And Digne - Livramento if you want more defensive output. Perrauds stats are very poor, this surprised me somewhat as I thought he'd done quite well.

Well that's a shame. Atleast it's at home. Our "season unbeaten by city" is in the balance.

I lived in Coventry for years, I'm immune to the annoying accent. Thing is I quite liked a lot of Villa fans in person as they were pretty reasonable and knew they were about the quality of us, Palace, Brighton, Leeds et al. It's only the nutters online who saw themselves as top 6 hopefuls around the level of Arsenal and Spurs.

Yeah I've been wanting us to get Romeus successor for like 2 years, during which time he's quietly become one of the best all round defensive mids in the league.

Villa fans have delusions of granduer, they were told by their club they were signing a tonne of players alongside Grealish to push for top 6, they all believed it. Then Grealish obviously left and they still seem to think they are a team pushing for europe despite the fact that they took a massive step back last summer and would be lucky to get top half.

Good question, will have a look when I get home, currently stuck in central London due to this annoying tube strike!

I see it. Armstrong wouldn't make their bench? What nonsense. Considering Cash or Digne over any of Livramento, KWP or Perraud on current form is very amusing too. Mcginn over Romeu too. Some very poor shouts. Will say, I do agree regarding Ramsey, he is class. If we played a 433 he'd get in no doubt but we don't and he obviously nowhere near jwp as our box to box mid and if we are having one of theirs to play 10 we'd have Coutinho.

Oo drop a link, it's always fun to meet admirers

I think they have a better keeper and Coutinho is very good and that's basically it. Konsa probably beats out our second cb too. Salisu, our fullbacks, our midfield, and Broja are miles better than what they are working with imo. Stuart Armstrong immediately improves that side and Adams is comfortably outscoring every player they have. Combined 11 for me is Martinez Tino Salisu Konsa Kwp Jwp romeu Coutinho Armstrong Broja Adams Obviously they can still beat us, player for player no Middlesborough players start for spurs, but I am personally think we should be targeting 3 points.

I think he'd walk into basically any team in the league outside Chelsea and City and improve it immediately. All opinions though. He's just so good at so many aspects of being a midfielder I think he'd fit into most systems. His only weakness is dribbling but his passing more than makes up for it.

When I saw the line up I was very concerned that we'd be dominated. What I didn't realise is that if you have a strong midfield then you will always have a good chance. JWP was so good in that midfield that he massively carried the team, Diallo was good too. And it wasn't like they were up against average players, they won the midfield battle against Rice and Soucek, one of the best midfields in the league. Jwp is absolutely class, it's getting towards the point where he is irreplaceable for us even if we got like £80m.

I rate our chances. We have a better team and a better manager. Anything can happen over 90 minutes but I'd certainly think of us as favourites. Starting 11 I'd probably play Forster KWP Salisu Bednarek Perraud Romeu Jwp Elyounoussi Armstrong Adams Broja Shame to drop Tino but these have decentish wide options and a weak midfield so I'd rather have the more defensively sound but less ball progressive fullback pairing. We don't need fullbacks to run it up the pitch, JWP, Romeu and Armstrong are going to cut through like a knife through butter imo. Depending on fitness ofcourse.

Damn that's weak.

Same but for Vestergaard.

Broja would be fine - he's great Armstrong would be great - he's probably fine but certainly has had a rough start Ings was a poor signing - he was not Lemina would have a better post saints career than Hojbjerg Forster being nailed down on a long term deal was great business as his good form in 2016 would last forever Those are the ones that immediately spring to mind. I'm sure there are more.

Doubt Livra would want to be cover for Reece James, it's why he left in the first place. Also Broja is probably worth about £25m and Anjorin about £10-15m. ~£40m is pricey for a back up fullback even at Chelsea, any more money and they will be very out of pocket. Also, Broja seems to get on well with Livra and Anjorin is used to playing with Livra too. Getting the three of them in the team together is probably the goal.

Disclosed fees since 2015: Obafemi - £1.8m Reed - £5.85m Targett - £14m Gallagher - £5.85m Total: £27.5m However the summer before this started: Shaw - £33.75m Lallana - £27.9m Chambers - £18.2 Total: £79.85m If those three were sold a year later then we'd have a profit of £107.35m or about 134m euros. This would have us as 23rd on the list, below Dynamo Zagreb and above Villa. Obviously other sides also probably had sales in 2014, just trying to show how the reason we don't appear is the timescale cuts off our three biggest sales by a year.

https://www.southamptonfc.com/news/2022-03-01/press-conference-live-ralph-hasenhuttl-southampton-west-ham-united-emirates-fa-cup-2022

I'd sell for anything significantly over £40m. His value is capped at that so its makes financial sense. Our best team has him in it (and KWP at LB) but KWP Perraud isn't much of a step down at all. Sell and reinvest if the offer comes in. £55m profit for one year investment, would be one of the best deals we've ever done. Doubt he is worth £60m though.

40 points hasn't been neccessary for safety since 2003. Our current point total would keep us up every year since 2016 and we still have 12 games to go. I think we'll be fine...

Wasn't there an article in January that said we would begin negotiating when safe from relegation? Now we are like 500-1 to go down I wonder if we will try and get a deal done before the summer window opens.

Wolves next five games are Palace, Watford, Everton, Leeds, and Newcastle. Now obviously there are no "easy" games in the premier league, but I back them to get over 10 points from that run easily. In order to catch them or atleast stay level we need to keep this run of form going. If we lose even one or two in the next 5 weeks they'll be out of sight. Spurs have West Ham and United in their next 5 so catching them up could be doable if we keep our current form up.

To be honest I could be wrong. The clause was heavily rumoured in the run up to the signing but I can't find anyone reliable confirming it exists post signing, it just say "plus add ons" and doesn't elaborate

Unless you are Howe, in which case they should build you a statue. On the upside, last time he was in the prem bournemouth spent big money and he didn't stay up, so atleast it's personal improvement