Simon3737

Lemina and Long for Boufal and Redmond please.....

All our centre-halves except Hoedt are right-footed according to Pellegrino. When we signed Hoedt, he mentioned we have very few left footers in the whole squad. I checked on Transfermarkt.co.uk and that suggests we only have 6 left-footed players, the 3 left backs plus Hoedt, Tadic and Gabbi. I don't know if this is 100% accurate, but interesting I thought. Apparently Long is the only "bi-footed" player. The rest hop everywhere I assume!

I can't see VvD playing this match. He hasn't trained with the first team all year and needs to learn what Pellegrino's tactics are etc. I hope he gets back training with the first team pretty soon and has a good media strategist to advise him how to publicly apologise effectively. Maybe pretend he can barely read and blame it all on his pet dog It will damage the morale of the whole team if he gets picked, but gets booed.

Thanks! That suggests the rumoured deadline day midfielder that didn't materialise would have been dependent on Targett going on loan (unless Rose was to be left outside the 25).

Could be a loan? Would be fantastic re-signing for us. Exactly what Gabbi needs.

Maybe they would consider buying him if he was 25 instead of 32! Fortunately for us, no big club is likely to poach a 32 year old. I'm not saying he's the best link-up midfielder ever, but he's certainly the best in our current squad in that position. If the black box can find a 23 year old 'next Frank Lampard' to replace Davis, then great. Or maybe PEH will become good enough one day.

I'm guessing he's no longer on his original Arsenal contract. Could that affect (reduce) our sell-on fee? Just wondering.

Maybe the "the supremely ropey crossing of our wide men and fullbacks" is the problem then! Davis gets the ball to them well enough. Unless Lemina can play the Davis role (I'd be interested to see him tried), I think Davis is the best we have to link midfield together.

I wrote this on Huddersfield thread after the match, but more relevant here...

I think the biggest problem with our team is that our midfield is just too slow (since Puel). I think we have to always play Romeu plus one of Davis/JWP (never both). They are all slow, so, unless we buy faster versions of them, we need quick (thinking as well as running, so not Redmond) players next to them to support Gabbi. I think Lemina will be great and I'm sure Gabbi can score loads of goals if he gets support. Based on our current (not on strike) squad,. I'd play the following team (back-ups in brackets): -----------------------------McCarthy--------------------------- -----------------------------(Forster)--------------------------- Cedric-------------Stephens---------Hoedt-----------Bertrand (Stephens)-------(Yoshida)--------(Yoshida)--------(Targett) -----------------------------Romeu------------------------------ ----------------------------(Lemina)----------------------------- --------------Davis------------------------Lemina--------------- -------------(JWP)-------------------------(PEH)---------------- ---------Long-------------------------------------McQueen----- --(Boufal/Gabbiadini)----------------------(Tadic/Redmond)-- -----------------------------Gabbiadini-------------------------- ---------------------------(Austin/Long)------------------------

http://buffstream.com/watch/soccer-4.php Very clear

That would show quite some talent! More than we displayed against Wolves tonight!

To be fair, he only took 1 out of 3 cups seriously.

Yep, Wolves FM was shocking. Their commentators sounded like they don't like watching football!

Out of interest, can anyone explain to me why some players can't last 90 minutes these days? They all seem to be super-fit athletes with detailed exercise programmes, thoroughly researched diets for their home lives as well as at training etc. Does it just come down to genetics?

The answer is very simple. 90% of people are straight and only 10% are gay. If 90% of people had green as their favourite colour, it was both your parent's favourite colour, your sibling's favourite colour and everyone in your school class's favourite colour too, then if a new boy joined your class everyone would just assume his favourite colour was green too. If his favourite colour was green, he has no need to say anything as it was assumed by everyone anyway. If his favourite colour is actually red, he would need to 'come out' to everyone to say he's different to them, he prefers red. It really is that simple!

I'd be very surprised if Mr Gao has taken out a personal loan to fund the purchase of a business asset. No sane businessman would do that. It would make him personally liable if the loan is defaulted on, meaning he could lose his house (or one of his houses more likely!). He's probably set-up some sort of limited liability shell company to borrow this money (so if there's a default, he could liquidate that company and lose nothing personally). My hunch is that this debt will be transferred to the club eventually. Rupert Lowe tried, and failed, to liquidate a shell company (Southampton Leisure Holdings), but keep the football company as a going concern. He didn't get away with that trick and I doubt Gao could either. As I said on the other thread, debt isn't necessarily a bad thing so long as it's affordable, sustainable and allows the club to gain more in increased revenue than it has to spend on the debt repayments. Overall, I think it's too early to tell if this is a good or bad takeover. We'll have to judge the Gao family on their actions over the next couple of years.

It can be a good thing if what we've been told is true, that the Gao family 'partnership' is going to enable the club to increase investment and enable us to 'move to the next level'. A level Kat could not afford to fund. If the investment is affordable and sustainable (and greater than Kat would have spent), then having this funded by debt is a 'price worth paying'. It's basically like taking out a re-mortgage to pay for home improvements which will add value to your home and earn enough to both repay the mortgage and still earn a profit. If the Times article is true and Mr Gao isn't going to increase spending, that suggests we've been lied to and the debt is just to enable him to funnel money out of the club by paying dividends to himself to repay his personal debt. If that's true, I'm afraid 'the Southampton way' will rapidly look more like the P*rtsm*uth way!

Debt isn't necessarily a bad thing or a good thing. What matters is two things: 1) Are the debt repayments affordable/sustainable in all circumstances (e.g. if we got relegated, TV money dropped, interest rates rise etc)? 2) How much do the annual debt repayments cost the club (because that's money we can't spend on transfers, wages etc) and is this cost offset by the benefits of the investment (bigger stadium revenue, qualifying for Europe regularly, Chinese shirt sales etc)? If this is borrowing to invest long-term in the club to sustainbly 'move to the next level' then great. If it's going to be wasted on buying 32 year old players, gold toilets for the Board or large dividend payments to the Gao family then we should start panicking. Unfortunately, I doubt us fans will ever find out if the debt is sustainable or how much it costs to repay because we're a privately owned company.

Ok, I’ll bite. ...that’s what he said etc etc  Yes, football is shockingly behind the times in LGBT+ tolerance as well as tolerance of many other things (the idea of accepting female medical staff seems pretty cutting edge to most clubs and women aren’t even a minority group). But, equally, the simple fact is most people are straight, are able-bodied, have no problem with their 15th chromosome etc etc, and therefore most people tend to instinctively assume everyone else is like them. This needn’t be because they are prejudiced in any way. It’s just down to a lack of forethought or awareness. As a result, many well-meaning, tolerant people inadvertently use phrases like ‘that’s a bit gay’, ‘your argument is retarded’ etc. This is why it’s very helpful if people are open about their sexuality, explain about their children’s health issues etc. It raises understanding and awareness and helps people avoid inadvertently saying or doing something that could cause offense, misunderstanding or exclusion. In a backward environment like football where men are role-models for kids, the benefits of a man from that world coming out is even more helpful. I’ve generally worked in pretty open and tolerant workplaces, but people tend to assume I’m straight. This doesn’t offend me at all, but telling colleagues I’m gay just saves me having to pretend to join in the ‘what mark out of 10 would you give that new girl in HR’ type conversations (which often occur along with the blokey football conversations I enjoy). Yes, there are some ‘political correctness gone mad’ types who actively seek out opportunities to take offence at the slightest thing (man hole cover etc), but they’re just ‘being a bit gay’

Totally agree. There is a huge difference between 'not minding' what someone's sexuality is and 'not caring' when a friend or work colleague chooses to come out.

I think I've figured it out! Tom28 is most likely a guy called Tom who was born in 1928. Les Reed was born 24 years after, in 1952. Therefore, Tom28 must be Les's 89 year old Dad!

I think this would be a very good idea if it was Europe-wide, but if it only applies to transfers within England (or the whole UK), won't that just damage the prospects of English-based players? If there's a later transfer deadline day for selling players to Europe, surely that would also have to allow English clubs to buy players from Europe after the domestic transfer window has "slammed shut" ©. This will just encourage English clubs to do more international transfers and less domestic transfers. Having said that, I think more English players playing abroad would help the England team (not that many Premier League Chairmen will care much about that).

How about also adding Guy Askham, Jim Hone, Lee Todd and Uwe Rosler?

The Gao family can't just take all the Sky and VVD income and walk off with it! That money will have already been budgeted for to pay for all the extended and improved player contacts/wages and buying Lemina etc.