dockland Dave

What did people expect when we were promoted. The spine of the team is the same one that got us out of div 1. If we finish 17th i will be a very happy man. Some fans on here seem to expect us to be in the upper half of the table, please you are deluded. I always look at what the bookies think at the beginning of the season, and as the old phrase goes, you never see a book bookmaker. The bookies seemed to think we would be in the relegation mix up and we are. As for the those who expect Ramirez to be the real deal deal straight out of the box, very few flair players are in this league. Look at Henry or Pires or Modric or Ronaldo, all took the best part of a season to find their feet. Whether spending 12m on him is a wise move is yet to be seen, but don't judge him yet. So here is my assesment Keepers - weak position, hopefully Boruc can find some consistantcy and make position his own. You don't become a bad keeper overnight! LB - Luke Shaw has made the position his own and all the big boys are sniffing. Fox seemed out of his depth, but this lad will only get better and better, lets hope we can keep him. RB - Clyne - the boy is only 21 but looks a real talent, has pace and can tackle. Has proven to be a very good piece of business and as with Shaw will only get better Centre Backs - Fonte and Yoshida - Both struggled to settle, and pardon the pun, but our defending was kamikaze at best. However with time both have formed a useful partnership, not top class, but good enough to help us survive Midfield - Morgan Schneiderlin - looks like he could play at one of the big boys, does the simple things well Cork - His return to fittness has coincided with an upturn in our fortunes. Like MS he looks at home in this division. Davis - A bit part player, but always does a job when he comes on Ramirez- You can see in flashes why he is special, when he gets going we will have a big star Puncheon- Most of us thought he would have been sold off, sent out on loan or would be sulking in the reserves. Has been our surprise package, scored some important goals and has been our best player in a number of games. SRL - Never going to be mobile enough to be top draw, but he is a goal scorer and if he hits 15 goals from this season we should be safe. JayRod. - still getting to grips with this league, but has shown enough to see he should make a bigger impact with time Guly - the fans scapegoat, but better than most of us give him credit Lallana - if only he had a bit more pace, would be one of the best players in this league. But saying that if he did would have left with Bale & Walcott years ago Manager - On a steep learning curve, but appears to be getting there. If he manages to keep us up after 2 consecutive promotions, the bloke should be given the respect that he deserves

stop being a pompous idiot, your opinion is your own and fortunately is not the same as most on here

Lets get this straight. We have never been a club as big as Man City, Villa, Sunderland,Newcastle, Everton. They have all bigger fan bases than we have. Please lets be realistic, unless we gradually grow organically over the next decade we will never be considered a big club. We are comparable with most of the bottom half of the premiership, and alot of the Championship. I would like to see us punch above our weight and see us finish top half year in year out. But i expect we will start the season hoping to hit 40 points like all but the elite. Please let us enjoy the premiership, don't have deluded expectations

I think we are talking about potential. I think he could be our best centre back. I can remember West Ham came in for him for him last year, and we are starting to see why

based on fan base

Celtic are the second best supported team in the UK behind Man Utd, they are a big team.

It makes me cringe listening to what "St Joe" had to say. He gives us all a bad name

I am quite happy to be compared to Norwich. Numerous similarities, similar sized cities and similar sized clubs, both have young up and coming managers, we are attempting our second consecutive promotion like them, both attempt to play football the right way, both have a striker that has spent most of their careers in the lower tiers of the league but are now showing they can cut it at the top. if this time next year we are in the same position as Norwich are now, we will all be well chuffed

Totally right, the lad wants to play in the Prem. Can our fans start being realistic

http://www.oddschecker.com/football/english/championship/winner slightly more relevant, always quote more than one source

If AOC wants to go and one of the big six come in for him with a decent offer, we will sell. All the power today is with the players, and we will not keep an unhappy player. I hope like most of you that he stays, but I don't think the decision will be in Saints or NC's hands. For those who think we are Man City of this league, I think you are being very delusional. The clubs who have fallen out of the premier league over the past couple of years have parachute payments bigger than our current turnover. Look at the betting odds to see where the bookies see the CCC going next year! NA wasn't brought in to the club to recruit big names from the premier, but to do what he did at Scunny which was to unearth gems from the lower leagues, but with a far larger budget this time. If NC wanted to bring in a manager who could have attracted "big names" to the club, he would have brought in a big name manager. I expect to see some new faces this year, but it wouldn't surprise me if we cherry picked the better players we saw at SMS last season from league one, rather than those bigger names deemed not good enough for the prem.

I can't believe we all listened to the same interview. The bloke said nothing wrong about us. I have never understood the hatred some of our fans have over JP. He played well for us under AP, struggled under NA, crowd got on his back, manager didn't fancy him, has since been loaned to a Millwall and Blackpool and did well at both. most of the posters on this thread seem unable to think for themselves, please relisten to the interview, an honestly tell me where he said anything derogatory Saints related

Wow a host of Lincolnshire Saints, I am now in Woodhall Spa!

Very arrogant. We are by no means up yet

Derry, are you Howard' agent. The lad is a good CCC player, who was never quite good enough for the top fight. He is currently struggling to get into a mid table ccc team, and bar a 2 year spell at Barnsley has never really set the world alight. NA made his reputation on picking up diamonds from the lower leagues at Scunny. This new lad may be a risk, and to an extent we are buying potential, but that would be potential to be better than the likes of BH.

But what we have to remember is that the club is not owned by NC, and hence he can't really promise anything

what does worry me slightly is that the derrision the majority of posters are giving "Northam lights" on here is very similar to that given to "left back" when he started posting on here. Those shouts of abuse subsided when he his pieces of info started proving true. Bottom line is none of us have a clue what is happening with regards to our owners. Would any of us be really shocked if we found out that that ML's family had decided they didn't want the burden of a L1 football club in their business portfolio?

If NC is realistic about getting us into the Champions League, he knows that it will be impossible to compete at St Marys with the current set up. IMHO lets get into the CCC before the club even contemplates moving

Spurs are expanding, as are West Ham. Liverpool and everton are desperate too

Why? It is what a lot of us expected to happen. Saints were ML toy, I doubt his heirs have the same attachment to the club, and i suspect are not willing to run with NC costly plans. I don't think Leftbacks comments are a slur on NC. It amazes me how irate people get when they come across an opinion that they has probably been rolling around in the back of their own minds, but would prefer not to hear. Surely as a message board, and as long as those opinions are not offensive, people are quite within there rights to state whatever info they have heard.

If I remember rightly Tottenham paid five million plus potentially another five in appearances. That is highly rated for a full back

sorry Lallana is a good player, but to compare him with TW and GB is going a bit too far, both those two were considered two of the hottest youth prospects in world football when they left us and their sale prices reflected that. Bale is probably the best player in his position in the PL at the moment and is younger than adam. I suspect Lallana would not (apart from Blackpool) make any PL team at the moment, although technically gifted, he lacks the necessary pace to be a very top player. £3m or a player who has only ever proved himself at L1 seems like good business to me

Quite believable. I think it is human nature to try and dismiss the truth when you don;t want to believe it

some of the posters on here really believe all the hype. Southampton aren't Man City, do any of you really believe that MO is really going to drop down to this level. Saints have always made a habit of appointing either a manager with something to prove, or an up and coming one. most people were totally underwhelmed when WGS was appointed, 6 months after hed had taken Cov down Hoddle came here to rebuild his name after taking mystic meg with him as England manager and making some very strange comments about past lives Dave Jones came from Stockport after a brilliant season in what is now L1 Souneess came here after indifferent spells at Liverpool and Galertasary Even Alan Ball had not pulled up any trees as a manager before joining us. going back further i could mention Laurie Mac and Chris Nicholl As for our last incumbant, some of you seem to forget he single handily bankrupted Charlton Please folks some of you think we are Man Utd, Liverpool or Chelsea. We are still a provincial club with a bit of cash, arguably not even the biggest or best supported or biggest team in this division, as that would be Sheff Weds. We are not traditionally a big club, staying in the PL for so long only because of the loyalty and brilliance of one man. I always despised the arrogance of the bigger clubs towards the Saints, and now some of you lot are showing the same disdain to the clubs in this division. Sorry for the rant, too much wine tonight

those knocking NA for once being a physio should remember that probably the worlds best manager was once a translator!