Saint Martini

Based on what? Your own private source or some newspaper/website? He played for PSV until he moved to Palermo in the summer. He seems to play there most of the time so a move would be strange. He was the captain for the Sweden U21s that won the euros this summer. Decent player but I don't know where he would fit in since we have quite a few CMs.

From the Dutch media reports my understanding is that Southampton have done nothing wrong in the transfer. We paid 13 million euros for him and for us that was the end of it. The transfer is being investigated because only half of it ended up at Twente. 20% went to Doyen, Groningen and some clubs in Serbia which seems legit but 30% went to Tadic' agents. If this money went to Tadic' Twente would have had to pay income tax on it since Tadic was their employee. If it stayed with his agent there is no problem. I don't think Tadic is in any trouble either. In a similar situation had to pay back taxes on a signing bonus they paid to Laudrup and Arveladze when they signed for Ajax. Ajax recently sued Laudrup and Arveladze because they argued the taxes should have been paid from the money the players received. Ajax lost the case.

Am I the only one wondering what name he has on the back of his shirt?

I three different leagues

As an Ajax fan I hate to say it but he would be a good addition. He's not a natural number ten even though he fits have the creativity. He's really developed his defensive game recently and could do a job replacing Wanyama in my opinion. He's still very young (only 21 with 5 seasons/100+ games experience). If we can get him on a free in the summer or for a small sum now we should go for it. The only reason not to would be Reed but the question is if he is good enough if he isn't better then Vilhena.

Maybe they should just give him the boat?

AS a fightback he is much better then our other backup alternatives (Yoshida & Caulker). Caulker turns so slowly he'll be exposed time and time again against quick wingers and Yoshida has a tendency to play like a centre back when there's crosses coming in (i.e. he comes over to far leaving his direct opponent free at the far post).

Dutch newspaper de Telegraaf are reporting Saints will pay a behind closed doors friendly against Ajax on Thursday. It's behind closed doors so there's no (football related) excuse to travel to Amsterdam.

To be fair. It was Cedric that did this up until the 70th minute when they moved Hazard to the right to get him away from Cedric. Cedric was awesome, and unexpectedly so.

I saw him a few times during the U21 euros and was very impressed. Physicality imposing but so accomplished at the same time. Great technique and positioning and take the ball first himself if necessary. If we get him instead of van Dijk I won't be disappointed at all.

Was thing of going but since I have to be back in Gävle Friday morning I will have to hope for a new opportunity in the group stage. Just so you know there are still plenty available tickets in the home section. Very easy to order via their homepage.

I'm starting to think we might be interested in Hector Moreno from Espanyol. He was on his way to PSV but the deal had collapsed in the last few hours. Espanyol seem to think they can get more for him then the €4m PSV have offered. He's a leftsided central defender and had played for Koeman at AZ in 2009. Maybe we're the ones willing to pay a bit more then PSV?

He knew he was on a virtual yellow and still chopped him down without even trying to pay the ball. If it is at all possible he should have been shown a red card, it could have an example for referee courses.

Anyone planning to drive down to Herning?

Okay, that became a bit of a mess. There were two columns with the seeded teams in the left and the unseeded ones in the right. Of the seeded teams FC Copenhagen and Trabzonspor have gone out and FC Zurich would have gone to the seeded teams ahead of us but have gone out as well.

Seeded. [TABLE=class: t1, width: 100%] [TR=class: yellow, bgcolor: #FFFFCC] [TH]4th Qualifying Round (44 teams)[/TH] [/TR] [TR] [TD]Seeded teams coef. Unseeded teams coef. ------------------------ --- ---------------- ------------------------ --- ---------------- Borussia Dortmund *3 Ger 99.883 FC Zürich *3 Sui 16.875 Ajax @3 Ned 66.195 Slovan Liberec *3 Cze 16.325 Rubin Kazan *3 Rus 57.099 Southampton FC *3 Eng 16.078 Athletic Bilbao *3 Esp 56.999 West Ham United * Eng 16.078 AZ Alkmaar *3 Ned 46.695 FK Krasnodar *3 Rus 15.099 FC Salzburg @3 Aut 43.135 CF Os Belenenses *3 Por 12.276 Viktoria Plzen @3 Cze 41.825 Rosenborg BK * Nor 11.875 FC København ** Den 40.960 IF Elfsborg * Swe 11.545 PAOK Thessaloniki ** Gre 40.880 Garabag Agdam @3 Azb 11.500 Steaua Bucuresti @3 Rom 40.259 Hajduk Split * Cro 11.200 Trabzonspor ** Tur 36.520 HJK Helsinki @3 Fin 11.140 Young Boys @3 Sui 31.375 Vorskla Poltava *3 Ukr 11.033 Sparta Praha @3 Cze 30.825 Zorya Luhansk *3 Ukr 10.533 Fenerbahçe @3 Tur 30.020 Apollon Limassol * Cyp 10.460 Standard Liège *3 Bel 25.440 Omonia Nicosia * Cyp 10.460 Legia Warsaw ** Pol 24.800 Atromitos FC *3 Gre 10.380 Girondins Bordeaux *3 Fra 24.483 Molde FK @3 Nor 10.375 Panathinaikos @3 Gre 19.880 FC Thun ** Sui 10.375 Sampdoria *3 Ita 18.102 FC Midtjylland @3 Den 7.960 Vitória Guimarães *3 Por 17.776 Videoton Fehérvár @3 Hun 7.950 Lech Poznan @3 Pol 17.300 Aberdeen * Sco 4.580 AS Saint-Étienne *3 Fra 16.983 Milsami Orhei @3 Mol 3.750[/TD] [/TR] [/TABLE] Source: http://kassiesa.home.xs4all.nl/bert/uefa/seedel2015.html

Just checked Viaplay to see which match they are showing Saturday 16:00 and it seems that they have gone back to seeing all matches! I guess they solved the rights issues for web based viewing in the new international TV deal.

Good result so far but the play has been average at best. Until the 1-0 we were sloppy and lost a lot of battles in midfield where Vitesse seemed to outnumber us. Luckily they didn't create anything in the final third. Shares our best player so far and he made the interception that started the attack for the 1-0. If he is defensively half as good as he is offensively then we won't miss Clyne for one second. Probably just him not being used to the system. He seems to be confused at times where he should be. Not that strange though, he probably doesn't even know all the names of his teammates. Now lets have a second half with better play and even more goals.

Koeman had a press conference yesterday with mainly Dutch press and one of the things he spoke about was the amount of players we have signed from the Dutch league. In short all players were already being scouted and considered by Saints before his arrival. He also commented that there are a lot of players from the Dutch league being followed by Saints. http://m.ad.nl/ad/m/nl/1017/Buitenlands-voetbal/article/detail/4106370/2015/07/23/Koeman-We-hebben-Feyenoord-genoeg-geholpen.dhtml?originatingNavigationItemId=1001 I remember seeing a discussion that a lot off the recent signing have direct link to the Koeman brothers and that this might become an issue if they would leave at some point. Good to hear that the sitting department have been involved from the beginning.

I guess he reads Saintsweb, he's changed it now!

Exactly, and that Henrik Larsson guy never did noteworthy after leaving Celtic either. ;-) When buying players from Scotland (or similar leagues like the Dutch or Belgian league) you have to look for players that are so dominant that they can be considered too good for the league. Just playing well for a top team in one of these leagues isn't that much of a challenge. The other thing you look for is good performances in Europe against better opposition. Something that both Forster and Wanyama had done.

I do.... Stupid Swype.

Haha. Jan van Halst, a analyst at FOX sports is standing behind the goal (naked guy in the suit). I guess he'll be the expert commentator in our matches against Vitesse.

http://www.express.co.uk/sport/football/592006/Southampton-Ron-Vlaar-Aston-Villa-Transfer-Lazio-Injury-Concerns We're favourites to sign Blast avoiding to the express. I really hour we don't sign him, overrated and injury prone.

Easy mistake to make