Evil Monkey

£25m plus Long for Dembele.

Forster Cedric Stephens Yoshida Bertrand Lemina Romeu JWP Boufal Redmond Gabbi Jwp wider for his crossing. Lemina and Cedric have the pace to make up for his lack of it. Boufal can skin his man or score from distance so I think we need to give him a run in that position.

Is Hoedt nailed on too?

Barkley wouldn't leave Everton for Saints. Saints wouldn't pay what Everton would want. Saints wouldn't pay Barkley what he'd want. Barkley isn't even very good. Good enough for us though obviously.

How about this? VVD not for sale. End of. He's still in a strop. So until he sorts his head out we are down a CB good enough to start. What better replacement Hoedt, than a young DUTCH international to bring in. £12m is relatively small fry anyway, but maybe he's on our list as a long term replacement for VVD. So Virgil can either get back training and play in a good EPL defence next to his international team mate, forge a good relationship with him in a WC year, or continue to sulk. And watch his compatriot take his place at Saints and Holland.

Dembele to Marseille for £20m is crazy. 32 goals last season (Ok, it's the SPL but still). I'd be staggered if mid table Prem clubs didn't fancy him at that price. £20m plus Shane Long?

You know he means in total right? No one is expecting Romeu to score 12-15 on his own.

How many excellent CBs did City have last season? Or Liverpool? Or Everton? I get your point, but even without VVD, conceding goals wasn't our main problem. Scoring them was. And to defend Stephens and Yoshida further, Forster was ****ing woeful behind them. I'd much rather we replaced him but that's unlikely.

I'm surprised people think we should/will sign another defender. If VVD stays and partners either Yoshida or Stephens I'd be happy with that. They're both as good as, if not better than Fonte has been lately. Bednarek hasn't even kicked a ball for us yet, I'm sure he's at least good enough for 4th choice. How many CBs do we need for a season without European football?

Yoshida.

Can't believe no one has done a Saints/Everton XI yet. I'll start. Pickford (only on last season's respective performances) Coleman Keane Vvd Bertrand Romeu Gueye Gabbi Barkley Redmond Lukaku

Yeah, that's not an ideal partnership you're right. But this time last year we'd have been equally as worried by a potential Yoshida/Gardos pairing. The alternative would've been to sign Sakho or someone for big money and push Stephens down to 4th choice. He's done enough to prove he deserves better than that.

I suspect the club were surprised at how well Maya and Stephens did together last season. As was I. Imo, this is how our CB cover has changed over the last year. Vvd - Vvd Fonte - Maya Maya - Stephens Gardos - Polish kid. Spells the end for Gardos probably, but we have replaced him and Fonte with 2 young and likely to improve u21 international defenders. "The Saints way"

Ake, Baker, Batsuyai and Loftus cheek. No money.

You know he said he wanted Sakho plus another £40m right? Which still leaves £20m if we sign Semedo for £20m. That might help pay the wages of a player from the Portuguese league for some time.

If Puel finishes the season having taken us to 8th and a Wembley cup final, despite ****ing off half the dressing room (allegedly) then he's done very well. But player power reigns supreme. IF he isn't wanted by the players then he should and will go. If he stays I'd be content and it will show that he isn't that widely disliked after all. Replacing him with Silva would make sense as he was on our short list last summer. Now with half a season EPL experience under his belt and out of contract again, it all adds up. Could still be a risky appointment obviously but one I can see us taking.

2 points Vs Liverpool though. 0-0 home and away.

Chelsea have a lot of fringe players good enough to get in to our team/squad. It's just a shame that these swap deals that people like to talk about seldom come to fruition. How about we give them VVD and £20m in order to create something like this... Begovic Cedric Zouma Ake Bertrand Romeu Loftus-cheek Gabiadini Tadic Redmond Bastuiyi

He looked solid enough today. Made some routine saves. Wish he wouldn't telegraph which way he's planning to dive for a pen so obviously. He leant right over while Ali was running up.

I'd quite like Begovic. He is too good to sit on Chelseas bench. Not too excited with the Hart rumours.

I can understand the Romeu link because Barca get a bit gooey over their home grown lads, but Cedric? Hardly the best RB on the planet. Would think they could do better.

Just replied. Sorry about the mix up. Ticket now sold.

Got another buyer lined up. Will post again if this goes wrong.

Emailed you.

Just 2 tickets going now. Been let down so they're still a available.