Lallana's Left Peg

The article says its a release clause in his deal, so basically the club have no choice and Tadic would prefer to leave for Ajax, which is actually a damning incitement of what he thinks is going on at Saints right now. £15m is cheap but that's the release clause the club put in his contract. Tadic leaving is a loss but its not the end of the world - that will come when we see who the club sign to replace him. Our transfer record for the past two seasons has been **** poor.

The Times saying we've made Wilshere an offer. They reference lots of interest in him but only mention us, Everton and Palace by name: https://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/sport/jack-wilshere-im-leaving-arsenal-0rlc67637 He would be a great signing, I think hes a really good player, but it would come at a cost of having to sell someone we we have a lot of numbers in that area of the pitch.

Are you suggesting Sky are the bastions of truth and establish and validate sources for all their stories?

Whether or not you think we need him, that's now Maddison, Walcott and Promes our esteemed recruitment team have failed to get over the line in the last year. Their only deal since last summer was to sign someone for £20m that no-one else wanted and couldn't even get in our matchday squad by the end of the season. This is after selling our best player for £65m. Either they aren't doing something right, or they are having their hands tied behind their back by others. Either way, its not too clever.

This is my favourite article from last season: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/football/2017/12/28/southampton-keen-daniel-sturridge-ready-make-audacious-move/

You answered your own question. Revenue.

Even though he only signed for him a few years ago, the market for players has increased considerably since then so the fact he was signed for £10m doesn't mean much. They're probably selling him for £8m in 'old' money terms now for £12.5m. That's why the clubs that buy players and send them on loan prosper - those players don't even need to do well they just need to exist and clubs make decent profits on them.

BBC Scotland very adamant he's a top target this summer. 12 months left on his Celtic deal. https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/43978875

We're not allowed a summer where we don't endeavor to lose our best central defender.

Got to start with Maya and Stephens in a 4-2-3-1. Play Long on the right but tell him to get him and down give it everything for 60mins. Tadic behind Austin, and Redmond on the left. Hojbjerg and Romeo or Lemina in front of the back four. Tell them all to go for it otherwise the longer this goes on the worst we will be.

2/5 on to get relegated, won 1 in 23 league (games or something like that). Bournemouth to effectively relegate us next weekend. Then let the post-mortem start - no point waiting as every week we lose in the summer its a week less we have to prepare for a league I genuinely think the powers that be will massively under estimate.

Les Reed's whole model is based on motivating players via the carrot at the end of the stick being a move to a big club. When things aren't going well, that move doesn't disappear, so why would the players care if we're struggling or not - they get their move either way.

There is such a lack of belief. They may be motivated, but there is no belief. Squad seems quite fragmented to me. They might get on at a personal level, but when too many of your team mates either want to leave or are just not very good it does create a certain level of apathy.

Any insight into what the strategy will be this summer? Whilst I think there are a number of players that should move on our recent recruitment recorded is so poor I'm more inclined to think we'll replace with even worse players than we are improve the team and squad.

He seemed ok to me, but I think he was a little hesitant on the ball as playing in a central two if he lost it then there wouldn't really be any cover for him. Don't think there is much more to be said beyond what already has been. First half was atrocious - got outfought and players looked a little confused in possession at times. Second half they had a bit of belief and we grew into the game. If Hughes wants to play two up top we're gonna need to find a way to do that whilst protecting the central defenders who too often get outmuscled by other players - and combine that with a less than desirable win rate in the air then it's something we really need to consider moving forward. That said, we may just have to win games 3-2 with some newfound attacking verve.

They probably drew up the pledges and realised the club aren't compliant with any of them.

I thought that was a decent performance overall, but our lack of any clue in the final third (ability and coaching) could send us down.

The team isn't great but he's not getting the best out of them and he just cannot impact a game positively for us with a substitution which renders the subs bench absolutely useless

It's not that it was a bad performance. But a defensive mistake (basic things) screwed us over again and we just never had any belief in the final third despite some positive and incisive approach play. Basically the degradation in quality of the team is finally starting to really do us harm. Don't get me wrong, this team would be doing better under a competent manager, but he can't be blamed for a lack of quality. Lack of quality + poor Manager = relegation zone in mid-Feb unfortunately. No-one at the club appears to care though.

On that basis could the players not get a rest at the clubs choosing over Christmas?

I see your point but if we have a two week rest over Christmas that means we have cram in something like at least 4 games elsewhere in the season which creates a higher density of games in other periods of the season which increases the chances of injury and definitely increases fatigue in that period. How much that two week break they had three months ago matters at that point I am not sure. Maybe if all Christmas games were played before the winter break then I would see the benefit but I don't see how the schedule could accommodate it unless teams dropped out of the league cup.

How does a winter break benefit teams when they still have to play the same amount of games over the course of a season?

It says we still have some way to go, but I'd expect that. The confidence came back to the team in parts and that seems to be very important to us.

First twenty minutes when the ball was bouncing off him every time he went near it I was wondering what on earth we spent £20m on. But fair play to him his movement in the box is great and he gives defenders plenty to think about when the ball is in the air. Is that a £20m player? Probably not. But has a bit of what we're missing and thats important to us.

Nothing too much - it was just a combination of playing a terrible side and us playing our better players in each position whilst having a player up front who won his fair share in the air and had the instincts to be in the right positions in the box. First twenty and last twenty were bad, but inbetween we took advantage of playing a poor team that had plenty of their better players injured. I'm not ****ing over us winning, but the truth is that we didn't do much differently at all. We maybe moved the ball quicker a few times to be fair, but that may be it.