Brave Sir Robin

Yep. Fair enough. I did say maybe. Missed that interview with Ron somehow. The timing of the tweets showing an empty training pitch and an office with something about the pictures being for sale certainly fit with your theory. It's all speculation though. I still think the biggest concern is that we didn't manage to get our replacements in first - that's a fact, and it's hard to see how that would be part of a sensible plan. So, the board have some work to do to redeem themselves as far as I'm concerned (although I wouldn't go as far as to say they've been completely useless - they did get silly money for the players that left, signed 2 decent looking players and eventually drew the line at selling arguably our 2 best players). Fingers crossed...

Err.. That's the impression I've had all along. Surely that's why we set up a development centre in North Africa and packed Radhi Jaïdi off to be it's figurehead, and why Ralph keeps harkin on about branding and commercial operations? Ever since Cortese quite rightly stated his opposition to FFP but failed to convince anyone that it shouldn't be implemented, it was clear that we needed a new way to grow the club within the boundaries set by FFP. The only catch is that we'd ideally also like to keep playing in the Premier League as well as bringing the country's top talent through our academy, which is where things start to get complicated!

It seems to me that some of our anger has been based on our perception that our club has been selling our best players. Maybe Koeman has assessed his squad and decided the 5 that left weren't up to the standard he wants at playing his system, and the stupid money on offer ought to be enough to buy replacements that are. The only argument that holds water that I've seen about incompetance in the transfer market is that we didn't get replacements in first - that's where it looks like we've given in to "player power" So in answer to the OP, I'm feeling reassured to an extent by Ralphs assertions, but still disappointed at our apparent drop in status and difficulty attracting good players (this time last year we were viewed as a decent alternative to Liverpool and Spurs, now we appear to be competing with West Ham and Aston Villa) and further saddened at the direction football in this country has been taking since 1990. If we keep what's left of our squad now and bring in at least 3 more players equal to or better than the quality of the 2 already signed, plus another 2 or 3 squad players, I'll feel able to start the season confident of staying up.

...except that the transfer comittee, including RK had apparently agreed that we didn't mind losing Lovren & Lallana (see article on official website - "the five players who have departed this summer were allowed to do so “in the best interests of the club”), whereas Morgan & Jay Rod are players we wish to keep above all others. Make sense to me. Lallana's attitude was atrocious and he was fairly easy to replace, Lovren may be less easy to replace, but RK seems confident he can manage that. Morgan, on the other hand, is arguably the best player in his position in the league and couldn't realistically be replaced as even if we got top dollar for him, any suitable replacement wouldn't be interested in joing a non CL club. Jay Rod is our best striker. We don't have many strikers, and replacements would also be expensive and hard to attract (plus he might actually want to stay!).

You could equally argue the owners of Liverpool aren't "fit and proper owners" - how much money have they frittered away on ridiculously over priced squad players now?!

Surely any potential buyer will wait until the club have been relegated before buying? It'll be a lot cheaper then, will still have top drawer facilities, and will probably need less investment in players to secure promotion than the amount that would need to be spent now to have a chance of avoiding relegation.

Have Yazoo reformed?

Harry Isted, Kyle Clinton & Marcus Barnes would be my guess http://www.saintsfc.co.uk/team/academy/

He almost had me feeling optimistic there, then he ruined it by saying "they'll make three or four good signings"!!

It'd almost make more sense to shut down all the rest of the club rather than the academy! Producing top quality players to sell to top clubs for huge profits is what we're all about now it seems

Judging by comments by fans of other teams on forums & social media, I'd say we're more pitied than laughed at.

Injured or not, i'm not expecting him to be more than a squad player for Liverpool

Doesn't matter if it is a great price. We need strength in depth in our squad more than we need more money to spend right now, and every replacement brought in means a more complicated job for the coaching staff getting everyone to gel.

Have to say I agree with this. Wasn't worried when it was only 3 out for good money with 2 decent replacements in, but we've gone too far now. There's clearly several more leaving. Even if we buy top quality replacements for everyone who's left, we simply don't have time for the squad to gel, so we're going to see lots of mistakes on the pitch, and every mistake is punished. What's happened to our promising young squad is tragic and shameful. The EPL needs to take a long hard look at itself. I'm wondering now if there ought to be a cap on the number of players a club can buy or sell in each window.

Seems to have all gone quite about that Red Panda. Are we signing him or not? Off to a Chinese club offering more bamboo?

Boruc Chambers Fonte Vlaar Clyne Davis Wanyama Cork Ramirez Pelle Tadic No worse than last season when we beat them

Quite. Or, on the other hand, bu115h1t! And what an insult to the 2 highly rated players we've bought in! Everyone knows agents are full of it. They're just saying whatever they need to to get deals through so they can have their commission ffs!

BBC and my "fotmob audio news" android app (!) reporting we've softened our stance with Liverpool, and a move for Lovren is close. Koeman quoted as saying he'd like Vlaar to replace him, but he will be expensive right now. Fingers crossed both happen as far as I'm concerned!

ok, so maybe it was before that, but I remember the interview, and I'm sure others will too

I would do the quoting malarkey but it's fiddly on my phone, so in reference to the above: +1 to what Barcelona said. In reply to those saying he's got it wrong and KL has reversed her father's ambitions for the club, I can clearly remember reading an interview with ML & NC not long after promotion to the Championship, in which they were asked about long term ambitions. ML replied he wanted the club to establish itself in mid table premier league and be self sustainable there, NC said he wanted to get them to the Champions League, then they both laughed and ML said something along the lines of "well who knows?! But we can discuss that after we get to the premier league!". So as I see it, KL is absolutely carrying on her father's work where he left off. NC was always going to leave once we reached the brink of Europe and he asked for enough funding to challenge the top four rather than rest on our laurels. It doesn't mean we're going to be relegated. It just means we'll continue to hover around mid table for years, with an effective conveyor belt of good players coming through our academy, playing for a year or two and helping us maintain our position before leaving for a profit to larger clubs. If anything has gone wrong, it's that the board weren't able or weren't sure whether to reign in NC when he effectively mislead potential signings about the clubs ambitions. Thing is, if he hadn't, we wouldn't have got them, so that's a tricky one... In the meantime, on paper at least, the board are doing a good job of the damage limitation of NC's departure fallout, with a good manager and departing players replaced with equally skilled newcomers, a state of the art training ground and a return to stripes. I'm confident we'll have a couple more decent signings soon, and that one or two academy graduates will make the step up and impress, and that we'll finish mid table, which I and most other Saints fans will be very happy with.

Jamie Redknapp Nepotism

Great. Then he can get tapped up by Stevie G and tell the press how desperate he is to play for Liverpool! Right now, I'd rather have a foreigner to be honest!

I've completely gone off English players now because of recent events. I don't suppose he's got a German or Dutch parent by any chance?

You've been texting insults to Lallana? Excellent work! Please do share his number so we can all join in!

Won't be as good as ours though. MoPo will be acutely aware of that now!