eddie

i was, alas, not being serious

Not norwich though..... BANANA SKIN ALERT

ha. if all those transfers go through, which granted would be incredible, there will be many many hats eaten across hampshire

Exactly. And we don't know what was spoken about in the dressing room. Both may have been quite open about looking to move....so toby may have know for a while

I wonder how ramirez would play under koeman, whether theres a chance. I know there's a danger of thinking of koeman as the miracle maker, but still. Was it his decision that ramirez go to hull or had he already gone?

if there's a choice between the two, you'd be mad not to put the money towards getting toby, we all would. whether its so black and white behind the scenes....debateable. why not have both...?

Sure and you're right. The ideal would be to have no reliance on signings....its just at the moment would you say there's 3-4 academy players who can play at saints level (pushing for 6th) and help out in european campaign? I think hesketh was O.K. I think reed at least showed at lot more of his potential when he was on the pitch. you may say they haven't got the chance to prove themselves, which is fair. But you can't force the academy to produce talent. Sometimes you need to buy players that have had the experience and game time

yup, and no doubt when we do, fonte will then leave and we'll have to find a new cb!

still hurts eh?

2-3 million, considering what we earned last season and with foreign clubs knowing that premier league clubs can afford to splash a little bit with tv money in a coupl' years, is realistically peanuts. It's championship player money. more than happy for elia to sign for saints and show with a strong pre-season that he's got some qualities, can find his best position and then come next season play a few cup/european/lower league games.

You don't hear of many Gilberts these days. sadly seems to have dropped off the radar. never get this with some baby names....apparently at one time gilbert was a cute name you'd call your child. like baby gilbert, or baby kieth. or little baby norman.

totally agree.

big time. Been to see them a coupl' a times when I studied there. great atmosphere in the dave longhurst Stand where its standing only

ha, ha, ha. In other news, not that we're going to get him because it would be replacing schneiderlin for a similar value/skill, which we never do over buying cheaper and training up. Would be immense though

succinct way of putting it

start with 'pelle is garbage'. Then tackle the whole 'zero cover' statement. Next, challenge the remark about Austin being a better signing than Toby. Lastly, deal with the whole 'difficult to find decent centre backs' thing (even though we have a defender wanted by numerous clubs, worth >15 mil, who wants to play for saints) that'd be my advice on how to approach it

very good point

That is an awful lot of money. At the same time, he is rather good

for a player who spends most of his time near the goal area, I'm amazed he doesn't put more away

this does seem like a bit of a sensationalizing. tadic hasn't scored just by luck. you don't know if juanmi will fit in or not...because you literally have never seen him play for southampton and have no idea what koeman's plan is for next season or for additional transfers this summer. our defense was reliable after forster was injured, kelvin davis pulled off some heroic saves but waning motivation from clyne and injuries to alderwiereld/morgan didn't help us. Davis had his best season ever last season, to talk of replacing him is a bit premature. Agreed reed is good, though. there is a difference between fixation and giving someone confidence. Koeman didn't have a backup (maybe long could have been given 1-2 more games starting instead of him...arguably), but he put trust in him. Pelle clearly excels when he's confident and plays with more freedom (e.g. away at Stoke in the autumn when he just thumped a 25yd shot on a whim). He really didn't 'fall apart'....noone was expecting him to set the league alight, he was average for years in holland and italy. 16 goals in all comps in a season isn't disastrous. If anything can be held against our team, it probably isn't creative. We don't put them away, but in most games last season (agreed, not so much in Feb-April time) we still were trying clever balls and switching the ball to the other side. Anyway. less of this doomsday talk and more focussing on the +ve's, I say

many thanks

what is the quota for english/british players ?

edited having noticed the major elephant in the room

yup, very good point . didnt think it through