What the f**k is going on. Done with this rabble

[SKD]

4 minutes ago, egg said:

Other clubs finances are irrelevant to ours. We could have shit players on £30-40k PW and be OK financially but not compete. However we have better players on £60k + PW so are more competitive, but that comes at the expense of having to sell to balance the books. It's crap, but it's where we are sadly.

I think we’re on the same page. I think, given it’s the first big loss to a ‘direct rival’ it hurts a bit more… more will obviously follow. 
 

As you say, it’s crap. 

[Matthew Le God]

11 minutes ago, SKD said:

I think we’re on the same page. I think, given it’s the first big loss to a ‘direct rival’ it hurts a bit more… more will obviously follow. 
 

Yep, when Burnley sell a player for £100m, have billionaire owners putting lots into the club and a 42k stadium I think they'll put a bid in for Bednarek.

[MAY-Z]

Wow

 

when I woke up this morning in Australia and saw this was the top thread, I assumed we had sold JWP for 27.5m, but to see we had sold ings for 30m is not bad news at all

 

at his age, with his injury history and his contract status I expected he would end up at Spurs for 22m

 

some of the overreaction on here would also suggest we have sold the 2019/20 ings for that price, there is no guarantee 2021/22 will be the same for ings

[Far que]

Saints always shop in the bargain basement,that’s why we’re relegation fodder

[washsaint]

3 hours ago, SKD said:

We needed a take over this summer. It’s too late now unless we some how manage to pull off a miracle.  
 

I’m glad we’ve built a squad of championship players as at least they’ll have the experience to get us back up.

You really are a bit of a t**t aren't you?  No idea why you support Saints as you never have a positive thing to say about the club and all you ever do is moan and complain.  Bet you;re a barrel of laughs down the pub

[max_saints]

Big money for a player with only a year left on his contract, and not interested in signing a new one.

Yes, we've traditionally sold our key players to the top 6 and this is worrying for the optics, but in this case I am guessing top 6 wouldn't take the 30m risk on an injury prone ageing player. Have a feeling we nudged this a bit on our end too due to the money involved.

We could have made him stay and survive another season with his goals but we would be back in the same situation next year, and without the 30m for reinvestment.

Calculated risk on the club's part to see if they can reinvest wisely, and hopefully plug the deficit of Ings' goals. (IF we do reinvest in a replacement, cue last min diego costa free transfer)

[ErwinK1961]

5 hours ago, SKD said:

Why are we losing to players to Villa? (obviously clearly money related) That’s the issue. 

As a club we have 0 ambition. Our goal is to stay afloat. We simply cannot keep pulling rabbits out of hats and keep getting lucky.

We are a shambles. 

All you’ve done in the JWP thread is repeatedly tell everyone about how big a side Villa are, how much better they are than us, how they have so much more ambition and how they are going to finish in Europe etc etc.

Now they’ve actually bought one of our players, you’re moaning that we’ve sold to them?

So what is it then? Can’t have it both ways.

I’m not sure why Ings going appears to be a surprise to you, it’s been in the pipeline for at least a year (which again you’ve prattled on at every opportunity about saying you were ITK). Would have thought you’d have come to terms with this by now.

The club offered to make him our best ever paid player. He turned it down. What else could they have done? Nothing.

His motivation has clearly now been shown for what it was, a bigger pay rise. I can’t see Villa being the move he was hoping for, but a bit like Fonte I don’t think he’s had much choice in the end, so backed himself into a corner (his pay packet will soften the blow I’m sure).

Pretty sure you’ve also been questioning his attitude these last few months, so surely the club selling him for as much money as possible, to bring in someone who actually wants to be here, is the right call no? Perhaps might be an idea to refrain from writing them off before they’ve even signed.

[SKD]

1 hour ago, ErwinK1961 said:

All you’ve done in the JWP thread is repeatedly tell everyone about how big a side Villa are, how much better they are than us, how they have so much more ambition and how they are going to finish in Europe etc etc.

 

Clearly I wasn’t wrong, was I. 

As for claiming to be ‘itk’, that’s not true. I know Danny (loosely, via someone who knows him). Around January, I was told he’s off to either tottenham or United. At the end of the season, I was also told that Coty and Leicester were sniffing around. It appears this villa move has come out the blue as clearly he was desperate to get out. 
 

Surely you can see that losing your best player(s) to, what has been for the last couple of seasons, a direct rival, is a very concerning trend. 

 

[SKD]

3 hours ago, washsaint said:

You really are a bit of a t**t aren't you?  No idea why you support Saints as you never have a positive thing to say about the club and all you ever do is moan and complain.  Bet you;re a barrel of laughs down the pub

Not true. I’ve praised recent signings and the strategy. I’ve also praised semmens and  Crocker. You chose to ignore that. 

If we’re being honest, there’s not a great deal to be positive about is there. 

[skintsaint]

5 minutes ago, SKD said:

Surely you can see that losing your best player(s) to, what has been for the last couple of seasons, a direct rival, is a very concerning trend. 

I think Villa came in hot with a stupidly high offer that we couldn't turn down, even Villa fans were struck with how this came out the blue. At the end of the day everyone has a price and will be sold no matter their standing. 

The most important part of all this is the replacement....so I wait with baited breath

Edited 5 August, 2021 by skintsaint

[SKD]

1 minute ago, skintsaint said:

I think Villa came in hot with a stupidly high offer that we couldn't turn down, even Villa fans were struck with how this came out the blue. At the end of the day everyone has a price and will be sold no matter their standing. 

The most important part of all this is the replacement....so I wait with baited breath

Agreed. The fee, is a decent one (although obviously the cost of relegation will be more if we don’t replace him well - which is probably more than likely). 
 

It’s more that we’ve sunk to a level where our best players see a move to villa as more appetising. It’s the koeman Everton situation all over again. Funny enough we’ve not recovered from that either. 

[Convict Colony]

7 hours ago, SKD said:

Which, kind of shows, how poorly our club is being ran. 

If we’re unable to compete, then it’s already not sustainable. 

[captainchris]

8 hours ago, Sideways Jim said:

Enjoy supporting a new club if my club is a joke 👋🏻

It’s not ‘your’ club loser….. 

[whelk]

Am I the only one who is appalled at the foul language in thread title? And lack of question mark

I was always told swearing shows lack of vocabulary

 

Edited 5 August, 2021 by whelk

[adrian lord]

26 minutes ago, whelk said:

Am I the only one who is appalled at the foul language in thread title? And lack of question mark

I was always told swearing shows lack of vocabulary

 

Indeed it is jarring. Everything has its place and I think foul language is great when confined to the terraces on a Saturday afternoon. 

[CB Fry]

52 minutes ago, SKD said:

Agreed. The fee, is a decent one (although obviously the cost of relegation will be more if we don’t replace him well - which is probably more than likely). 
 

It’s more that we’ve sunk to a level where our best players see a move to villa as more appetising. It’s the koeman Everton situation all over again. Funny enough we’ve not recovered from that either. 

I have it on good authority that Danny has been reading this forum and his mind was made up after reading your posts about how much bigger Villa are, how much ambition they have and generally how fabulous they are as a football club compared to us.

So thanks a bunch.

[Born In The 80s]

I must admit, I'm pretty surprised at how many fans are cool with this news. 

25m sounds like a good deal for a guy in the last year of his contract on the face of it, but what is the cost of relegation? Who will replace Ings' goals this season? Having scrolled through the forum, lots seem happy with replacing him with an unproven Championship striker. It is more likely that this swap will make us a worse team than a better one next season and, truthfully, how much worse can we afford to get? People ask what do you want the club to do? I would have liked to have seen him stay for a year to ensure we have a proven goalscorer in a likely relegation battle. The cost of relegation far exceeds 25m or whatever they got for him yesterday.

Looking at the squad, I find it impossible to not be concerned. There's not one area of the squad that I feel comfortable with - from GK to strength in depth up top, it all looks very relegation to me. I see us conceding goals and now, without Ings, I can't see us scoring enough.

This is a very big ten days for us in the transfer market. We need proven, experience. Without it and I think we are going down.

 

[SKD]

1 minute ago, CB Fry said:

I have it on good authority that Danny has been reading this forum and his mind was made up after reading your posts about how much bigger Villa are, how much ambition they have and generally how fabulous they are as a football club compared to us.

So thanks a bunch.

Some call it trolling, I prefer to call it honesty… 

[Nordic Saint]

12 hours ago, S-Clarke said:

Not sure what everyone is panicking about. We've still got Long.

When he came on last night the Northam gave him a rapturous reception, singing his name. Hopefully, that will reassure the Club that we don't need Ings and that Shane is the way forward. At least he didn't look any less likely to score than Adams. 

[Chapel End]

Well who would have thought it !! Just how much more posting being done by SKD on this, absolutley in his element right now...  Sad boy

Any sensible poster can see that selling a player with 9 months to go on his contract, wont sign a new one here and wants to go is the right thing to do, that`s before we take into consideration his fitness problems which are clearly apparent, they simply do not understand football transfers too much.

[BotleySaint]

If you're having a meltdown now then I truly fear for you when we sell JWP and Vestegard in the next couple of weeks (e.g. the source of most of our goals) and replace with promising youngsters and championship players..

[Mikey88]

11 minutes ago, Born In The 80s said:

I must admit, I'm pretty surprised at how many fans are cool with this news. 

25m sounds like a good deal for a guy in the last year of his contract on the face of it, but what is the cost of relegation? Who will replace Ings' goals this season? Having scrolled through the forum, lots seem happy with replacing him with an unproven Championship striker. It is more likely that this swap will make us a worse team than a better one next season and, truthfully, how much worse can we afford to get? People ask what do you want the club to do? I would have liked to have seen him stay for a year to ensure we have a proven goalscorer in a likely relegation battle. The cost of relegation far exceeds 25m or whatever they got for him yesterday.

Looking at the squad, I find it impossible to not be concerned. There's not one area of the squad that I feel comfortable with - from GK to strength in depth up top, it all looks very relegation to me. I see us conceding goals and now, without Ings, I can't see us scoring enough.

This is a very big ten days for us in the transfer market. We need proven, experience. Without it and I think we are going down.

 

Perhaps he might have been worth 30m or more to us if he had stayed for his final season. But that would require him to stay injury free and firing on all cylinders for a year which as we saw last year, is no guarantee. 
 

Also, you’d have to wonder where his head would be at if he thought he had a big move lined up at the end of the season. Would he be going all out? Would he not be a bit cautious every time he felt a slight niggle? For me, I agree with Ralph and think it’s important we have got it sorted now and have the money in the bank. Now it’s time for the board to step up...

[Dorchester Saint]

2 hours ago, SKD said:

Agreed. The fee, is a decent one (although obviously the cost of relegation will be more if we don’t replace him well - which is probably more than likely). 
 

It’s more that we’ve sunk to a level where our best players see a move to villa as more appetising. It’s the koeman Everton situation all over again. Funny enough we’ve not recovered from that either. 

You sir, are a massive wet wipe!

[Matthew Le God]

2 hours ago, SKD said:

It’s more that we’ve sunk to a level where our best players see a move to villa as more appetising. It’s the koeman Everton situation all over again. Funny enough we’ve not recovered from that either. 

 

2 minutes ago, Dorchester Saint said:

You sir, are a massive wet wipe!

Wet wipes clean up shit, not create it. 😉😇

[StrangelyBrown]

2 hours ago, SKD said:

Clearly I wasn’t wrong, was I. 

As for claiming to be ‘itk’, that’s not true. I know Danny (loosely, via someone who knows him). Around January, I was told he’s off to either tottenham or United. At the end of the season, I was also told that Coty and Leicester were sniffing around. It appears this villa move has come out the blue as clearly he was desperate to get out. 
 

Surely you can see that losing your best player(s) to, what has been for the last couple of seasons, a direct rival, is a very concerning trend. 

 

Who else have we "lost" to a rival? Not exactly a trend is it?

[Whitey Grandad]

9 hours ago, SKD said:

Which, kind of shows, how poorly our club is being ran. 

If we’re unable to compete, then it’s already not sustainable. 

Finally, you have put your finger on the answer, albeit unwittingly.

It’s precisely because we choose not to compete that the club is sustainable.

[SKD]

3 minutes ago, StrangelyBrown said:

Who else have we "lost" to a rival? Not exactly a trend is it?

Koeman, all be it a few years back, you could even throw Bertrand into the mix. 

A trend has to start somewhere. Next it’ll be JWP, vestergaard, Armstrong, KWP and so on. 

Edited 5 August, 2021 by SKD

[Whitey Grandad]

2 hours ago, SKD said:

Clearly I wasn’t wrong, was I. 

As for claiming to be ‘itk’, that’s not true. I know Danny (loosely, via someone who knows him). Around January, I was told he’s off to either tottenham or United. At the end of the season, I was also told that Coty and Leicester were sniffing around. It appears this villa move has come out the blue as clearly he was desperate to get out. 
 

Surely you can see that losing your best player(s) to, what has been for the last couple of seasons, a direct rival, is a very concerning trend. 

 

Why do you reach that conclusion? He’s a professional footballer. That means he plays football in order to earn money. He went for the best offer that he could get. It really is that simple.

[StrangelyBrown]

1 minute ago, SKD said:

Koeman, all be it a few years back, you could even throw Bertrand into the mix. 

A trend has to start somewhere. Next it’ll be JWP, vestergaard, Armstrong, KWP and so on. 

That's not a trend....

Can you try and be a little bit objective?

[Turkish]

5 minutes ago, Whitey Grandad said:

Finally, you have put your finger on the answer, albeit unwittingly.

It’s precisely because we choose not to compete that the club is sustainable.

The club isn't sustainable, we are in shit loads of debt, with a massive loan hovering over the horizon isnt the interest alone on that 5% of our annual income? We have an invisible owner without a pot to piss despite 10 years of premier league money and all our player trading funded by sales, we have to move players out to just bring loans in. That is not sustainable.

Edited 5 August, 2021 by Turkish

[Whitey Grandad]

11 minutes ago, Matthew Le God said:

 

Wet wipes clean up shit, not create it. 😉😇

And they are difficult to flush away.

[Chapel End]

2 hours ago, SKD said:

Clearly I wasn’t wrong, was I. 

As for claiming to be ‘itk’, that’s not true. I know Danny (loosely, via someone who knows him). Around January, I was told he’s off to either tottenham or United. At the end of the season, I was also told that Coty and Leicester were sniffing around. It appears this villa move has come out the blue as clearly he was desperate to get out. 
 

Surely you can see that losing your best player(s) to, what has been for the last couple of seasons, a direct rival, is a very concerning trend. 

 

Changing like the weather 🤣

You said Villa were big step up and now they are a rival,  making a bit of a tit of yourself again, head is all over the place 🤯

Yes you were wrong he didnt go to spurs or united and not Coty 🙄 or Leicester did he?

Your posts were just like the "Bertrand is definitely off "  rubbish 

Give it up mush, you haven't got  a clue 👍

[SKD]

3 minutes ago, Chapel End said:

Changing like the weather 🤣

You said Villa were big step up and now they are a rival,  making a bit of a tit of yourself again, head is all over the place 🤯

Yes you were wrong he didnt go to spurs or united and not Coty 🙄 or Leicester did he?

Your posts were just like the "Bertrand is definitely off "  rubbish 

Give it up mush, you haven't got  a clue 👍

Nope. No change here. 

I don’t blame ings for going. Villa are showing ambition to improve, we’re not. 

The fact players see Villa as an upgrade due to our lack of ambition, is what pisses me off. 

[suewhistle]

2 hours ago, whelk said:

Am I the only one who is appalled at the foul language in thread title? And lack of question mark/?/

I was always told swearing shows /a/ lack of vocabulary/./

 

5/10, see me.. 😉

I do agree with your point though, it's all a bit dramatic and needless. Losing a fit, motivated Ings now is a worry but no surprise, so it will be interesting to see how he performs for Villa and more importantly perhaps, how many times in this season. The following season when he definitely would have been gone isn't so much of a bother.

I'd just love us to finish above a Villa without Grealish.. but reading SKD I'm not sure we will win a game..

[Turkish]

9 hours ago, egg said:

Other clubs finances are irrelevant to ours. We could have shit players on £30-40k PW and be OK financially but not compete. However we have better players on £60k + PW so are more competitive, but that comes at the expense of having to sell to balance the books. It's crap, but it's where we are sadly.

You're right they are irrelevant to ours, much like my finances are irrelevant to yours but it's a fair question to ask all the same when a business has a similar income to many around it yet cant survive without spending more than it earns from selling it's prized assets, whilst none of the others are in that situation. 

[CB Fry]

33 minutes ago, SKD said:

Koeman, all be it a few years back, you could even throw Bertrand into the mix. 

A trend has to start somewhere. Next it’ll be JWP, vestergaard, Armstrong, KWP and so on. 

So its not a trend, but in your suicidal world the trend is just about to start as of now so it is a trend.

Clear.

Why do I think to wouldn't be difficult to find a post from you saying how shit Bertrand is (or even Koeman, or even Ings).

Edited 5 August, 2021 by CB Fry

[SKD]

1 minute ago, CB Fry said:

So its not a trend, but in your suicidal world the trend is just about to start as of now so it is a trend.

Clear.

Cool. Let’s see how things pan out. This decline has been on the cards for a while now. 

Edited 5 August, 2021 by SKD

[tunit]

1 minute ago, SKD said:

Cool. Let’s see how things pan out. This decline has been on the cards for a while now. 

You can't say that every single season and then the one season it happens say 'you see, I told you this would happen'

[tajjuk]

No one pointed out the possibility that maybe we pushed Ings to go? The club said the offer was too good to turn down, we knew he wasn't signing a new contract, we know he has injury issues, we know his age. Maybe the club preferred him out of the door now for this very good offer, rather than going on a free at the end of the year or 2-3 days before the end of the window to say Spurs or Man City for like £15 million.

Just a thought. Maybe they said 'Hey Danny we know you want to go a Champions League club but none of those have shown any interest at all so far, Villa have made a bid for you, it's a really good deal for us, it gives us time and funds to find a replacement for you, please could you seriously consider it, they'll probably throw a lot of money at you'.

I remember back in the day that things came out of the club that they weren't too disappointed in the Shaw deal, because not only was it very good money but there were question marks about his diet and professionalism, which turned out to be pretty accurate. 

Maybe similar here, maybe a few things have come up behind the scenes in his medical report or his numbers pre-season have been off and the club have thought we need to get rid of him now for the best deal we can.  We don't know what goes on behind the scenes, I mean there was all this talk about him being professional and not letting his levels drop, but maybe they have, maybe he's not been at it since he's returned. 

 

Edited 5 August, 2021 by tajjuk

[egg]

21 minutes ago, Turkish said:

You're right they are irrelevant to ours, much like my finances are irrelevant to yours but it's a fair question to ask all the same when a business has a similar income to many around it yet cant survive without spending more than it earns from selling it's prized assets, whilst none of the others are in that situation. 

I haven't looked at other clubs accounts, but I'd hazard a guess that if incomes are similar, the difference will be our wages. We've been paying a load of deadwood players (and ex management / staff) for ages and that's dragged us down. Shocking decisions have hurt us. 

[Matty's Caddy]

How can a club with a billionaire owner willing to splash the cash be considered a direct rival?

 

[tajjuk]

Just now, egg said:

I haven't looked at other clubs accounts, but I'd hazard a guess that if incomes are similar, the difference will be our wages. We've been paying a load of deadwood players (and ex management / staff) for ages and that's dragged us down. Shocking decisions have hurt us. 

Because ironically we have tried to improve, we didn't sign Hoedt or Lemina for example because we wanted to avoid relegation, we thought they would improve the team, improve and either take the club to the next level or be able to be sold for big money. They were talented young players, at big clubs, who were looking for more game time, they just flopped.

Plus clubs like Villa will still have people on Championship wages, many of their first team squad will probably be on £15-20k a week contract signed in the Championship, whereas similar players for us will be on more like £30-40-50k a week, that is even before accounting for the likes of Lemina, Hoedt, Carrillo, Boufal, Forster, etc. who were/are probably on £60-70k a week but offering basically nothing to the first team.

The last 3-4 years we've probably had £250 - 300k worth of wage bill doing nothing, and that is problem with established PL clubs, once you get into the league and stay there for a while all your players and all your signings expect PL level wages, so you end up with a big wage bill with not much room in it unless you change your income stream. 

[Lighthouse]

3 minutes ago, egg said:

I haven't looked at other clubs accounts, but I'd hazard a guess that if incomes are similar, the difference will be our wages. We've been paying a load of deadwood players (and ex management / staff) for ages and that's dragged us down. Shocking decisions have hurt us. 

Just to put things into perspective, this is the entire team we’ve been paying to play for someone else over the last year or two. Forster may have to come off his line for a change but you get the point. Any club in the league is going to struggle paying for that on top of their actual match day squad.
 

Gunn

Valery - Hoedt - Forster - Vokins

Clasie - Lemina

Boufal - Elyounoussi 

Austin - Carrillo

[Saint86]

33 minutes ago, suewhistle said:

5/10, see me.. 😉

I do agree with your point though, it's all a bit dramatic and needless. Losing a fit, motivated Ings now is a worry but no surprise, so it will be interesting to see how he performs for Villa and more importantly perhaps, how many times in this season. The following season when he definitely would have been gone isn't so much of a bother.

I'd just love us to finish above a Villa without Grealish.. but reading SKD I'm not sure we will win a game..

Bravo 👌🏼.  Saved me (and doubtless some others) the hassle / scratched the itch to correct 😄

[SKD]

1 minute ago, tajjuk said:

Because ironically we have tried to improve, we didn't sign Hoedt or Lemina for example because we wanted to avoid relegation, we thought they would improve the team,

Not technically true. We brought them with the funds from selling a world class CB (understandable). 

Regardless, it highlights why letting a proven goal scorer go, is risky business. 

[Shroppie]

The more read, the more I realise the thread title refers to the ranting outpourings of certain posters.

Quite right. I'm done.

[Saint86]

5 minutes ago, Lighthouse said:

Just to put things into perspective, this is the entire team we’ve been paying to play for someone else over the last year or two. Forster may have to come off his line for a change but you get the point. Any club in the league is going to struggle paying for that on top of their actual match day squad.
 

Gunn

Valery - Hoedt - Forster - Vokins

Clasie - Lemina

Boufal - Elyounoussi 

Austin - Carrillo

Gets the point across fairly succinctly. I said at the time that the Reed leadership was one of the worst things to happen to the club. We've tied an absolute millstone around our necks - and even once they've all left, we'll still have the debt.

Yet i see fans constantly blaming Gao for the club's finances. The blame for the club's current finances does not lie with him, and if anyting, under his ownership we've got rid of the idiots like Reed and Krueger (who would have totally ruined us), introduced Crocker and Semmens, started to really fix our recruitment, and brought in Ralph who I am convinced is a good manager for us and fairly loyal to the project.

Edited 5 August, 2021 by Saint86

[Matthew Le God]

18 minutes ago, tajjuk said:

Because ironically we have tried to improve, we didn't sign Hoedt or Lemina for example because we wanted to avoid relegation, we thought they would improve the team

 

14 minutes ago, SKD said:

Not technically true. We brought them with the funds from selling a world class CB. 

Not technically true SKD! 😉😇

 

 

Edited 5 August, 2021 by Matthew Le God

[SKD]

Just now, Matthew Le God said:

 

Not even remotely true SKD.  

 

 

Fair. Memory obviously doesn’t serve me as well as I thought. 
 

Everyone is wrong every now and again I suppose. 

[kwsaint]

We finished 2017/18 fourth from bottom and only just survived in the premier league.  We had blown the VVD money on poor players and were in a complete mess.  Three years later we have got rid of most of the deadwood and are still in the PL somehow.  We have a manager committed to the club and some promising young players.  Not always convinced that RH gets his tactics right, but at least all the players are playing for him.

I think that we will be bottom 6 again this season but hopefully have enough to survive - especially as I think that all the teams coming up will struggle and Palace are in a shocking state.  Which is a position that three years ago at the point that Hughes took over I would have gladly taken.