Nordic Saint

Obviously, it's too soon to judge the whole season but we looked better in our first two games last season and certainly no worse than we have in the first 2 games this season. We totally dominated Swansea in our opening game, which ended in a scoreless draw, and then we had an entertaining 3-2 win v West Ham. This season, most pundits agree that Burnley and Everton were better than us in our opening games and that they had the majority of play and shots on target. The addition of Ings has given us a much needed goal scorer but we have lost our most creative midfielder, Tadic, who was also our joint top goal scorer last season. Our manager still doesn't seem to be any closer to knowing what his best team is. Let's hope he learns that before the Leicester game and that we actually do look better in that one.

I really rate Ings. He is already our best striker. But, a combination of Ings and Rodriguez could work very well. There is always the January transfer window. And then there is that other Saints/Burnley player, Cork. He has scored 2 winning goals in Europe already. But, there is no way Burnley would sell him.

The 5 points we picked up in our first three games last season proved absolutely crucial. Like last season, we have a relatively easy start to the season, not having to play any of the big 6. Fixtures will get much more difficult than this and points will be harder to come by. So, you are right, a home win v a weakened Leicester team is vital.

Did anybody ask him why he didn't retire when he reached the retirement age of 65? Wether you think what he did in the past was good or bad or a mixture of both, in the last couple of years he has appeared physically and mentally tired and his decison making has been poor. He's not going to get any better in his late 60s. So, why does he keep hanging on to the detriment of the club?

Paul Mitchell to become the new Director of Football at Manchester United? https://www.thesun.co.uk/sport/football/7016606/manchester-united-director-of-football-mitchell-van-der-sar/

Christoph Klarer was our most dominant defender and as he was the youngest player in the team, he looks a very good prospect and I think he's going to make it all the way to the first team. Valery is a decent player but he's a bit error-prone defensively.

Klarer looks a very good prospect. The big Austrian central defender only just turned 18 in June but he is already one of the stars of Saints U23 team so far this season and gave a really dominant display in the Premier League International Cup win v Dinamo Zagreb. It's early days yet but I think he's going to make it all the way to the first team.

It's still a massive improvement on the decades when the league was dominated by just 1 or 2 clubs, Liverpool 70s/80s and Man United 90s, like most European leagues still are. So, can people please stop whingeing about it and celebrate the times when unfashionable clubs like Leicester and Saints upset the big boys.

I try to be at Wembley when Saints players make their England debuts and so was there that night. Before the game, watching all the Scots coming up Wembley Way, it looked like it was going to be like the games in the 70s, but inside, the Scots were confined to one corner so the celebrations from the England crowd when Rickie scored were tremendous. Fans were still singing his name when they poured out of the exits at the end. He was popular with fans of all clubs. This was pretty special too. Channon always turned it on against the Scots:

Everton were one of the 6 teams we beat in the league last season. In fact, we beat them at home and drew at Goodison. Of the other 5 teams we beat, 2, West Brom and Swansea, have been relegated. That leaves only Everton, Bournemouth, Crystal Palace and West Ham as teams we managed to beat last season. So, how we perform against Everton might give us some indication of whether we are going to match or even improve on the number of wins we had last season. As we drew up there at the end of last season and were unlucky not to win, and most fans on here feel we have strengthened our squad considerably in the summer, a draw would be reasonable.

Vestergaard looked far better than he's looked in any of the pre-season games, which came as a pleasant surprise. He really was commanding in the air and blocked and tackled well. He still pushed players over on a couple of occasions, conceding free-kicks but apart from that, you really couldn't fault him. However, he was up against one of the slowest and most ineffective attacks in the league. Burnley scored even fewer goals than we did last season, and their big, lumbering forwards, Wood and Vokes, were ideal for someeone like Vestergaard to deal with with. What concerned me during the pre-season games, was that Vestergaard looked unable to cope with fast forwards running into the penalty area. So, let's see how he copes against Everton, who will present much more of a challenge than Burnley did.

I thought the same. Ings made it look like some of our other players were playing in slow motion. Coming on as a sub may have had something to do with that, because Elyounoussi also looked sharp, but Ings appeared to have the quickest feet out there.

An exciting debut by Danny Ings. He looked very sharp and did everything but score. He showed the ability to control the ball at speed and we've lacked someone who could do that since we sold Mane. I look forward to seeing a lot more of him this season.

If he's done the full Liverpool pre-season, he'll be the fittest player we've got.

"Till 2022. Jeremy Wilson’s write up is clearest: Danny Ings has completed a £20 million move to Southampton, initially on a season-long loan but with a commitment for an additional three years. Ings completed a complicated switch to St Mary’s after the club’s agreed the structure of payments ahead of the close of business. Although his first year will be on loan, Southampton have committed to buy the striker on July 1, 2019. Liverpool are guaranteed £18 million, with a further £2 million based on appearances. Despite both clubs insisting his next 12 months is part of a loan deal, the 26-year-old has signed a four-year contract until 2022. Liverpool will also receive 20 per cent of any future sale of Ings." I thought that the fact it was an intial loan deal meant we had no commitment to buy the player at the end of the first year if he proved unfit to play, but the way the terms have been described it appears we do. So, it's a bit of a mystery unless it officially being called a loan deal, when it really isn't, is a way of circumventing the medical so that Liverpool's medical insurance policy still applies for the first year here. The only other obvious explanation would be that we can't afford to pay the first installment of the transfer fee yet. Any other explanations out there?

"Danny Ings, he's one of our own." Good luck to the lad. He's had a promising career blighted by serious injuries. If he can get back to his best with us and score a few goals, it would be great. The deal sounds good too. On loan to see if his kness can hold up and if they can, a permanent deal. I'm not expecting miracles but surely he has to be an improvement on Long and maybe he will even score more than Gabbiadini. Ings and Austin could be the classic little and large combination up front.

Does anyone know who does these discussions for us nowadays? Is it Ross Wilson or Mark Hughes? I think Mark Hughes would be more convincing. Lawrie McMenemy was very good at persuading big name players to come here.

A lot of pundits would have picked Tadfic out as our most creative player last season, as they often did before our televized games. Unfortunately, he was surrounded by a lot of dross. The same excuse is also trundled out by posters on here for Gabbiadini's lack of goals and assists last season. Tadic has 2 goals and 1 assist in his 3 Champions League games so far this season. Before we sold all our best players, Tadic had other good players around him so obviously he got more goals and assists. Football is a team game. Neverthless, Tadic still got 7 goals and 4 assits for us last season. He got 9 goals and 14 assists in 2015/16 because he had good players, like Mané, Pellè, Fonte, van Dijk and Wanyama, around him then.

He is a skilful player but his problem has always been his lack of goals. He improved a lot in the 2nd half of last season and started scoring a few. If he can maintain the form he showed this year in the Championship, he could be useful. We have to remember though that he never scored when he played in the Premier League before and we already have too many goal shy forwards in our squad. Traoré sets up goals with his crosses but, being realsitic, do we have anyone who can score from them?

Possibly because there was no eompetition for him so he was easier to sign. We don't seem to sign players other clubs are trying to buy as well. Vestergaard, like Carrillo, was easy to sign because nobody else wanted him and his club was happy to sell him. Borussia Mönchengldcah had one of the worst defences in the Bundesliga last season. As we saw when they played us, they seem to have solved that problem now because, as well as Ginter, Jantschke, they now have the youngsters Beyer and Mayer coming through. If we weren't prepared to compete for Gibson, we should have gone for the player who is replacing him at Boro, Dael Fry. He is the most promising young central defender in the country.

He used to be the best goalkeeper in in the country and his 70 caps testify to that. He's still only 31 so it wouldn't surprise me if Billy Mercer got him back to his best at Burnley. I remember when people laughed at Pompey signing 'Calamity' James. He was brilliant for them and it was his goalkeeping which was largely responsible for them winning the FA Cup. It will be interesting to compare Ben Gibson and Jannik Vestergaard, although both Saints and Burnley lack goal scorers so it should be one of the easiest games of the season for both of them. A truer test for them both will be when they have to face teams with good forwards.

This is a very good point. Many of our players only looked good for 70 minutes of football last season. Any more than that and they were out of it. As for hangng on for a result with 6 minutes of added time to go, no chance. One of the problems at the club seems to be laziness from top to bottom. The signing of Carrillo in January was a sign of this malaise. He was an easy signing to make and that's been the case with many other of our recent signings: nobody else wanted them. We've also signed a lot of players who had not played 90 minutes regularly in the years before we bought them. I know Cortese divided opinion but he was full of energy and didn't tolerate laziness at the club. The same, of course, applied to Pochettino. Hard work brings rewards, laziness doesn't.

A club like ours is not going to be able to buy a striker who can score a goal nearly every 2 games like the top clubs can but we should have been looking at getting one with a ratio close to 1 in 3. Instead we seem to settle for 1 in 5 strikers or worse and so struggle to score goals. This summer we should have brought in someone like Nils Petersen. He wouldn't have cost any more than Carrillo. If there is any money left, it's still not too late.

Yoshida looked the fittest Saints player on the pitch when he came on so he is definitely ready. Gunn Targett Stephens Yoshida Bertrand Romeu Hojbjerg Armstrong Elyounoussi Austin Gabbiadini

Right now, it's the dream. In fact, realistically, it probably is a dream.