Saint Albert

The "let him rot on the sidelines" quote has done the rounds in a few publications today. It is a natural response to his agent's obvious attempt on Monday to burn all bridges and turn the fanbase against VVD, thereby making a stay at Southampton untenable. I hope it does not come to that. If September 1 rolls along and despite his and his agent's best efforts he is still a Saint, they should try and reintegrate him. He's a ***** and he has been unbelievably disrespectful to the club, but he claims to be a professional and the club and fanbase should try and greet his supposed professionalism with pragmatism. He'll have no need to kick off a fuss until January approaches. It would be completely wasteful if we do a Liverpool (Sakho) and let a valuable player rot in the reserves.

Behind the scenes video here: https://mobile.twitter.com/SouthamptonFC/status/895012795732946947/video/1

They're in the club's presser. The juicy bit was quoted earlier. https://southamptonfc.com/news/2017-08-08/southampton-mario-lemina-transfer-announcement

Welcome Mario Lemina! Looks like a good signing to me. I'm assuming (hoping) the club got him for the DM role alongside Romeu.

Is Coutinho about to go full VVD on Klopp and Liverpool? https://uk.sports.yahoo.com/news/coutinho-liverpool-training-protest-bid-force-barcelona-transfer-120636420.html

If it follows the same pattern of previous articles, more information may appear in the Irish Independent today. Greedy player. Greedy agent.

It is hard to imagine this. I think that his representative's goal in drafting this press release was to up the ante and make any return in a Saints shirt untenable.

Or simply "What should the board do about VVD?"

Well that's interesting. Not sure where that puts us with Patrick Roberts.

This Telegraph bit talks about Chelsea's transfer goals and their interest in VVD, post ****-storm: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/football/2017/08/07/chelsea-managerantonio-conte-hoping-strengthen-defence-psgs/

I don't think that comparing this footballing situation to "real life" employment is helpful. If VVD acted like this in the real world, 99 times out of 100, his employer would have fired his sorry arse.

Hmmm. VVD burnt his bridges here and is manufacturing the dirtiest of all the recent departures. I still think, looking at the bigger picture, that the club should stand firm but after this reintegration looks to be a bit of a forlorn hope. Of all the possible alternatives at this point, only selling to Liverpool will irritate me.

ESPN Brazil are apparently reporting that Liverpool have agreed to sell Coutinho to Barca for £90M.

The Mirror thinks that Chelsea are about to offer £60M... http://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/football/transfer-news/antonio-conte-demands-more-signings-10942418

Liverpool have contacted Hakim Ziyech according to this Dutch report, that has been picked up by a few British media outlets: https://www.bladna.nl/hakim-ziyech-liverpool,16730.html

I too have never understood or appreciated this. Ultimately it's just not a conversation that is worth having. If I wanted to talk to idiots who support other clubs, I'd go on Not606.

I'm going to scoop you on this one Tom. Darrren1 is going to change his user name to "Prrrepubscent1", and he will add an avatar to his profile, of Gerrard in mid slip in front of Demba Ba. Mods: make it happen. You know you want to.

I like this interpretation. If Pellegrino was intentionally obfuscating the media, I would be impressed.

Hughes on Lemina after Stoke's preseason friendly against RB Leipzig yesterday: Pellegrino after Saints preseason game against Sevilla:

Monaco apparently want Imbula.

Translation:

Nothing earth-shattering, but Kevin Palmer writing in the Irish Independent that VVD is still training alone, and is refusing to make a transfer request: http://www.independent.ie/sport/soccer/transfer-window/liverpool-target-virgil-van-dijk-refusing-to-make-the-move-that-could-break-the-deadlock-over-his-future-36003643.html Palmer also went on to tweet "So why is Van Dijk so keen to join Liverpool....Might it be that his agent will earn more out of that move than any other?"

So to summarize Kelly's comments about Liverpool's contact with VVD last season were inaccurate. Like others, I have a hard time understanding why Liverpool apologized and ended their interest in a player they desperately want, if they had clean hands.

If he signs for us, the bastard probably deserved it.

Not going to help his confidence, that kind of stuff.