CB Fry

Comedy gold fellas. Comedy gold.

Probably why Stoke have only bought one player at that price since we've been back in the Prem, Palace have only ever bought one and Watford and Leicester have never bought any. Newcastle and Sunderland have bought a few, though, so let's hope we start emulating their great work.

You said he was "given a budget that was only likely to buy also rans" which is not the same thing. He may have signed also rans, but he has been given a budget to assemble a team to be competitive and is comparable with other clubs. You're asking for evidence from me that Cuco Martina is a Koeman signing? Dear god. We signed him from Twente, and he spent eighteen months playing for Erwin Koeman, who is currently the assistant manager of Southampton Football Club and also the brother of the first team manager, Ronald Koeman. I'd like you to find some evidence that Cuco was a player unearthed by Reed and the black box and thrust onto an unsuspecting and helpless Ronald Koeman.

He's not doing the job expected right now because we're thirteenth. I don't think he is thinking of walking, and I can't see us sacking him even if we end up, say, 15th or so - he might then go at the end of the season if we do finish that low, I imagine there is a break/review clause at that point anyway, or at least it is a natural end. At this point I expect us to havea run of form at some point and be fine, I like our manager very much and I would like to see him deliver us back to a level that the cost of our squad should deliver - around about 10th from where we are now.

I believe Stoke City have signed one player for more than £10m in the entire time we've been back in the Premier League. One. We signed Long for twelve million knowing he would be on the bench as "competition" for Pelle. Have a look at Leicester's bank busting signings. Or Palace. Koeman has been given the tools.

Koeman has signed not one, not two but three £10m plus attackers to play alongside Jay Rod, an £8m signing. Koeman signed a £10m plus keeper. Koeman signed two £10m defenders to play alongside our captain, plus a £5m right back who may not be to standard. Plus an £8m defender currently crocked which has been covered by the club by another defender on loan, who had previously been subject to £8m transfers. In midfield/wings Koeman signed £10m winger, plus an £8m midfielder to play alongside our existing £12m midfielder. Added to that is £6m for another midfielder, decent fee for a back up midfielder. Let's skirt over the £12m legend on the bench today. Koeman has signed £10m or thereabouts - some twelve mil, some eight mil - for all over the pitch from front to back, so much so that we very often have ten million quid players on our bench. The idea he has had "a budget to buy only also rans" is utterly fu cking laughable. The cost of the team we put out stacks up very, very well compared to any in our competitive set. And Koeman's hands are all over it.

No, it is Koemans. The black box didn't sign Cuco, the Koeman family did.

Comedy gold.

You think we're going to win one game between now and the end of the season? Christ. After 20 games last year the team third from bottom had 17 which is identical to this season. There's nothing at all to suggest that 40 points will be required for survival.

42 points would mean relegation? 42 points meant 14th last season and 12th and 13th the two before that, but yeah, you're probably right. Also 40 points has meant relegation once in this millennium and that was more than a decade ago. But yeah. Bang on.

This could be Michael Laudrup all over again, just without the cup win. He was sacked in February of his second season.

Why is our situation so different from all of those clubs, then? I believed you don't really like it when people say we are particularly unique or special. I don't think we are, we're just like all those other clubs more or less and no more guaranteed to lock in finishing seventh in perpetuity than any of them, just like Palace, Leicester and Watford won't be doing either. Southampton Football Club: really not that unique.

I think this is right - no idea why Man U or Bayern would genuinely want him in the summer if he carries on as he is. I was hoping he would have a barn storming season, maybe break his own hat trick record and then we cash in big style when it becomes inevitable that he would go. Not quite worked out like that this season. On current form I think slightly more likely we've got him for one more season.

Where did I say it's random? Of course it isn't, our performance has been decided by choices we have made in recruitment, team selection, tactics and, to a lesser extent, retention. I didn't just shrug when we ballsed up our European campaign, it was a fu ck up of our own making. But there is no crossroads, except there always is a crossroads. If we'd finished fifth, twelfth, eighth, seventh, tenth, fourteenth last season, the same sh it would be coming out now - invest/push on/does she want to sell up/show ambition/waah waah look at X club why cant we be them/capitalise on our position/etc/etc. The usual grab-bag of obviousness but yeah, it's me with the platitudes, right? There's plenty of clubs that have finished top eight only to drop down alarmingly subsequently - from Villa and WBA to Boro, Blackburn and Fulham. There hasn't been any club, whatsoever, of our size that have consistently remained ahead of the chasing pack for any longer than three seasons, with most managing one or two. (The only one I can think of on three is Villa, where on season 3 of being sixth attendances went down as fans git bored and the fanbase started moaning about investing to push on. Or "capitalising on their position" or something.) So thanks for your in-no-way platitude heavy "if we capitalised we could have done better" insight. I have no doubt the management of the club are jotting it down right now.

Exactly this. There are people on this forum who like to talk about us being at a cross roads but we're really not. It's very very clear what our strategy is, we'll stick to it as long as the Leibherrs (and specifically Les) are in charge. Yep, we want to try and be "best of the rest" if we can, to achieve European football through the league but completely on our terms and completely within our budget. So if that takes us to the cusp of the top 6 one season, great. If it takes us to a more middling 12th place another season, not great. That's football. Neither the first scenario or the second scenario is going to see us break the fundemental strategy - fees, wages, financial structure will remain the same in both situations. Sometimes we will hit heights, sometimes we won't. It's rather strange that Les Reed says pretty much the same thing over and over and over again in all his interviews but people on this forum still don't get it. We hadn't finished seventh for 25 years until last season but you wouldn't think it reading the dins on here who've decided last season is now the base standard for all subsequent seasons to be judged, with any drop in league position from our rightful seventh some kind of outrage. Boo hoo. We've regressed. To twelfth. In the Premier League. Brace yourself girls, Saints might finish, gosh, twelfth or so in 2016. Oh, the humanity. I wish we were Watford. I wish we were Watford.

Exactly this. We are a Ronald Koeman team from front to back to bench. And he's had far more to spend assembling said team than, say, Claudio Ranieri.

How have you arrived at that?

Happy New Year.

What are you ranting about now? Quite aware of the timeline re Clyne, the fact is Klopp has been appointed to get them back in the Champions League, and joined the club expecting to do that, as did Clyne, as did Lallana, as did Lovren. Rodgers got sacked because he failed to get them back into the CL. These are facts. Good luck to Watford, I have no doubt they will be finishing top eight every single season for the next ten years now, because they're definitely not just the latest club that knee jerk forum bed-pi ssers can bawl their eyes out about. Why can't we be Watford oh why can't we be Watford oh why oh why it's so unfair.

Poch isn't an ex player. Toby was never our player. Clyne went to Liverpool, a Champions League contender club, who sacked the previous manager for not making it, and have employed the new manager to take them back there. Clyne would have been bought to help achieve that aim. They've all left us to go to get Champions League football, and the money that brings of course.

Which ones didn't leave for Champions League football? I'll let you have Lambert, who would have wanted to go to Liverpool regardless (but were in the CL when he joined), but who else?

Vardy wouldn't have become Vardy unless he had been written off.

Makes me sick the tedious way Leicester City have gone about being top of the league. Give me the wondrous and romantic way that Manchester City and Manchester United do things anyday - pure footballing heart. When United spunked £100m and City £150m in the summer it reminded me of why I fell in love with the sport as a child. Heartwarming.

Spending loads of dosh is the preserve of the heart now? Fu ck me, how utterly depressing. Your club historian, everyone.

Define "deep ****".