CB Fry

Jesus Christ. He used showcase to distinguish the club from the accusations of 'selling' club which is what you are blubbering about. If we uncover someone who turns out to be brilliant they will end up at a Champions League club for a big fee. Of course they will. It's an output of our scouting, recruitment and development. The other output is us finishing top eight or thereabouts. Really, really not difficult.

I think you can look further up the thread for my analysis of how the club has been run, is run now and will be run going forward. You don't like it, that's your problem. I fu cking love it.

That's funny because as far as I can see all you see when you look at those fees is how it negatively impacts our net spend and makes us look all unambitious and weak compared to the driven determined footballing powerhouses like Sunderland. I mean look at their net spend. Life is, like, so unfair ain't it Strawlock? Our business model is not to to sell players high, it's just an output of the fact we have had brilliant players that the very biggest clubs want. Understand yet? Nah, didn't think so. Listen, I know you're upset that our club isn't going to be run like the little computer games you play, or like a casino run by a sink estate lottery winner on smack. If I were you I'd leave things in the hands of the adults running the club. Unlike you, they have a fu cking clue.

The only things we will keep doing is a) not over spend on fees or wages b) invest in the academy in the hope we keep seeing one come through per season c) try and sign semi - ready gems like Mané/Tadic for decent sums d) strive to finish as high as possible. That's what we'll keep doing. Why "won't" we or "can't" we do that?

Why are you so completely obsessed with what fees we might receive? Strange you are calling other people simpletons when you have no grasp whatsoever of what our business model is.

Remind me, what was made up during the window?

The point is we can still finish fifteenth if we start over spending or taking a different path. Fifteenth won't be a successful season - with our budget it will be a failure - but it could happen. Chances are we won't see loads of departures to big clubs if we do ever finish there, which judging by some of the mournful totting up of the last two years (eight players we let go etc etc) would be a dream come true right? The club can only be run the as best as it can.To finish as high as we can within what we can afford. Sounds good to me. Like every method it's not guaranteed to work. The only thing we can try and guarantee is to not financially screw ourselves.

That's not really a problem either is it? If our academy players are only good enough for us (like, at present, JWP, let's lump Targett in too) then that's fine because that saves us buying a CM and a LB. Perfect. If we get three seasons from Victor and flog next season for £15m ish, that's okay, we wouldn't spend more than that replacing him anyway. No worries. Mane having a 15 goal season this year will make him a £30m player, we won't be able to keep him. Fine. If we don't sell for big bucks we have a stable team (the thing that people have been moaning about while referencing Everton etc etc) if we do sell for big bucks then we have some big bucks to spend some on replacements. There's a misunderstanding of our model. It isn't about having to sell players on. It's not about selling high to buy cheap. We don't have to sell anyone. It's about building the best team we can afford to finish as high as we can. Part of building the best team we can afford is we will end up with brilliant players that other clubs will pay more than we can afford, so we can't keep them all because we are building the best team we can afford and we cannot and will not afford to keep them. If we don't have enough brilliant players we don't end up finishing as high as we can afford but we don't sell as many. But we can still afford the team. Either end of the scale we will not a) over invest so we have a team we can't afford or b) under invest, flog everything, keep the money etc. We are run brilliantly, but it's pretty tedious to see how the club is run being perpetually picked over for faults and our successes dismissed as the club "getting lucky". Spoiler alert. In the next five years Saints might finish fifteenth in the Premier League. It's far more likely than finishing fourth. Brace yourself for it. But finishing fourth or fifteenth I hope we do it in a cost neutral, sustainable way.

Why would it be made up?

You seem to be hanging your entire argument on the idea that if we didn't sell any of those players but still spent all the money we did, we'd be much stronger. We'd have Lallana and Tadic and Theo and Oxo and Mane and Shaw and Betrand and Cedric and Chambers and Clyne and Lovren and Van Dyke and Morgan and Clasie and Lambert and Pelle and Long and Jay Rod and Boruc and Forster and and and. Presumably headed up by the modern day Steve Gritt/Alan Curbishley co-managerial combination of Pochettino and Koeman with Adkins as first team coach. Oh, think of that net spend. We'd be like, so strong.

Absolutely. Wales are definitely through - they need to win one of three and still have Andorra at home, plus highly likely that other teams will drop points anyway. On the plane. Norn Iron looking good too. Would have liked to see the wee man take Scotland through but still comedy value in Scottish failure so can live with it.

You're worried that he isn't "complimentary", another said it was a "bad example", another thinks it all stems back to him not signing for us, so maybe not.

Makes sense to me. He's not mentioning us because he nearly joined us 15 years ago. He's using us an example of a medium sized Premier League club now being more attractive than a large German club. We're the best example for him to use really especially as the useful facts around club spending show just how much we have invested in the squad. Mane, Clasie, Van Dijk, Tadic are all players that historically one could have seen joining German clubs instead of the ranks of mid-Prem. It's brilliant we have them. All in all, makes our whimpering display in the Europa League even more sickening.

Bit of a non argument really. I don't think net spend is a particularly useful metric when assessing clubs transfer business, especially round about now each year when the transfer window comparison stats come out. Our friend Strawlock agrees with me, but for some reason is trying to engineer some kind of argument with me about it anyway. I can't really fathom why but he's always been slightly odd. He has the opportunity to concede I am right at any point.

Err, what youre saying now is precisely my point when I say net spend is not a particularly important metric. Understand?

Yes, yes, yes but our net spend is much worse than Sunderland and Norwich so they have far more desire to improve than we do or something. I wish we were them.

Not a sniff at Celtic but the minute he joins a big Premier League club he's called up the national squad. Sickening or something.

The England campaign looks like a right triumph compared to some of the other major nations.

It's one metric. It's not the only metric. It's not the most important metric. Happy to help.

That is an infinitely more important metric than fu cking net spend, but hey what do I know. Let's sit back and marvel over Sunderland and Norwich's intent to improve their position.

Just as many ifs and maybes for clubs with supposedly more "willingness to improve their position" by spunking millions on players fees and wages. I just don't care if we're seen to have won the transfer window, and when assessing our business, as decent recruitment with a small surplus feels like a brilliant result to me. And a season with no players wanted by the big four, if it happens as you say, would be a dream scenario right? And lastly, I've considered the possibility that it might all go terribly wrong and we fall off that "fine line" and end up, gosh, 15th. Or worse. Last season that fate did not befall many clubs that thoroughly beat us in last year's net spend competition. For example Hull, QPR and Newcastle put us to absolute shame with their intent and ambition. No falling off any fine lines for them. This season I expect to be looking on helpless as ambitious intent-ful Sunderland leave us for dust. It could have been so different.

It's a metric. It's not the only metric, and massively misinterpreted and misused.

We have had seasons like that quite recently. The one when we signed Osvaldo for a start. As long as we keep going as we are it's unlikely we will ever have a season where one or two won't go for £XXm. Mane and Wanyama next season and then the season after, maybe our boy Romeu will get a big bucks move. By then we may have all forgotten was derided as the cheap option/bargain basement replacement for Morgan and we can go full on grizzle about how we didn't tie him down to a longer contract. If it pans out like that, good. It means we're successful. Mane going to Man United next season means hes scored at least ten, maybe fifteen goals. Good. It feels like it is working great for us right now. But Sunderland can rest easy in their beds knowing that no big four club is going to poach Jermaine Defoe or Borini. So strong. And what a net spend too. Brilliant. Jolly good for them.

Er, I don't think you understand journalism or sources.

Just for you kid. Look at Norwich. They spent, like, ten million pounds more than we did. I wish we were them I do.