CB Fry

Yeah, man. Heads in the clouds and unrealistic people. Bring back the days when we were, like, going to totally be in the Champions league and stuff.

Actually, you're right. We're relegated in May 2015.

The position we are in now is that we don't kick a meaningful ball for two months.

I look forward to this thread being dug up in September.

Clearly not. Otherwise these players would be desperate to get away to Aston Villa or West Ham. They're not, they're signing for the biggest clubs in the world.

He has behaved like a petulant child. The "dream" you refer to was no more than that - pie in the sky that only a fool would believe. Have fun on the Liverpool forums.

Makes you wonder how all these football clubs around the world that haven't ever been run by Nicola Cortese manage to get anything done.

What else have I said then?

I'd say saying he could have handled it better as a pretty dispassionate assessment, but if you are that desperate to make a "you're crying you are" lame point score then carry on.

I think you need to calm down. Plenty of us are simply saying he could have handled it better. That doesn't require table bashing "he did this..he could have done that" ranting from you.

So on one hand you're saying the club should have just turned all offers down flat and not sold because they don't have to, but at the same time you support Lallana going on strike to force a move. So, how does that all work out then?

I don't demand or expect loyalty. I fully expected Lallana to go and don't begrudge a man a career and more money etc. But Lallana has handled this very poorly and now looks like a total pri ck. Not because he has left, but how it has all been done. Anyway, we now have a newspaper advertisement to read tomorrow. How exciting.

He is getting some appalling advice. Paying to take a page in the Echo reeks of arrogant "here's something for the little people" pigheadedness. Even just giving a short statement or an interview with the Echo would have been better but a full page ad from Brand Lallana? Seriously, turn it in.

I'm giving them both barrels and going with "you're just a small town in Everton". Take no prisoners.

And with that, the scales fell from his eyes.

The bedwetting is a) describing it as asset stripping b) or a fire sale c) or players leaving because they "don't believe in the vision of SFC" anymore, as opposed to it being MANCHESTER SODDING UNITED OFFERING ONE HUNDRED GRAND A WEEK d) Pointless dumbery around "tell them all to fark off" and "it's £50m per leg or no deal" e) Pointless dumbery around "let em rot in the reserves" f) Pointless dumbery around how absolutely no player would ever want to leave to join Manchester sodding United if only Cortese was still here. g) "Why is Les Reed the supreme power in Southampton these days?" h) Something Les Reed something something Charlton Athletic something i) And let's start pretending that Les Reed said we would spend all the money brought in plus our transfer budget by the end of August so we can go nicely apesh it when we've "only" spent forty million come September. j) Disingenuously make out something like "why are people merely pointing out players are being sold being called bedwetters and not realists?" Avoid a) to j) and no one ain't never calling you no bedwetter, squire.

This. Seems spectacularly unlikely, and while a loan might work, it isn't our style. Really can't see it. Would be a really odd thing to do in the middle of a asset strip melt down fire sale clearout as well.

Not sure there is unbridled optimism. Just effing lunatics pi ss ing the bed, and then some normal people who accept that when Manchester United come calling then players will want to go. Koeman gets to create the next Southampton team. In the last twenty years we've had good to great Saints teams built by Bally, Strachan, Hoddle, Jones, Adkins, Pardew. Pochettino built an excellent team too. He's gone. And we've had excellent players, from Richards to Killer, to Beattie and Pahars, from Oakley to Cork, from Svensson to Schneiderlin, from Niemi to Boruc. The current crop are just as transient and replaceable as the last lot. We have a new manager. We'll get new players. Some of them will be dog sh it. But one of them, maybe two, will be effing brilliant and come November we will love them like a new son. And off we go - the future starts now, we're finishing twelfth next season and I am going to f uck ing love it. Because we're going to Wembley too. Why not, we're managed by a cup expert. But I'm not unbridled, just happily realistic. Get on it.

Which clubs have bought in a replacement before selling their star player? It's a "fundamental principle of football" so you must have loads of examples.

Those adidas kits were fu cking sh it. "Quality assurance" from off the peg Adidas football kits? Effing la la land.

Fair enough. I'd like to understand more about this "fundamental principle" of football where replacements are bought before players are sold. I genuinely cannot think of any high profile (or low profile) examples of this.

Well, watch out. You are veering into Alpine territory with a some of your posts. Some of my all time favourite Saints wore own brand kit. It will be fine.

And this is a pi ss take, right? Got to say it's a pretty good trolling act, so feel free to keep it going. We need to bring the new generation of trollers through because who knows the day when Alpine chokes on a giant Toblerone he tried to eight widthways.

This is a pi ss take, right?

No you're right. We never stood toe to toe with any big teams in the Premier League before. Never. Not ever. I think last season was the first time we had ever beaten Liverpool in our entire history, wasn't it? The kind of thing it would be impossible to imagine the Saints team managed by Strachan achieving.