verlaine1979

Asked my football obsessed friend in Paris, and his verdict on Boufal is "He's amazing - the next Hazard, though he has a sh*tty mentality. He was by far the most impressive youngster in Ligue 1 last year, with a spectacular/entertaining way of playing."

Yup, don't these stats basically show that Koeman was no more or less a champion of the academy than Adkins, and that Poch's full season with Shaw and Chambers is just an outlier?

Would Yedlin be a reasonable back-up at RB if the rumours about Spurs looking to offload are true? No idea how well he did last year for Sunderland (statistically he seems about average), just remember a cameo at the last World Cup where he looked like one of the quickest players at the whole tournament.

Even for players who love the game, the obligation to train every day and the strictures of being managed by people you potentially dislike/don't respect etc presumably eventually turn it into a job (albeit one you probably enjoy more than a lot of people). Since it's a job, I can't see many footballers looking beyond money (actual capital) and prestige (social capital) when they weigh up where they want to play (maybe location, but I'm guessing it's a very very distant third, especially as the UK as a whole isn't exactly renowned for its beautiful post-war architecture or glorious weather). We aren't anywhere near the top in providing either type of capital, so we can't expect to prevent players from moving on (outside of football most people would probably weigh up job security when considering switching from one employer to the other, but for a variety of reasons, I don't think this probably matters much to footballers). In short, there's nothing - absolutely nothing - we can do unless someone has a spare £1bn they want to donate to the club.

Asking if JRod and Austin can 'replace' Mane and Pelle's goals is simply shorthand for asking if the team will play as well (and thus score as many goals) after the switch in personnel. See?

Allegedly, Puel is a coach who values fierce/determined types on the pitch. I've always found Romeu's attitude in that respect very good - both in terms of his defending, but also his willingness to try and get in the box - so he could well end up a being a key player for Puel.

When we start making £30m+ bids to poach players back from Liverpool & Arsenal, you might have a point. Until then, just because we aren't being eaten by the apex predator, doesn't mean we aren't sitting on a lower rung of the food chain

Looks like a good signing, but I'm not sure you need a black box to pick up under-utilised youth prospects from the Bayern squad.

Looks very strong and technically accomplished - Morgan mk.2.

Yes, because we might well play a tactical formation that wouldn't be enhanced by a physically dominant defensive midfielder or an attacker with unpredictability and pace.

No special knowledge, just based on previous summers. The club haven't ever really pushed the boat out on fees compared to what the rest of the league are doing, so I find it hard to imagine that we'll suddenly start trying to keep up with them now. I'd be very pleasantly surprised if we even brought in even one player at the £20m+ mark - far more likely we'll do what we did in Koeman's first summer and bring in a few at around the 10-12m mark again.

Proven quality now seems to start at around £20m a pop. If you're hoping we'll recruit 3 players at that kind of price, I fear you'll be very disappointed come the end of the window. The whole 'get used to the league' thing is also a bit of a red-herring - some players who are new to the league shine immediately and some don't, and some who are already established premier league players lose form when they move to another club (as we've seen with several departures from Southampton). I'd rather we bought sound, technical players and trusted in that technique than bow to spurious nonsense about the PL being fundamentally different to football as it's played across the channel & beyond.

Maybe the club will surprise me, but I really can't see us joining in the madness and more than doubling our record signing this summer.

Perhaps, but Brighton has the seafront acting as an alternate focus for the town, whereas with Southampton its basically Above Bar or nothing. I actually think that in places the city centre parks act against Southampton - green space bordered by thriving shops and residential areas are undeniably nice, but when they're surrounded by train stations, main roads and a shopping area decimated by the gravity of West Quay, they actually feel a bit alienated and disconnected.

A city centre/high street that isn't an absolute dump?

Sounds like someone has responded to the (more realistic) Bellerin link and thought 'are there any other short, Southern-European right backs playing in the premier league?'

Funnily enough, while the post-2000 revolution in German football has produced a generation of players with great technique, I don't think they have the same mental strength as the Deutschland of old.

Apparently he's actually quite an aggressive presence on the touchline (my driver in Cannes last week was a former Ligue 1 player, and said Puel was a 'take no sh*t' manager). In the interview he just comes across as a laid back guy whose lack of conversational urgency is heightened further by having to think in his second language.

Hopefully he can impart the same lesson to a rejuvenated JRod. He's never been entirely convincing as a one on one finisher.

Ah right, didn't realise footballers don't pay tax on the first £80k a week.

I sense you're probably joking, but just in case you aren't Coutinho had more goals, more assists and more chances per minute created than SD. I know everyone loves Davis, but the idea that his graft in attacking midfield (where both play) would be enough to keep Coutinho out of the team is absolutely insane.

Mental.

Davis played 600 minutes more during the course of the season than Coutinho, and Coutinho still scored more and had more assists. This one's a pretty simple choice, if you wouldn't swap Coutinho for Davis in our first 11, there's not a lot of hope for you.

I'd imagine playing with Coutinho behind him rather than Davis will probably result in substantial increase in chances at the very least.

Maybe we could have held out until the end of the window for another £5m, but the club have probably learned from Spurs and Villa that having a huge hole in your squad and a huge wad of cash is no good if you only have the last day or two of the window to spend it. If he was always going to go, and if he wasn't going to go to a bigger club than Liverpool (and he hasn't yet proven himself enough to make the step up to a regular place at a top 4 club yet anyway), probably makes sense to get 90% of what you were asking for, and give yourself the whole summer to reinvest it. I can see him moving on for £50m or £60m to somewhere like Bayern in two years if he does well (they have wingers to replace soon), so I do hope we have a nice sell-on percentage agreed too.