John Boy Saint

Has KWP been seen? As Saints posted photos of him last week training somewhere hot looking.

Seem to recall something during pre season last summer that the training regime was proving a bit tough for him and he was moaning about it on some social media or other. If that’s the case I very much doubt Ralph has much time for him. Like we have seen there is a footballer lurking in there somewhere, just beggars belief that him and his brother haven’t worked out that if he did apply himself over 38 games of a season (which in itself would be a landmark on his CV) delivering to his potential, there’s a pretty good chance he would get snapped up by a team willing to pay him even more than Saints do. Trouble is, referring back to his playing CV, right now no decent club able to pay him more is going to waste money on a bloke yet to play a full season anywhere he has been.

This is probably just what he has been waiting for - the Dutch have a stubborn almost belligerent streak running beneath the surface (they are nice people) KNVB pissed him off when he was a shoe in for the National Managers job, before we got him, so much so that he was metaphorically choosing the carpets and curtains for his office. Then just like that they did an about turn and out of the blue appointed Guus Hiddink. Which pissed off Ronald - Dutch friends said that if KNVB came and offered him the gig he would let them suffer and turn them down - which is how they ended up with people like Blind to stumble them along - being out of work must have mellowed him to take the gig, but Dutch friends reckon they must have lined his pockets with Gold and Platinum as the stink from years ago was still wafting round the place. So the Barcelona gig, if he does get/take it, presents him the opportunity to give a 2 finger salute as he skips out the door blowing a raspberry.

No Brainer - well earned.

Thanks for the update - I have a customer with one on order due to arrive soon - she will be pleased with the update! Did you know that Tesla anoraks actually track shipments of the cars - she knew hers was in the Panama canal the other day thanks to someones work on t'internet!! Right Intermission over .................... back to Squirrel Spo..........sorry LD Sports and Saints.

400 notes!......... Blimey I might have to set my alarm now to be first in the queue for next years concourse sale when that'll be down to 20 quid. However win the league and that £400 will be mere bobbins compared to what you could sell it on for. ☺️

Strachan - without doubt Hoddle had made the players believe they could win games - Saints faffed about when he left - Strachan came in made us fit enough to win games anyone leaving on 80 minutes missed a whole heap of goals as we had the legs to go 120 minutes easily - if Beatts or Ormerod had scored either of their chances in the 2003 cup final towards the end to force extra time Arsenal would have been battered. 4th place for Christmas after beating p*mpey, that was fairytail stuff for us Saints fans. Poch - Like Strachan made us super fit - a plan B might have been missing - We suddenly had a team of England internationals through what he had squeezed out of them: who would have thought. Koeman - Rebuilt and got us going again after being pillaged by the scousers - That Liverpool game 2-0 down at half time. Saints behind the scenes CCTV catch Sturridge and someone coming out of the away dressing room giggling - our dressing room door opens and Victor Wanyama steps out dressed to play - their giggling instantly stops as they look at him with eyes of "oh s**t!" . When our 3rd went in Koeman out Klopp'ing Klopp with his celebrations superb. We got to play European football under him. If Ralph can get us playing how Ralph would like us to play it could be fun. Adkins needs a mention....... as Hooiveld said, at pre season in Spain, to my mate when asked what the difference was between Adkins and Pochettino - "under Adkins in the Premier League we couldn't defend - now we can"....But Adkins gave us all present one hell of a ride, after years of misery we were Shark in a tank of fish, some of the attacking football we played under him to climb the leagues was breathtaking.

Bored journos ground baiting - Can’t see anything happening here Obafemi is a bit of a project for Ralph as he knows there is still polishing and shining to do. Only way he is going elsewhere is if there appears to be no more improvement likely.

Wouldn’t be surprised if the reason that Live Premier League on Chinese TV being sidelined to a lesser platform is down to falling viewing figures, a 4pm kick off here is 11pm there, Final whistle is 1am in the morning. If you walk into most restaurants in China at 8pm at night they are quiet because the majority have already eaten and gone home. Go to any big city in the world and at 11pm there is still a hubbub of activity most nights of the week, stand in Guangzhou, Chinas 3rd biggest city with 13,000,000 inhabitants, and its remarkably quiet at 11pm, look out of the hotel bedroom at the high rise apartment blocks around and most of the lights are out, so aside from the earlier kick offs most live games are at a very unsociable hour. Chinese are materialist they like their nice things they, like their money to buy the nice things with, sitting at work on a Tuesday morning with matchsticks propping your eyes open because you got up at 3am to watch Crystal Palace v Burnley ain’t helping your productivity to earn more. Buggering up Chinese owned PL football clubs from within serves no purpose, You might find eventually that this business with Man City and UEFA regarding the revenue streams from Golden Season Tickets ,over priced stadium naming rights etc, might have seen people poking around in the shadows looking at football clubs and their sources of income. Within minutes of the LD Sports announcement the sleuths on here had already found enough to go Hmmmmmm. We “had a break clause in the deal after a year”, that was likely the first thing to be written down when putting the deal together as the ejector seat should the detail be inspected by an outside agency. The big 6 are coated in Teflon with a razor wire fence round them - Saints by contrast would be a big enough club to make a visible example of, but insignificant enough for the vast majority of football fans to not give a tinkers cuss about the ramifications of whatever sanction is dreamed up for us. Still gives us something a bit more meaty to ponder, than threads asking “If you bought a Dog which Saints player would you name it after?” To while away the days to the 12th September.

Just so long as the Squirrel is ok 🙃

Blimey City have looks half baked v Lyon - deservedly departing Lisbon

Coffee say hello to screen 🤣

Didn't think it would be that sort of interesting 7 hours ago

Superb dummy sold there one minute Samedo is in Lisbon next he knows he is in Faro!

His wife said her and the kids would leave him if he took the Barca gig - having been boss at Espanyol

I have to say watching Leipzig last night you could see a little thread of what Ralph is trying to get going with us. They certainly were very workman like, no frills but solid stuff, that Upamecano was impressive I get why he was mentioned in hope for us in transfer thread comments. I cheered when that off target shot deflected in, pretty much because I just hate the squealing feigning at little or no contact Atletico must practice every Friday afternoon to get oppo players booked and sent off (thankfully the ref didn't buy much of it), every game its the same with them, but that same team a goal down suddenly ride every tackle instantly get up from the merest touch having acted like the sniper in the floodlights has taken them out. Tonights game could be interesting.

Got my pedants hat on (unless I've missed something recently) you've left out the Dutch bloke who apparently could challenge the mercurial Lovren for greatness. As an aside the fountain of t'internet truth Wikipedia claims Salisu signed last Wednesday.

Obviously no jolly abroad involved (Ralph has already said that - amazed the journo actually asked the question).Wonder if we will see a few friendlies with local clubs like the strange 3 x 45 minutes game we had v Bristol City where everyone had a go pre restart? Good challenge for management to make it interesting enough - as much as I like my house and garden boy do I long for a change of scenery and routine away from it.

Somewhere with nice scenery and good shops probably.

If Ralph can't get a tune out of Boufal, getting one out of Lemina is going to be like pushing water up hill. Ralph wants engines prepared to go and go again, Lemina's record everywhere he has been is yet to see him play a full season - I was going to say his engine is like a 2CV but that is maligning what was a proper workhorse of a car, maybe an engine of Lada.

I read on Sky that Hojbjerg will be unveiled some point today by Spurs - and the KWP deal is personal terms yet to be agreed - obviously no negotiators in the building at Saints as you would have thought most of that would have been just going over the pencil with ink, unless that's classed as tapping up even though they are on loan with us already.

Surprised given we have gone back to a "historical" sash - which I thought looked pretty smart for the Sheffield United game - we haven't gone back to the Old Gold shirts and Black knickers - as shorts were referred to on the programmes possibly into the 1950's (socks were likewise referred to as stockings). By the same token surprised the blue shorts have never made a return to go with the stripes, the only reason they were dropped apparently was because as the season wore on the blue got lighter and lighter in the wash, black held its colour better. Maybe thats what our new away is a reference to Dark Blue top to represent the shorts back then at the start the season - lighter Blue shorts to show how they looked as the season reached its conclusion and Mrs Miggins had put them on boil wash for the umpteenth time.

BBC Sport Gossip page has us via The Mirror sniffing around Harry Wilson along with Leeds, Toon, and Palace Liverpool have valued him at £20m (he was an loan for the Cherrys last season for those unaware). Pirlo apparently doesnt want Ramsey next year at Juve so all and sundry will be linked with him. Same pages Chris ' I like your shirt give it to me now in the penalty box' Smalling linked to Inter for a bang average player he still seems to be carving out a career with household name teams, unlike so many who have withered on the Man U tree and been cast out. https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/53727766

There you go Redmond is fast but fails to deliver at a level that matches his pace and and ability to run with the ball - stand a a couple of big boys in front of him and steam starts to billow from his ears as he tries to figure out what to do, Long similar blisteringly fast keeps the oppo defence on its toes alas as has been seen more recently his feet don't operate at the same pace as his running and he has missed a few of what many would consider to be easy chances. Watch KWP and what has impressed me is his football brain and tenacity, not sure if he is quick but his quick thinking and importantly his vision probably more than makes up for that. Recent games he has lost the ball realised his error and been the first to Mop up the mess, Redmond is often dwelling on losing the ball running through it in his mind, SL is offside having burned all his fuel in the sprint. Again in the recent games to change things up when Armstrong has gone off, a few times JWP has momentarily slid back into a RB position and let KWP have a bit of a foray further up the pitch When KWP played against us last season and clattered Armstrong for the superb JWP goal - I thought he looked like a fish up a tree in the Spurs defence that day - I wondered what the whatsit we were doing taking him on loan. Seems to fit nicely into Saints way of playing under Ralph, and after that game last season for Spurs he has turned my head around and has looked a breath of fresh air. At the end of the day you need allsorts of characters and abilities in your team - if the manager can pull all the attributes together to produce a potent force then that has to be better than just one individual who can run fast.

it does seem a bit bizarre - 2 weeks ago it came up on the official Saints facebook post - looked on the OS - nothing - looked on here - nothing. Maybe the PR department got excited and had a premature moment.