Dman

Amazing he’s managed to blag his way on to talkSPORT to be honest. Imagine hearing the transfer is £45m (to Everton, who are pretty well known to be unable to spend big due to FFP restrictions) and thinking, hang on, that doesn’t sound right…. 😂😂😂

He was always going to end up at either Newcastle or Everton. I can’t believe people even thought this had a chance.

Nice in theory, but in reality it won’t work like that. If they’ve got a £30m offer from us or a £40m offer from Newcastle, then they’re not gonna throw £10m away to spite them. The only thing is if Newcastle won’t agree to add a buy back clause, that could be a deal breaker.

If true, worrying. Would suggest there’s a chance Chelsea can get him out of our loan deal. Doesn’t bode well for the summer if Newcastle are serious.

I know a player or 2 (U23) from clubs around here, who’ve been shipped out on 2/3 loans to different clubs over a season or 2. Generally speaking they hate it and find it very difficult to settle. But I do agree with your last point, I guess it comes down to how much you back your ability. That being said, it would take a brave man to turn down the opportunity to join Liverpool. Not the sensible move, in my opinion, though.

The same one sung to Ronaldo every week, yet no fuss made (from what I’ve seen) there. Not racially motivated at all, basically being called a Sex offender

Silly boy. With Jota, mane, Salah, Elliott, Diaz his opportunities will be limited to non.

Agreed. First season he done well getting them into the top 4 and integrating a lot of the younger players (Mount etc.), which seem to just be forgotten. Second season, they became slightly too predictable to play against. The only thing with Lampard for me is he seems too nice and I can imagine giving the players a fairly easy time of it, where as your tuchel, klopps etc. Are just perfectionists and demand ridiculous intensity at all times (the difference between a good and great manager I guess). That being said, If (big if), he’s given 2 / 3 seasons at Everton to turn the tide and build his own squad, I think he could do okay there.

Who’s winning? 15 - love dman tonight.

“I cannot say that I prefer the 4-2-2-2 the most now,” Hasenhuttl recently said. “I prefer to be flexible. It makes it harder for the opponent to look at you and it makes it more interesting to prepare for a game.” Most people’s issues where that he was reluctant to move away from his preferred formation. He’s confirmed himself, he now flexible.

Confirmed to be absolutely true, by the man himself…. LOL https://theathletic.com/3096228/2022/01/27/ralph-hasenhuttl-is-showing-signs-of-increased-flexibility-and-southampton-are-seeing-the-benefits/?source=freedailyemail&campaign=601983

If Chelsea offered us a deal livramento including Broja, I’d snap their hand off. Broja would be far more important and valuable to us and we have KWP, who’s more than good enough (imo better atm) and I’m sure we could find a back up RB. Does make you wonder about the links to that Spence at Forest….

Interesting… FWIW Colwill (a Southampton lad, who’s family member's are key heavily involved with sholing), will be a top player.

I wonder if we’ve been told no to Broja (or not yet at least), but Anjorin is available…

In 2012, Aubameyang was playing top flight french football, so to a degree was already established in European football.

Imo, Ali wouldn’t suit Ralph’s preferred 4222 formation (tbh I think that’s a crap formation anyway), but I think if we played more of a 4411 (as we have done a few times this season now), I think he’d be a very good option in the 10 for us. The trouble with Ali, a bit like Ozil towards the end of his time in England, is that he’s not really a midfielder and not really a striker. He’s an attacking 10, who offers little defensively, which makes it very hard to squeeze him into a team. Similar in a way to MLT… where would he fit in to a modern side? Could see him doing well at Newcastle, under Howe, in the same way that King and Wilson played at bournemouth as a pair, at times. All theoretical though, he’s not gonna come here, he’ll end up at Everton or Newcastle.

For the love of god, please stop calling him ‘Ralf’. You’ve only had 3 years to start spelling his name right ffs. As for the geezer at AFCON, wouldn’t touch anyone based on who shines, in that comp (unless they’re established in Europe), with a barge pole, absolute joke of a competition.

I’d have thought 30m is more likely the figure they’d want (if he’s for sale at all). The fact we’ve made an offer would suggest that we’ve been encouraged that he potentially is available though..?

I agree. So, so important to us. JWP wouldn’t be half the player if he is, if he was next to diallo (not a dig at him, btw) instead of Romeu.

Always makes me laugh when people get excited over a transfer that clearly won’t happen. if the interest is true, I’d rather it was directed at lingaard, we won’t be getting either though. Alli is a Everton or Newcastle signing.

Haven’t the new owners basically already said that the running of the club will be left to those currently in charge? Theyve probably provided the additional funds to make these sort of deals, but let’s credit Crooker here, he’s the one who’s driving these sort of things.

it’s a very simple concept, to be honest. When agreeing the deal with the selling club, in this case Chelsea, it was agreed that they could buy the player back for X price (usually these deals have a start and end date - for example that fee kicks in starting x and ends y) The buy back price is only applicable to said club (Chelsea), so if Liverpool offer is 50m which we’re happy to accept, but we have already agreed Chelsea can buy for 25m, we would have to accept both offers, regardless of what is higher… basically if Chelsea meet the price set in the time period set, we have to accept the offer. This doesn’t mean the player has to go to that club, they could refuse, which would allow us to sell to the open market at a price we want. Finally, if Chelsea want to purchase him before or after the period set (I don’t know what this is or if there is a period at all), then we aren’t obliged to accept any offer for him.

They can also be very misleading. For example, someone compared Redmond to Buendia the other day stating the stats determine Redmond is a better player (it was clearly nonsense then as much as it is now). Gerrard has found a system since the arrival of couthino, which has since drastically improved the output of Buendia. Again, on paper Redmond may look better, but watch the 2 and you’d see Buendia is considerably better. The long and short and last I’ll comment on the matter is to not try and be clever by using stats to support an argument which is clearly nonsense. Watch a player before you make a judgement.

To be honest, it was said in jest.. I wouldn’t want either of them, but from what I’ve seen, he was the brains behind the organisation of the 2.. especially with the youngsters who he had worked with just before.

Exactly, they’ve been around for ages and the famous ‘black box’ was basically just a data storage tool. As you said, nothing new. I don’t think anyone is ‘anti stats’, you’d have to be stupid to be as they can be very useful. However, they’re not the be all and end all. If anyone think Brentford were signing players based on stats alone, you’re wrong. As with any club, they would physically watch the player in the flesh as well. Data can be a good way to identify targets but there are so many differing factors, it’s just stupid to compare x with x based on stats. As shown by the Armstrong and Broja debate. Upon arrival, Armstrong looked the better player (on paper), but it was clear the minute Broja stepped on the pitch he was going to be a future star… you don’t need to be for or against stats to determine that. Blackburn clearly have a style which enables strikers to get Plenty of chances to score (as shown by Brenton, this season) and also had Harvey Elliott who was a fantastic, creative player in that division. Whilst his ‘stats’ may have been decent, IIRC, a few Blackburn fans had doubts about his ability to step up and basically said he scores so many because he has so many shots (I.e poor / average conversion).