James

Yes, I do understand that but you can't ignore that we receive the same amount of TV revenue as every other club and generate tens of millions from player sales every summer. We have made a net profit on transfers every year bar the year we returned to the Prem. We have to spend to keep pace with the teams around us. Teams like West Brom, Stoke and Palace are investing decent money in their squads on players they have confidence will do an immediate job. We are taking a big risk by gambling on young players who, at the moment, don't appear to be ready. I'm all for developing youngsters but it has to be balanced otherwise a duff season and you'll be relegated. We certainly aren't too good to go down in the next couple of years. We have built our reputation as being the "best of the rest" but this year we are risking that. Players like Hojberg and Boufal came to us because of our status as a good club outside the top 6 that played good football. We are putting both of those positives at risk this year.

Wasn't really old enough to appreciate what went on when we had Branfoot in charge (my first full season was the season after he left). Genuine question for anyone who knows but how long was the discontent for Branfoot simmering before it became an outright mutiny amongst fans?

Pellegrini. Reports that he was interested, track record of winning things, managed some of the biggest clubs in the world, would potentially have attracted top draw players and perhaps would have convinced some of our leavers to stay. No doubt I'll be shouted down and told Puel was a better fit for Saints but fact remains that he was relative unknown, had only managed in France. Did a decent job with Nice but they are now top of the French league which smacks of a Pearson/Ranieri situation at Leicester where the squad was clearly capable of more. In my opinion Pellegrini would have represented ambition and a desire to build on our position whereas Puel struck me as a bit of a cheap appointment. I'm not opposed to using the academy at all but in a big league where there is huge competition it needs to be supplemented with experienced buys that are ready to improve our first team straight away.

He is clearly better than Yoshida, Stephens or Gardos. Anyone who claims otherwise is doing the age old trick employed by Saints fans of claiming certain of our sold players are cr*p to justify the actions of the club.

It's not the sales per se, it's the lack of replacements or, when we do replace, doing it on the cheap. You can't sell lamb, replace it with mutton and expect to progress. When the first exodus happened when Poch left we at least brought in replacements but we aren't doing it this time and seem to be relying on existing squad players/youth. If this is the new direction then fine but you can't preach progress and not actually back it up with actions. Similar teams to us are investing in their squads but we aren't.

And to think that we started the summer from a position of immense strength having finished sixth. The writing was on the wall for me when Ron walked out and we (IMO) failed to bring in the best manager available to us. We've gone backwards, there's no doubt about that. Just hope that we can survive in the Prem this and next season.

What a surprise. Also Gardos comes back at an "interesting level"?! What does that even mean?

Wouldn't hold your breath for anyone decent. We might get a couple of loans in but don't see much else. Not sure why anyone expects Saints to spend now. They didn't do enough in the summer and we've never done much in January. I always think back to the first year under Koeman when we were well in with a shot of Champions League and all we did was get in Elia on loan. It was obvious that year we needed someone to take the heat of Pelle, we didnt, he stopped scoring and we duly finished 7th.

To be honest, when the game this is achieved is a woeful one nil that we've scraped past the Norwich B team at home it does take the shine off it a bit. Doesn't really prove these academy players are actually good enough does it?

Odd that we've strengthened one of the teams near us but decent deal on paper. Yet another window where we've sold before we've brought anyone in, really doesn't lift the atmosphere of gloom around the club at the moment. Lots for Les to do in the next week but won't hold my breath for him to deliver what he promised.

Stopped reading after "the sooner we get relegated". Moronic suggestion.

Well there were - Plymouth and Coventry. Had we not beaten either of those teams then there would have been a chance we'd have been in the playoffs.

We've lost four games in a row in the league. The Liverpool game was the exception rather than the rule. Having seen us get spanked by Palace, travel all the way to Hull and lose to arguably the worst team in the league and been to Prague to watch that so called "performance" it's easy to see why fans have some trepidation when it comes to dedicating their time and hard earned to watching us away from home (especially mid week when it's a 500 mile round trip). Personally don't blame anyone for not attending.

Personally I think it's a natural reaction. There is a distinct lack of enthusiasm and excitement enminating from the club at the moment. Dull manager, dull team, dull style, no transfers and about to sell our captain to a rival club. No wonder fans are becoming ambivalent. I'll be at Anfield though, more in hope than expectation mind.

And when we don't it'll be another thing to add to the list of items Les Reed has said that turned out to be BS.

Will be interested to see how Les spins it. We are being warmed up to the fact that we won't get a replacement I think. CP saying we can rely on Stephens and Gardos, Maya being made captain on Wednesday.

Nearly every time Reed says something the complete opposite happens. He should learn to not say anything at all on matters which could go either way. He will probably claim plans changed due to the emergence (by which I mean a couple of halves of Prem football out of position and a full game at CB against a championship side) of Jack Stephens.

I mean it does say we will "try" and replace him rather than that we "will" (which is what Reed said). He will probably go back on it and say that we've been impressed with Yoshida or something I'd imagine.

"If poss" - mixed messages as compared to Reed's "he will not be sold without a replacement" but then, given his track record, we can't exactly expect any of what LR says to actually happen.

Don't rate him at all. Seems like a bit of a panic signing (especially on loan). He'd be OK as a stop gap I suppose as at least he has Prem experience but I do foresee a situation where we will need to reconstruct our entire defence over the summer. This kind of signing/target does slightly undermine our supposedly genius transfer policy of having targets lined up - we've known Fonte was on the way out since the summer and we are waiting until the last 10 days of the window to sort out a loan for Sahko, doesn't feel like this one has been particularly well planned but then nobody is infallible and maybe the board have just been caught out here.

If we sell him to West Brom then that really does say something about the club for me. You can't sell your captain to a team like West Brom and then claim to be ambitious. Whatever Jose's reasons are it does seem to indicate something isn't right at SFC at the moment.

Reed said in his interview that he wouldn't be sold without a replacement. I therefore expect a replacement to come in either before or just after we sell. Otherwise I'm afraid we need to add another statement to the list of things Les Reed says which then don't actually happen.

Have been wanting us to find a way to play him and Bertrand in our "first team" for a while. Maybe wide left as per Arsenal in the League Cup?

To be fair, any striker we did sign wouldn't exactly have to be top draw to be a significant improvement on what we've got at the moment!

Good post, nail on the head for me.