OnceaSaintalwaysaSaint

I was specifically watching him on Friday. He was either slow to get back or standing in an offside position so the midfield couldn't pass directly to him and his runs were blind alleys that would have been cut out. As Saint86 said, if we're going to be crossing as much as we did against Wednesday, Tall Paul would be a better option. The luxury is AA who surely has been given enough chances. That's twice I've seen him play against Wednesday within 12 months and twice he's been the worst player on the pitch.

I thought it was Djenepo and Aribo who are brothers. When Djenepo sporting his new haircut started warming up, the section around me singing the Ha...ri....bo song 😀

When he was on at the Reading game, it was very much him telling players where they needed to be. Reckon on him too though JWP may be around for a while yet.

He's got a pretty impressive fail compilation on twitter. Also there's the time he celebrates a goal in front of the Swansea fans and is taken away by Russell Martin...."Ah, we meet again, Mr Lumley". Think Baz might be safe.

You can't play 'possession ball' and have McCarthy in goal. He struggles to pass to his man five feet away. That leaves Baz. I genuinely think his distribution is very very good and his control of the ball is solid. If someone can train him to stop shots (is this intuitive or can it be trained?), we'd have a top goalie. Until that time, we need someone else.

I'd like that but what we'd give for a proper striker. Just hope it's not too much 'possession football' passing sideways at the back and Baz holding on to the ball for 30 seconds. There's got to be that forward intent. I can see a lot of teams holding back on the press and effectively say 'you're meant to be the better side, you come to us'.

Hopefully Martin has realised he's not even good enough to be our No2 goalie. Still don't understand how someone, whose only job is to block shots and pass it out, can be so bad at distribution. He's a total liability. To be fair to Baz, he's comfortable on the ball and his distribution is pretty good.

Snap....so got tickets for Wednesday instead. Grateful that Saints released additional seats for the game but judging by the amount of green on the Saints website, it could be a bit lonely in the section.

Ha, our kid when he was 9/10 insisted on an away shirt for a Christmas present with the name Classie on the back. Ever since, Saints shirts for Christmas presents have been nameless!

Didn't see the game and only reading the threads but this is the common theme that needs to be addressed. AA & Che are and always will be crap, so like last year, we need a striker.

Like this bidding war. Do I hear £55m from Liverpool, do I hear £60m from Chelsea? Ah, we have a new bidder Al Hilal.....

Did see Russell Martin (not Selles) come over at the start of the game. Nice touch. Heard he used to do it at Swansea. Be interesting to see if he still does it if/when we go on a losing streak. You'd think it's a no-brainer as a manager to get the fans on side....just need a good song for our new guy.

Fair point. I think Edozoe's speed and potential will come good this season. Changing the subject, wasn't Charles brought in as a defensive midfielder to replace Lavia? He played centre back today. Does that mean Lavia could be staying? Only Liverpool have so far shown a real interest and if they don't meet our asking price, perhaps he will play in the Championship.

I'd like to keep both of them too and wouldn't want Tella gone for the sake of selling him. But if you had the choice of keeping Tella or Edozie, would you keep Tella?

Or maybe he won't. I'd bite Fulham's hand off for £15m. Just back from the Reading game and across the back Manning, Charles, Bednerek +1 (probably Bree given KWP will probably be off) would do me. I'd argue ABK is probably the best of our central defenders but don't trust his commitment. Still think we need a striker. And on today's performance, comparing Edozie & Tella, Edozie looks far better, so if Burnley offer the reputed £20m for him, take it before they have second thoughts.

So we've rejected two bids from Monaco for Salisu. Can't believe he's part of our long term plans so anything near what we paid for him (£11m) and he should be out the door.

Did we get anything for him? Even the Qataris with all their money probably realise he's not worth much. Yep, three down (plus Ely) - things are picking up.

I see Burnley have just signed Nathan....oh, wait a minute, different Nathan! I hope this one stays. Is looking a bit of a spark in the pre-seasons.

Boy, he was crap in those friendlies. I guess they took him to Goztepe to save on the return fare. I always think of him as a Che. Really useless but he gives it 100% every game. As someone said, if we also get 6m for Aribo, it's starting to look like a successful transfer window!

Even yesterday against Goztepe he looked a class act when he came on. That's reinforcing his value and like you say, there are a number of characters that frankly let themselves down last year when we were on our downward spiral, but Lavia still gave it every game 100%. He comes with zero baggage and with so many prima donnas in this game, that's worth a pretty penny on its own.

Problem is, we don't know who's going and who's staying so the squad can't be sorted. I'm just hoping Alcaraz stops putting in too many eye-catching performances before the transfer window closes.

Got to agree. This time, though, there do seem to be a couple of options to pass further forward. Tella and the new lads looked lively. AA , however, still runs down blind alleys and Che, bless him, is just useless. I don't buy in to this "they've scored hundreds of goals in the championship before so they'll do ok" line of thinking. We've just spent £15m on a defender. The same amount will buy two quality lower league strikers. Surely our scouts can find them....

Just to pick one comment from "Saintsweb intelligentsia" in last season's pre-season friendlies courtesy of S-Clarke: " So, two pre-season games and sadly we still face similar troubles as we did in the real games. To put it bluntly, we lack quality and any sort of top flight ability in the attack." And there's lot of other comments that proved sadly accurate... Pre-seasons indicate our style of play for the coming season, so I hope we're not going to fanny about passing the ball sideways at the back looking to pull the opponents out of position all season.

Personally, I'm hoping all the players we keep can find some form, especially Edozie, Sulemana & Alcaraz but as for AA, he's a proven lightweight and I'd prefer us to find a striker or two from League 1/2 or from Europe's leagues and build them up. AA's been given enough chances.

So the rumour is Chelsea are invoking their buy-back clause on Tino (£35m) and then letting us have him on loan for a year. Like that rumour.