chiknsmack

You contribute more goals and assists than most midfielders in the league. It's the modern fullback (a la "Trent", the greatest right back the world has ever seen); defending doesn't matter.

SR have said the plan is to win the Championship this year. The entire squad has just taken a 40% pay cut. A couple of experienced first team regulars have fallen off the wage bill. SR chucked in over 130m last year, so the clubs isn't financially restricted like under Gao. If the plan is to get back to the Prem ASAP and stay there, we need to win promotion with a squad which has at least a handful of players who are PL mid-table quality. We have maybe two handfuls of such players now, and a few will obviously go (Salisu apparently doesn't want to be here, Adams didn't sign a new contract in the Prem, Lavia is top shelf, ABK is a German international with interest from multiple German top flight clubs) so we really need to be hanging onto most of the rest if we plan to have another 10+ years in the Prem starting in 2024-25.

The other reason to keep him would be to play him at DM where his defensive recklessness wouldn't be so costly and he'd get more use of his technical skill on the ball. No-one can say he's a boring player and, though boring is often preferable in a CB, in a DM/HM boring is bad (see this forum's opinion of JWP and his lack of attacking influence in open play).

It's Stu. AA is 33 x 6 (average carries per 60 touches, loses the ball at the same rate as Aribo). Though he's not really a midfielder, so not sure it's comparable. Alcaraz is 36 x 7.5, but didn't play enough minutes to make the graph. JWP rarely loses the ball, but it's not because he's press-resistant. It's because he passes it backwards or sideways to someone else. If he would ever turn to progress the ball himself, he'd lose it more. The reason so many people around here don't like him is because he's so far to the left on this graph, meaning he never tries to carry the ball and start an attack. Maybe it was his job to be a DM and never get involved in helping the team attack, but it shouldn't have been because a.) that's not his game, and b.) a team that needs to score goals to win games, and win games to stay up, can't afford to have a player whose job is to pick up the ball in defensive midfield and NEVER look to move it towards the opposition goal.

If Everton don't break the rules, perhaps we sign Tarkowski. If we sign Tarkowski, perhaps we concede half a dozen fewer goals. If we concede half a dozen fewer goals, perhaps we pick up enough points to stay up. Now do the same with McNeil. Now consider how much Onana added to Everton. Now consider who they'd have had to sell to stay under their FFP limits. And so on. There are so many knock-on effects from Everton's alleged cheating that you can't cleanly unravel it. We know being in the Prem versus the Championship is worth about $100m per year. So Saints, Leeds, Leicester, Burnley, Norwich, and Watford have been robbed of some part of $100m ($200m in the case of the latter two). We don't know who has been robbed of exactly what (and perhaps Everton would've stayed up both years even without cheating) but you could maybe try to make things right financially. Making the assumption that Everton have stayed up in the past two season because of their cheating, they've benefited to the tune of $200m over the past two years. So while a $200m fine to be split between the six relegated teams wouldn't fix things, it would help and serve as a deterrent to other teams thinking about cheating. Relegating Everton to the Championship or League 1 also doesn't fix things, though it again does help and does serve as a deterrent. Relegating Everton to the National League North AND making them pay Saints/Leeds/Leicester/Burnley $100m each AND pay Norwich & Watford $200m each still wouldn't fix things. There's no clean fix when you can't figure out the degree to which Everton's cheating harmed the other clubs.

This is style #0021 from Spized.com, if you want to play around with their kit design tool. I love this idea of a main colour for the body, second colour for sleeves and main stripes, and third colour for collar and minor stripes. And just pinstripes/varied stripes in general. If Saint Garrett is around the mark (as he usually is IMO) I'm going to have to get that third shirt for sure. Probably the away shirt too. Maybe all three depending on the execution of the home shirt. (Do we read anything into the #45 on the shorts?)

This is how I saw him, does some of the pretty stuff from time to time, but no real presence or aggression. Sort of player that goes missing easily JWP circa 2018.

I'd love SR to buy Sampdoria. There's already the Saints connection through Gaston/Maya/Gabbiadini having played for them in recent years. If the three teams could get back to being mid-table top flight sides, It'd be a nice intermediate step between Goztepe and Saints. I do have a Sampdoria shirt in my wardrobe, but that's besides the point. Goztepe averaged 47% possession across the season. In the 1-1 draw the week before the playoff game, against the same opposition, they had 46%.

Both, please. CB and DM are the big holes in our projected squad for next season, and they are both options for both spots (I know "Stephens at DM" is a meme, but Lyanco playing a bit further forward were he could use his technical skills on the ball more and where his defensive shenanigans wouldn't be such a liability would be fun). Plus if we're looking to have CBs who are comfortable on the ball, they'd be better than most. ------------ Onuachu to Luton would be a win-win for all parties. If they're going to attack the Prem with the same game plan as the Championship, he's exactly what they want up front. If we could get half our money back on him that'd be miles better than we did with Carrillo.

Depends what you mean by "made the breakthrough". Kevin Danso played for us on loan at age 21 and didn't look to be much. He's now starting at age 24 for Lens - currently 2nd in Ligue 1 with two games to go - and being talked up for a move to a Champions League club. Nathan Tella couldn't establish himself in the starting XI or even the squad a year or two ago when he was 21/22. At 23 he's made the Championship TotY. I'm glad the club didn't sell him for buttons last year because he hadn't broken through by 22. Some players are good enough for the Prem at 21. Some aren't, but might get there by 25. If a player is 25 and on loan in L2, we should cut ties. But 23 and proven capable at Champ or L1 level?

He came in at the start of last season after SR decided to replace everyone bar Ralph.

https://www.southamptonfc.com/news/2023-05-09/loan-watch-southampton-football-club-9th-may-2023 Tella and Smallbone have had successful seasons at Championship level, and will walk right back into the squad (and probably the XI, depending on who leaves) if they want to. Watts, Olaigbe, Chauke, and Simeu look borderline Champ/L1. There are a handful of U20/U18 kids who will be looking for senior football somewhere too. It all depends on who leaves and what the new manager is looking for. For example, if we lose Adams and Onuachu and the new manager wants two up front, there's room for a couple more strikers in the squad. If we keep our current four strikers and the new manager wants to play one up top in a 4-3-3, there isn't. We also need to add some strength, experience, and leadership to the side somewhere. That would push some youngsters down the pecking order.

If you have the chance to watch today's match again, there are a few moments when you can look at Brighton doing what we could be looking to do next year in a possession-based system under Martin. 23:30 is the stereotypical Brighton play. The CBs slow the game right down and virtually stand on the ball until Aribo gets bored and presses. His press forces the players behind him to follow, at which point Brighton play a couple of quick passes to get on the attack. The first minute of the second half is the same thing; the CBs passing the ball back and forth when not being pressed, slowing moving up the pitch, then eventually playing a forward pass to a wide player. 60:30 is the best example. 30 seconds of “boring pointless possession for possession’s sake” before the Saints press invites three quick passes to get into the Saints box.

We already have a bloated squad. And there are a handful of Swansea players who are looking to leave and would be great pickups for us. I'm not massively excited by Martin, but if he brings Piroe and one or two others with him I'll be happy.

Because when the club dropped to League 1 the academy became a lot less attractive for kids and their parents. Bugger-all decent prospects joining the academy system ten or twelve years ago means now, when those kids would now be hitting 20 and ready to try out senior football, we don't have much (certainly no PL-ready prospects) coming through. We do have some outstanding 16-18yos coming through (from when we got promoted back to the PL and so the academy became more attractive again), but they're not ready for the PL yet. So we needed to buy in 18-21yos who were possibly ready to take the step up as Livramento/Lavia did. The plan was that once Livramento/Lavia/Edozie/Larios/Mara have proven themselves to be good enough for a top ten club, we could sell them on for a profit and replace them with the Ballard/Doyle/Edwards/Dibling/Payne/Merry generation as they turn 21 and return from Championship/L1 loans. Keep the club in the prem, keep the good young kids entering the academy, keep churning out PL-quality players. Drop out of the prem and the production line suffers, and you have to buy players to fill the gap where production fell off.

He shouldn't be a striker. He should be at the top of a midfield diamond, with Lavia at the base and Alcaraz and JWP at the corners. Get the ball, play it central to Che, he can hold it up for Alcaraz or JWP to run past him or turn and play the early ball through to the two pacey wingers/strikers playing ahead of him. He's similar to Joelinton; a shit striker who flourished when dropped deeper and used to link up the play instead of shooting. He's big, strong, covers ground, can pick a pass, and can't shoot to save his life.

I've said it before, but if these three don't stay then I hope they are only loaned out. It'd be nice to have them on the books if we bounce straight back to the Premier League and, even if we don't, them having another year of PL experience would only help their market value. ABK would want to put himself in the frame for a spot at the Euros, so wouldn't want to be in the Championship next year. Sulemana and Alcaraz are recent additions I wouldn't want to sell unless we would make a profit on them; there's no need for a fire sale and even if there was they'd be the last players I'd want to see go cheap.

Shouldn't play again this season. He's earned an early release for good behaviour.

Kiwi here in the same situation. Fan since 1997-98 when I got my first FIFA game on Playstation, started following more closely in League 1 (staying up into the wee small hours of the morning, refreshing for text updates on the club site or some British newspaper website). I've read enough about 1996-96 and 1998-99 to know that the club has a history of fighting their way out of trouble late in the season, so I kept the faith until today.

We're talking about playing in the Championship or playing in the B team. I genuinely cannot see a situation where a player would want to play for Saints B until he's 27 when he could play in the Championship - where he made team of the year the year before - and try to get Saints back to the PL to earn himself PL football, and wages.

He brought Livramento, Simeu, Small, and most of the kids who came from other clubs into our youth system (both from bigger clubs to our U18s, and younger kids into our U14s/15s). He also would've known all about - and had some involvement in the recruiting of - non-English youth players (ie. Broja, Lavia). He was involved in our academy for seven years from 2006, before moving to the FA to be in charge of the youth pipeline for the FA (so everything to do with England U15s to U20s, including guiding the development of all the players and coaches) for another seven years. He came back to us three years ago and spearheaded the "playbook" (basically having a set way of developing, training, and playing for all teams at the club from the kids to the seniors). If you told me the club had to sack everybody but one person and start from scratch, I'd keep Crocker. Make him "Director of Everything" (basically the role he's taking at the USFF) and let him do whatever he wants.

I haven't seen much of Harry Wilson this season but he's played nearly the full 90 in each of the past two matches and scored in both. He looked very good today, as did the Fulham attack as a whole (particularly Robinson and Willian down the left). Though they did only put two past Leeds. Those Forest long throws caused Liverpool a whole heap of problems. Maybe we should consider something similar ourselves?

Onuachu showed less energy when defending than even Aribo would've. If Armstrong had to come off I'd have almost rather seen McCarthy come on as a striker than Onuachu. (Though the real question is where were Mara and Djenepo, who also would've been clearly better options than Onuachu when the job was to close down Odergard and Partey while offering some pace on the break.)

The owners merrily chucked in 150m this year. Sales of Lavia/JWP/KWP/Salisu/ABK/Adams/Tella would net similar (40+40+5 lots of 15 is a reasonable rough estimate; if you think I'm short then sell Bednarek/Lyanco/Orsic/DCC/Alcaraz/Sulemana/Onuachu/Stu/whoever else too). Expiring contracts for Walcott and Elyounoussi will fall off the wage bill. There will still be a big chunk of change coming in from being in the PL this year. Unless you think Dragan is going to throw in the towel, pocket the sales money to get back the money put in, then try to squeeze his original 100m out of the club somehow too, there are no financial pressures this summer. If I'm wrong about the sales (we keep everyone bar Lavia and Salisu) then there's obviously some financial pressure, but also an obvious commitment from the owners to risk their money for a quick return to the PL. We'd need a striker (we already have a stack of promising kids and a few options who are proven to be high-quality at this level), a defensive mid or two, maybe a CB (ABK+Bednarek+DCC+Stephens+Lyanco+Simeu would be enough in this extreme "sell no-one" scenario; in reality the first three will probably go and in doing so fund a replacement or two) and a manager.

Either one made sense in the context of the comments, but I also thought it was Vieira.