Saint_clark

He decides he fucking hates it in Southampton and skies his penalty to lose us the game.

"We brought Ballard into the first team as a replacement for Adams" would be a typical Saints move. Gotta clear that log jam of strikers.

I agree with both of you. I know he was highly rated as a youngster but he's now 26, and in his entire career he's scored 12 goals and got 11 assists in over 150 games. Doesn't scream one of the best midfielders in the division as one person said, or particularly creative as another said, and it's an undeniable fact that the player he would be replacing scored more goals last season than Roberts has his entire career. Doesn't mean he won't be good, but it's not unreasonable to have doubts about this signing.

If your performance contributed to your employer losing £100million or more a year in revenue I think your be thanking God if all you got was a 40% pay cut.

Maybe they're sending us an imposter?

Don't think it will be on the app because it's on TV? Isn't that how it works, only non-TV games are shown on it?

This would be an excellent signing and on the face of it was the obvious one to go after. If he's out of contract next summer that also puts us in a great place to snap him up if we get promoted.

It's crazy to think it was only last summer that Ralph was here, feels like years and years ago.

And given the way he performed for Celtic, he'd have probably done a good job for us in the championship as well.

Experienced centreback, proven captain and leader, strengths were always reading of the game and ball playing ability rather than pace, always had top levels of fitness and professionalism, knows and loves the area so would have no issue settling in, available on a free transfer, would probably accept a lower wage than someone with his playing record would normally demand due to his history with the club... There are a lot of other footballers who would be a good fit for us but to pretend Fonte wouldn't have been a very good option for a season in the Championship when he's now keeping clean sheets in the Champions League is just being absurdly stubborn.

And there are people who thought he wouldn't be able to do it for us in the Championship.

I'm actually warming to the idea of Charles as a CB permanently in this system.

I literally cannot get the bloody thing to work, ever. Doesn't matter if I use the app or sign in on a browser.

That's the one. He's obviously highly rated, would be good to get him on the bench at some point this season.

There's been a lot of them, Hesketh, Seager, Gape, McQueen, McCarthy (Jason not Alex), Jake Sinclair, Turnbull, Watts, Tchaptchet, Olaigbe. All of them tipped to be rising stars at one point or another and all falling by the wayside. I remember Ramello Mitchell being the next big thing, watched by clubs from all over...he can't even get a club at the moment. Who was the lad that went to Chelsea and immediately came back again? Is he still at the club?

Simon Clifford? It's not this guy regardless, Gifton Noel Williams was playing for Burnley when we got relegated from the Prem in 2005.

This is a really good point. A lot of the rumours have been underwhelming, but the actual signings have all been decent to very good, with some of them coming out of nowhere. IIRC it was only really Manning and Downes that were rumoured before signing and even those really could have been luck on the reporters side, as we've been linked with almost all of the players that did well under Martin at Swansea.

Given the way the post went I'm now wondering if your username was supposed to be "Niemi".

Wow. Just looked him up, I recognised the name so thought he must have forged a semi decent career in the lower leagues. One appearance in he EFL Trophy and 18 appearances in non-league at 27 years old.

Must be. We should be looking at £20million then if he's here till 2025.

Not sure what this topic has to do with us taking Flynn Downes on lone.

This thread started bizarrely and is getting even weirder.

He's probably been asked to make himself useful and take the pictures.

How much are we thinking? He's probably worth £20million but isn't his contract up next summer? Probably be lucky to get £15million.

It's his weedy little legs and his style of play (a lot of twisting and turning at speed) putting strain on his muscles.