Professor

Think he said he doesn't have a clear schedule for getting back but the original estimate of 6 months would mean about October. The Burnley game being December gives him some prospect of having been back for a few weeks by then which allowed the Lancashire Telegraph to run a story with local interest. JRod is quoted as saying he won't have a schedule until he reaches stage 6 of the recovery plan and that is still some way off but it was good to see they have him in the gym, keeping up fitness levels. Wonder if he's the only player so far to have met the Koemans?

At 26, Lambert had become a good player but he was still L1. It was Southampton who made him the player he is today but in football loyalty is mainly limited to the fans so it was no surprise that he would have opted to go if there was more money on offer BUT the club could have refused the bid, told him to wait to speak to the new manager and if he was wanted here, they could have required him to see out his contract. So its not entirely his fault that he left, it looks like he was almost pushed out of the door. Pochettino is a different case. With only one year of his contact left trying to keep him against his will was quite impractical and whereas the club has plenty of players, it only has one manager. That he wanted to go after Southampton had resurrected his career is disloyal as is the rumour that he'd like to sign a player or players from here for his new club. Contempt might be too strong a word, but mainly because in hindsight I think he was overrated and I'm glad to see the back of him.

This may reduce the Chambers to Arsenal fictions that have been printed but lets not call them 'speculation' because that almost gives credence to the publishing of downright lies, which is the main stock in trade of the football pages in the gutter press. Oh well, may as well get of the fence and admit that I'm not a fan of newspapers.

Won't be long-term problem. One of the British Values that the incredible secretary of state for education, Mr Gove, will introduce is that all children will learn the words of the National Anthem, practice singing it daily and the brightest will even learn the second verse.

Worth a thread with two Saints in the squad. With an eye to the future this is the moment for Hodgson to show he picks the side and not the media. Drop Gerrard and Rooney. Play as many of those who haven't started a game or have only been bit-part subs as possible, including Shaw, Lallana and Lambert. Interesting that people have commented on how countries with very much smaller populations than England can produce better football teams - but the England team has been mainly picked from a very limited pool - with over half the outfield players coming from Liverpool and Everton.

Rumour that Krueger is the victim of a serious clash of initials. Thing is, who will make the final decision whether he goes or stays......

It needs England to go out so that the media can stop their Gerrard and Rooney Love-in. Hodgson is a good front man but I thought he could have used what he had to better effect in his team selection and use of substitutes, so if an early exit results in a change of manager, that's probably no bad thing. But more important, IMHO, is that the team is coached to play better passing and possession football. I'm sure we have players with the capability but if you compare England to Spain and Italy, our possession play was dreadful. Maybe Hodgson thought that having five players from one club (Liverpool) would solve the problem of getting them to play as a team, but it was a very long way from doing that.

Some extremely good observant and incisive posts here. Hodgson, or his successor, could do worse than read this page of the forum, seriously well set out constructive comment.

The commentator just said Rooney could have had a couple - doesn't he realise he's talking about ROONEY. An effective striker could have had a couple but that's not Rooney.

Can only get worse at this rate. Common sense says bring on Shaw, Lallana and Lambert but as the team seems to be picked by The Sun and The Mirror it's not likely.

England's passing is very poor and their error ratio is high. Am I spoilt by watching the Saints.........

We all heard Ralph speak, because we all saw his video interview which said a lot of the things we wanted to hear. Was what he said true, though? There had been two weeks of silence during Pochettino's exit but Ralph didn't say what the club had done to try to keep him, if anything. The interview was released on 29th May telling us no players would leave without the agreement of the new manager, yet 4 days later we learnt that Rickie Lambert had been allowed to go to Liverpool. He also said the short list of potential managers would be made public, which was a foolish thing to say because that would never be done. It is possible for people to mislead their audience with what they leave out as well as with what they say, and IMHO RK gave a very effective impression of being open and honest but was in reality less so than the fans deserved. If he has applied for an ice hockey coaching job in Germany, it seems unlikely that he could continue as chairman of Southampton Football Club. No club statement yet to say he's gone, but if he is leaving its difficult to look back on the past six months and see evidence of the contribution he has made.

I like Steven Davis, a great example to others and it seems he might actually want to stay here. The Lallana interview suggests that the desertion by the manager was a big issue but AL may also be realising that if Koeman wants to keep him there is just the matter of a binding contract which he freely signed. Maybe letting Lallana keep the captaincy could be a gesture to mend fences, so perhaps there might not be a vacancy after all.

Sorry to say I didn't feel the surge of pride that I should have done when Lallana came on late in the Italy game. Still hoping England survive the group section but for me the pleasure of the Saints' link has been soured by Lambert leaving and the want away stories. I feel bad about this but I almost hope none of them get on the pitch tomorrow.

I know this has been done to death before but the yearly change in design is only a marketing ploy to increase sales. Small changes in design allow fans to 'get away' with wearing a previous year's shirt, hence the greater differences that have been made from year to year recently. Oddly, in Rugby, fans take a different attitude and by wearing an older shirt they show that they are long-standing supporters

Krueger's experience as a coach doesn't seem to make him an obvious candidate to chair the board of a sports business but Katherina's advisers must know something about him that most fans don't, because he does have to provide leadership to the Board and must be capable of gaining the respect of the other directors including Les Reed. The decision to give the interview that he did was the right move, although it became necessary because of the long silence that followed the end of the season when the media were intent on picking Saints apart. Maybe it was Ralph himself who recognised after that interview, that he didn't have the right experience or attributes to do the PR, or at least he agreed with whoever told him. He must have approved the prominent role that Les Reed has had during the manager selection, and that is, of course, in Les Reed's area of responsibility. Maybe Krueger would have led on Staplewood if it had been a news item about the completion of the project but because it was a visit by the new coaching team, that would seem to have left it in Les Reed's court. Maybe we will see Ralph again when Staplewood is officially opened.

The Liverpool game is a timely reminder of what a good deal Lambert was for them. £4m is about the right price for a substitute striker but to get one who is in the England squad looks like daylight robbery. Shame for Rickie is that if he only gets a handful of games or sub appearances, his boyhood dream might feel a bit flat after a while. Have a feeling he won't enjoy that first game whether he plays or not. If Saints lose he'll probably feel embarrassed and if Saints win he'll be wondering if he did the right thing. I suppose he would settle for a draw.

I'm not sure Lallana can force a move if the club decide not to agree - contracts are enforceable on both sides. The usual suggestion is that the player will under-perform but at 26, that could damage AL and his future career so possibly the club might take the risk. On the disciplinary side, AL has acted badly and if retained is unlikely to go unpunished, given as Guan said, the action taken against previous wrongdoers. Removing the captaincy would seem to be an obvious option. It's hard to see the fans taking to Lallana badge kissing if he stays but the decision is likely to be taken on whether he would be a disruption in the dressing room which must depend on the conversation Koeman will have with him. The club may feel that Lallana has reached his peak as a sub for England and that he may go downhill from here, in which case, taking a good fee that is enough to replace him and to strengthen elsewhere might be the better way forward.

How sad that people with such low standards as yours support the club that I love and have followed for over half a century. I think we had fewer unpleasant supporters when I went to my first games at The Dell.. By all means disagree with me, but keep your foul language and insults to yourself. BTW your conclusion is unsupportable because you cannot possibly know. Like mine it is an opinion but mine is based on evidence of the interviews with the Chairman and with Les Reed issued by the club which could easily be seen as a response to quell concern amongst the fan base.

Congratulations to all those who posted their concerns on this and other websites. It is important that the fans keep up the pressure on the club management to do everything that is reasonably in their power to move the club forward. That is not achieved by happy clappers who adopt a complacent attitude of unquestioning trust. As Saints' fans we all have the same objective, but those who keep up the pressure will have done their bit in letting the club know that as fans we are hungry for success. If all the club picked up from a scan of message boards was the idea that the fans had complete faith in them whatever they did, the outcome could be different, so well done those who have contributed. When the club do get it right, they deserve to be congratulated as well, even more so of course, and they have come out of the potential manager crisis very well, certainly better than poor old Norwich and WBA. Now we have to see how things develop on the player retention and player replacement front, having only lost one so far. To keep Shaw, Lallana and Lovren may be possible, but to keep them on good terms may be a bigger challenge. If that is achieved, or partly achieved, the new management will have done very well.

Have to put this in context - ie that Italy are probably one of the best four teams in the competition and England did only lose by one goal. Both the Italian goals could have been prevented, and England could have scored a second so in that sense it could have gone either way, but in the game I saw, Italy looked the better side, more in control, keeping possession and strong in defence. Are England better than Uruguay or Costa Rica? I think so. Doesn't guarantee beating them both but must be probable.

Michael Owen was complaining that when players cheated by diving and simulation, they didn't do it well enough. He should know. Football needs better quality cheating.

Just watching The Netherlands against Spain in the WC now 2-1 to the Dutch. Wouldn't it be great if we could have a Dutch manager?

He won't wear that - my mother is knitting him one that is 8 feet long. Told her its just paper talk created out of absolutely nothing except he's out of a job and Southampton have a vacancy.

It is a shame that after all his years with the club, that Lallana seems to have blotted his copybook with a lot of Saints' fans. Certainly not the club's fault and you do wonder if it is a case of ego having expanded in direct ratio to instances of his name featuring in the media but in the end, being good at football doesn't in itself make a person any more worthy as a human being. If Adam thought he might want to leave Southampton in the foreseeable future, he shouldn't have signed a long contract and should have accepted the lower pay that would have resulted. When he was tapped-up on behalf of Liverpool, which regardless of whether there was personal contact with him, was certainly done by way of by the leaks to the media, he should have been honest about it and if he wanted to leave, he should have made a transfer request, which would of course, affected any 'loyalty payment'. There is an impression of excessive self-interest by a young man who like many footballers is paid out of proportion to what they do. Premier League footballers don't get have high earnings because they do an important job, but simply because there is so much TV money sloshing around in football that the participants are able to each grab a share. If the new manager does want to keep Lallana and either persuades him to stay or the club refuses to release him, either way its going to take a lot of PR effort to re-build bridges with the fans. If he turns out in our first home match in August, there may well be a few boos amongst the cheers unless a very good story is put out.