Matthew Le God

No it wasn't. Don't be so ridiculously overdramatic! We've been completely dominant (78% possession, 8 shots to 2) of course the final third play hasn't been great but it is a long way from a poor performance.

We play on Sunday, Everton's squad is completely fresh for it with a week to prepare. By rotating 7 players tonight it helps us remain at a similar level of freshness. Really is pathetic that every single one of your posts is this daft (probably deliberately, but you never know with you alpine and dalek!)

Fonte was injured in the Liverpool game, Puel has stated this and you could even see he was when watching the match. If they didn't want him cup tied for the Europa League then he wouldn't have been the main centre back sub for the Inter Milan game home & away and the Sparta Prague game at home. Saints fans continue with this daft conspiracy theory but it makes no sense. If Yoshida or van Dijk were injured in those 3 games then the club was clearly willing to use FOnte so clearly weren't keeping him from being cup tied.

Fonte was on the bench vs Inter Milan home & away http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/37847418.app http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/37688282 and Sparta Prague... http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/37302387 So the club were prepared to consider using him in the group stage if Yoshida or van Dijk had to come off. If they didn't want him to be cup tied then they wouldn't have used him as the only centre back on the bench as there is a possibility he'd need to come on. The only matches he hasn't gone to is away in Israel and tomorrow.

You appear to be making excuses to eliminate any credit going to Puel. ROmeu this season is playing in a different role for Puel than he did for Koeman, Romeu is the lone DM. Can similar excuses not also apply to the players you say were..."noticably improved under Poch and Koeman very quickly"? Which players are you talking about? If it is Shaw & Chambers for Pochettino then why does your McQueen excuse apply to them?

Do you not think McQueen & Romeu have gone up a level compared to last season? I think Yoshida looks better under Puel as well.

Utter nonsense. 1) Which "rubbish players no-one wants" have we signed in the last few years? 2) How do you know the players we have signed weren't wanted by other clubs? Just because it isn't in the public domain, don't jump to conclusions.

It is a positive sign we have players clubs like want our players, not a negative thing. The time to worry is when we don't have players those clubs would want, which doesn't look like happening. If we want Saints to have players of the quality of van Dijk then it is inevitable rich clubs would want them, as players like van Dijk are good enough for the very top level. Football has a transfer pecking order and I find it bizarre some Saints fans continue to think we can keep players of van Dijk's quality long term if clubs with significantly more resources than us make an offer. Saints have been doing similar to other clubs... Celtic for example with Forster, Wanyama & van Dijk. The transfer market has a pecking order and we are not (and probably never will be) above Liverpool & Man Utd in the transfer pecking order even if we finish above them occasionally.

Why do you start threads like this and make no attempt to link to the quotes in question? The club (unlike you & alpine_saint) is aware of its position in the transfer pecking order and knows it can do well bringing through academy players and buying promising players in their early 20's, developing them and benefitting from them and if they do attract rich club interest the reinvest wisely in replacements. Why are you already so dismissive of Austin being Pelle's replacement or Redmond/Boufal replacing Mane? Are you not one to give people time (I think we all know the answer to that)? ............... Alpine for the last 10 years every thread you start, every post you make is painful to read. It is hard to recall you ever posting anything positive about the club you support and for the last 7 of those 10 years we have seen nothing but success! How about you give the club some credit and consider perhaps they know a lot better what to do than your negative ramblings on this forum for the last 10 years!

As Puel doesn't use that formation with us, I think that is very unlikely to happen.

Saints did better without Pochettino than they did with him.

The Telegraph said Southampton offered Koeman £86,000 per week. That is hardly "lemonade money"! Everton offered more, but Saints still offered him one of the biggest managerial wages in world football.

Are they not aware Shane Long isn't a first choice player for us when he is fit?

New article about it on Bloomberg... http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-11-16/chinese-suitor-for-english-soccer-club-in-major-restructuring

It is odd the top two tiers had terraces ruled out, but for example Exeter in League 2 were still allowed this...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NeOnLwi9CtQ

The FA won't allow Hull Tigers, so they certainly won't allow Red Bull Saints!

2 teams Saints and Crawley had both already qualified due to Charlton vs Colchester's game last night, tonight is solely down to who comes first and gets a home tie in the next round.

1 billion RMB = £118m

The discount was for pre-orders only and there was a deadline which has now passed. There is a free demo out on Steam if you want to try it.

When selling a club players count as employees, not assets which increase the value of the business. It is misleading to think how much in total we could get if we sold every player is part of the value of the club, as yes that would easily be more than £200m. Saints have a lot of players in the current transfer market worth £20m+. A half decent Championship season a players are getting £12m valuations, let alone at the level we are at in the top half of the league. I don't think the cost to build stadium like St Mary's or to develop Staplewood doesn't really matter to their current value. As a new owner can't do anything other than play football at the stadium unless the club buys a new stadium then a lot of St Mary's value is the land it is on rather than the building. IIRC the club also still have Jackson's Farm as a piece of land which could potentially hold some development value. From a fans point of view if their is a takeover it is probably better the price is lower, if that means it frees up more of the new owners cash for investment into the club.

Man City have rich Middle Eastern owners and yet a Chinese investment group bought 13% for £265m in 2015... https://www.theguardian.com/football/2015/dec/01/manchester-city-265m-deal-chinese-investment-group

They have a track record in property development...

If it is true are you going to rule it out being good before you know any details of their plans? I think what is key is that Les Reed remain in charge of footballing decisions. He is the footballing constant in the last 6 years.