Matthew Le God

Umm... how to break this to you? Tadic and Pelle have been dropped to the bench today.

Just saying "PL football" is too broad. Its significantly harder to get on some Premier League team benches than others. The quality standard at Saints means any youngster is competing with senior internationals in every position (multiple ones in quite a few positions). That isn't the case at all clubs.

Why do you think it was false? The story wasn't that Arsenal want to sign Wanyama, it was that in Pires opinion Wanyama would be a good signing for Arsenal (whether that is accurate or not is irrlevant) and the two are very different. It can only be false if Pires didn't say it.

Hard to take that article seriously when they think Saivet is a possible replacement for Wanyama. http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/sport/football/6524746/SunSports-daily-football-round-up.html Saivet is 5 foot 9 and a very attacking player, he doesn't play in the same role as Wanyama.

Quite a few of those could describe Beckham, especially when he had only just turned 21 like Ward-Prowse. You appear to want Ward-Prowse to be a different type of player to the one he is. He has a lot of very good attributes for the roles he is used, you've listed attributes needed for a player in a different role which is unfair. I'd also dispute a few of them anyway and they certainly aren't all "unimprovable" for a player with 10+ years left in his career.

Will you give them the honour of learning to spell their names correctly before they leave the club?

Sadio Mane is worth more than £30m in the current market. Are Martial for a fee rising to £58m or Sterling at £49m really significantly more effective than Mane? When the new TV kicks in prices will be further inflated next summer. There would be little incentive to selling Mane in January, let alone only for £30m. He'll probably be sold in the summer for huge money.

Last night in the second half Koeman was playing a 3-4-3 formation; which involved Bertrand as a central midfielder and Wanyama as a centre back... Stekelenburg Caulker Wanyama van Dijk Davis Ward-Prowse Bertrand Tadic Long Pelle Mane I'd rather he didn't do that again.

Which one? In the second half vs Liverpool Koeman was playing a 3-4-3 formation, which involved Bertrand as a central midfielder and Wanyama as a centre back... Stekelenburg Caulker Wanyama van Dijk Davis Ward-Prowse Bertrand Tadic Long Pelle Mane

They say its tighter security, but it was very poor. I joined a very short queue at the Northam turnstiles and ignored the metal detector queue. A steward at the turnstile then asked me... Steward: Have you been scanned with metal detector in that queue? Me: (looks at long queue) Yes Steward: Ok ...and in I went. Really is no point to the metal detectors and the queues they created if you can bypass it so easily.

When the day comes, I think Frank de Boer may be an option if he is still at Ajax. - Ajax and Barcelona connections and philosophy like Koeman gives a degree of continuity of ideas - De Boer has been stating openly and repeatedly for a while he wants to come to the Premier League, Saints have a higher wage budget and more scope in the transfer market than Ajax. Like Saints did vs Feyenoord for Koeman. Even more so when the new TV deal starts next summer. - He is a relatively high profile name in European football which would help attract players - Experienced in European competitions and a track record of winning domestic competitions - Saints have good relations with Ajax at academy level and also we've played two friendlies vs Ajax in the last two international breaks

Its largely the fault of Sky and their "question/topic of the day" which they ask each of their reporters to ask at all the press conferences that week. They can then use clips of multiple managers talking about the same topic on SSN.

I think thats unlikely, as he signed for QPR when they were in the Championship, he has only signed one contract with them (in 2013). The media claim QPR wanted to get him tied down to a £50k or £60k p/w contract, but they haven't been able to. He is on £28,000 p/w or less according to all of these articles... http://www.getwestlondon.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/qprs-charlie-austin-set-demand-9981457 http://www.standard.co.uk/sport/football/charlie-austin-set-to-earn-over-50000-a-week-as-qpr-bid-to-secure-strikers-long-term-future-with-new-9852902.html http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-2883438/Charlie-Austin-talks-new-QPR-deal-striker-set-double-wages-60-000-week.html http://www.express.co.uk/sport/football/576776/Southampton-10m-bid-Liverpool-Chelsea-Man-United-Charlie-Austin

You have very low standards of evidence you require before jumping to conclusions. Are you religious at all?

I don't know why people ask this, go on the Saints ticket website and look for yourself. It has a colour coded map of availability and you can also click on individual blocks to see how many are left... http://tickets.saintsfc.co.uk/PagesPublic/ProductBrowse/VisualSeatSelection.aspx?stadium=SM&product=CH15LI&campaign=&type=H&productsubtype=&productIsHomeAsAway=N

On what is that based? Our squad under Koeman is stronger than it was under Pochettino, he is still giving gametime to Ward-Prowse and Targett and gave 5 debuts to academy players last season. If Pochettino had Ryan Bertrand and not Danny Fox as an alternative option, then Shaw wouldn't have been able to breakthrough as quickly as he did. Chambers was 2nd choice to Clyne under Pochettino, he was getting games when Clyne was injured and coming back from injury. Gallagher got a lot of 1st team involvement largely due to the squad lacking the depth of senior numbers we now have.

The vast majority of our current first team squad are current internationals or relatively recent internationals, or in the England youth teams. The quality bar for an academy player to move up to the Southampton first team is now very high. The quality level needed for a youth player to reach the standard of the first team this season is tougher than any other time in the club's 130 year history. The number of internationals and depth of squad we had in 1983/84 or 2002/03 is small in comparison to 2015/16, the squad now is at a higher level than in both of those eras.

Been that way since August. I'm no longer paying the tax that doesn't exist on other club forums.

Attempt to answer my three questions that you have so far ignored...

I'm actually intrigued as to alpine_saint's rational for posting this thread. Not only because its extremely vague as to what exactly he is saying, but also what kind of response did he expect he'd get and why?

Yep, had Saints been given a penalty for the clear foul on Pelle and Saints got a draw then I doubt alpine_saint would have posted this thread. Its remarkable how easy every single one of his negative rants is to pick apart for the nonsense it is.

As ever, utterly bizarre! But its what we've come to expect from an alpine_saint post or thread. 1) Why would the club sell him in January? The summer perhaps, but they have little reason to do so in January. 2) Why when he is sold do you not have confidence they can replace him? They have shown time after time the recruitment set-up at the club has a process that works more often than it doesn't. 3) Define "f**ked"? Because take Mane out of our squad and they don't replace him... we'd still have a very good Premier League squad. In any case if he is sold, they'll spend good money to replace him as they have shown in the last two seasons.

Long isn't apparently back, he is definitely back. He was training with Saints in the build-up to the Sunderland game, played for Ireland this week and was in training with Saints this week. We have Juanmi as well. Many appear to have harshly written him off already. Seager was recently on the bench vs Sunderland and Aston Villa.

I doubt the Koeman is kept regularly informed of the youth recruitment strategy for 16 years olds coming into the club.