revolution saint

Maybe Walker Peters could persuade Ward-Prowse to move down here?

Somebody on the thread earlier mentioned we're trying to get Jamie Donley on loan from Spurs and reckoned that was the creative midfielder Solak mentioned. Thomas Frank wanted to get a look at him before deciding whether to send him on loan and that was holding things up.

Seems like he's a hard working traditional winger and we ain't got many of those. Had an interesting journey to La Liga if anyone's interested: https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/6289789/2025/04/20/carlos-vicente-interview-alaves-lamine-yamal-la-liga/

Leeds and Arsenal have both been linked with Charles and I can see a mid level prem team thinking they might be getting a future gem. He's not in that much of a different position to Wharton before he went to Palace. Hopefully won't happen but it's not completely unrealistic. Tend to agree with you on Downes - I thought Ipswich might have been tempted which is why I mentioned them but that looks unlikely now.

Yes, definitely a bit of a worry but with Ipswich seemingly signing that Hackney for 20M (20 fucking million!) then I think that cuts down the potential moves for Downes. Fair play to them and they needed to sort out their midfield but that's a hell of a fee for the championship. Could see someone deciding Charles might be worth a punt too. Hopefully we can hold onto both because, as you say, first choice CM is an area we look pretty good in.

I think you can see the contradiction here and we've actually got quite a lot of players with championship experience. Personally I don't think we should be prescriptive about signings whether that's overseas vs domestic players or the perennial experience vs potential debate. There's good and bad examples on all sides and so ultimately it comes down to scouting and having an eye for a player. If we get better players in then I don't really care how old they are or where they come from.

Edozie?

Yeah, his work off the ball was his (apparent) strength. My favourite damned by faint praise phrase is "does the simple things well". Yep, that's what we need - someone so limited they manage to turn basic competency into an achievement.

If you look at what I actually wrote, I didn't say there would definitely be motivation issues. I said I'd be concerned there could be. I was pretty clear that I wasn't being definitive about that. Fuck me there's some dense people around.

So he didn't initially turn us down then?

Classic Saintsweb strawman argument. At least about the motivation issue - people expressed concern over his potential motivation. They haven't moaned about it and you've just made that up. Presume you said the same when we signed Lemina?

Isn't the choice between good footballers who want to be here and good footballers who don't though?

Which is why I said I'd be a bit concerned about motivation rather than making a categorical judgement. Could be great, could be crap but definitely something that would need to be looked at carefully.

The point was you could end up with a player who has aspirations above the championship who joins because he doesn't have any better options and then goes through the motions. Off the top of my head some examples of players who joined but couldn't really give much of a toss about being here except for the money are ABK, Maitland Niles, Orsic, Salisu, Lemina. If you believe the initial reports then his first reaction was fuck off. Doesn't exactly scream come and get me, does it? Not all players will react in the same way but definitely need to do their homework on attitude and whether he'd be worth it after 6 months and the reality of championship football kicks in.

He looks quite good. Bit concerned about motivation though - sounds like the guy wants more than just a move to the championship.

I reckon it'd be really funny to kid Eddie Howe into thinking he's signing Ramsdale only to swap him out for Ryan Fraser at the last minute.

We were linked back in May with Daniel Peretz. He's joined Hamburg on loan now but wouldn't surprise me if we found someone similar on loan.

Definitely don't see us signing another CB even if THB also goes. Presume you're expecting THB to go for 28.5 - 33.5M now? Good work if we get that.

Chat GPT can fuck off.

I definitely see the argument in having some cover because, as we've seen this week, no one has stepped up into either the AM or right wing role in their absence. It would be cover though because I can't see us having the luxury of bringing someone in that would be a better first choice. Interesting that we're complaining about creativity this pre-season when neither have played much in the roles we're talking about. This argument is predicated on the assumption both stay which is probably unlikely. So, in that case, yeah, we need to get some players in that are better than the understudies we currently have. That's a fair argument. Better than Fernandes and Dibling just doesn't seem either likely or feasible.

Robinson left, Dibling right - both seem to be their natural positions.

Personally I don't agree, I think both would be excellent if they stayed but, again, it does sound like you think it's feasible to get better than them in. I don't think that's realistic.

Mostly the left although he switched to the right yesterday when he passed to Downs to score.

I think you're going to be disappointed if you're looking for us to get better players than Fernandes and Dibling in.

If Dibling and Fernandes stay then they can both make things happen in the final third. I'm always loathe to judge anyone on pre-season too much but Robinson has really impressed me too and I can see a situation where he becomes a genuine starter fairly quickly.