revolution saint

Chelsea want to use RLC as a makeweight in a deal to get Declan Rice but WHAM don't want to sell Rice and risk a riot. Whatever happens though Chelsea need to offload him at least for the season as there's little chance he'll get much time on the pitch with them. They're in the same position we are with Carillo, Hoedt and Boufal. Expect the price/cost of loan and wages to become affordable the later it gets in the window. I've always liked RLC as a player and think he could definitely improve the team however I'd be wary of his injury record and whether he's the type of player that is willing to close down and be the first line of defence. Definitely a class player (or at least was). Same goes for Rashica - brilliant little player and Werder Bremen were hoping he would be gone by now because they need the cash. Villa are probably out of the race to sign him now that they've got Barkley. RB Leipzig were thought to be interested but have signed Hee-Chan Hwang from Salzburg so might be out of the race now so, again, there could be a chance that Bremen might be flexible on a price. These are the types of deals Semmens were talking about when he talked about players that wouldn't otherwise be possible becoming more affordable and if you think about it there's lots of players in the attacking midfield area that could become affordable: off the top of my head RLC, Rashica, Cantwell, Brooks, Ntcham (I'm not suggesting any of these will happen but their clubs will probably be hoping they're not around by the end of the window). Arsenal are another club with the likes of Nelson and Rowe-Smith that need to be playing top level 1st team football. Personally I really like what I've seen of Rowe-Smith and think he would probably be a better bet than RLC and might be more of a possibility of a permanent move either now or at the end of a loan agreement. Obviously I've no idea of our finances and it appears that we're struggling to raise cash but if we've been keeping our powder dry and hoping for a big deal at the end of the window then there's bargains to be had.

Hi Lord D! Is she a remainer in the same sense Julian Lewis is? It's confusing innit - I'm not sure if remainer is a term you use to describe someone you disagree with or an actual remainer?

Loads of interesting things about Trump testing positive: Effectively gives him just over two weeks of active campaigning before the election (assuming he recovers well). Does that help or hinder him? Americans are patriotic - will he get some kind of boost in the polls because of sympathy? If he's not seriously ill will this encourage Trump supporting people who doubt the severity of the illness anyway to further ignore restrictions? How do the democrats play this? Attacking a bloke who is seriously ill rarely goes down well. If Trump doesn't have a serious reaction and he's left in isolation with just his phone and twitter for company then how deranged and mad will his tweets become?

As opposed to the tired, boring and sad guff you come out with perpetually? Know when to stop mate - this ITK "joke" is so thin it's transparent. You're like one of those comedians who has one joke or punchline and tries to make it last a lifetime. It's really tiresome and boring so please try and come up with some new material.

Problem from my point of view is that Dan Sheldon appears to be thinking he should be writing for an audience that doesn’t follow saints particularly closely. Most of his articles are full of stuff already in the public domain or discussed on here/social media. It’s either that or he’s paid by word and padding the article like a desperate undergraduate writing a dissertation. To be fair it must be hard finding information not already out there but he needs to do more tactical analysis and be more opinionated (and be prepared to back it up)

Great - we can sew up the double barrelled surname championship by the end of the month if we can get RLC. Definitely a great player assuming the injuries are a thing of the past. Was always impressed with him whenever I've seen him play.

It’s a subjective opinion but Smallbone is not way above league 1 standard. Did nothing today and needs to improve on his stamina and mentality. I’m all for giving youth a chance but so far Smallbone hasn’t taken his chances.

I can't imagine Ralph does really want to keep him - he's not even 2nd choice for his position. Djenepo, Smallbone and even Long are more likely to get on the pitch in front of him and that was the case for most of last season. If Ralph wanted him and rated him higher then he would have got more minutes last season - only way I can see him staying is if the offers are so poor that it's just not worth it.

First off, I'm a fan of Boufal - I think he's got more talent than probably most of the squad but it's pretty obvious that he doesn't have a (long term) future at Saints and it's very unlikely he'll ever be considered a first team player next season. If that's the case then all he's doing is blocking the path from the youth team to the first team. To be honest I'm not sure about Smallbone but if Boufal is holding back his development then there's not much point in keeping Boufal. Different if he were integral to the first team but he's not. Sadly it's one of those transfers that hasn't worked out and if we can get some money for a player that isn't going to get many minutes and is going to leave for free at the end of the season anyway then we may as well take it.

You can clearly tell his left leg is shorter than his right leg in that picture. We've been had yet again. Makes you wonder why we don't do proper scouting but at least we now know why we're looking for another CB.

Cheers for finding this - looks a much more likely kind of target than Ntcham. He seems to tick most of the boxes Ralph would want and is a good long passer so that fits in with the ethos of getting the ball forward quickly. Can also play CB which is handy. For all those conspiracy nuts out there - AZ Alkmaar have Billy Beane (moneyball fella) as an advisor - that's the same Billy Beane who is involved in a consortium looking to buy a premier league club. Probably nothing in it but you never know. Coincidence or is IT happening? Anyway, on the face of it exactly the kind of player we should be looking at but having said that the guy has been linked with a ton of clubs so probably just an over active agent or bored journo.

I would be really surprised if we went for Ntcham - just doesn't look like the kind of player Ralph would be interested in. If anything he looks more like another Lemina type - talented and ambitious but without the workrate to match those aspirations. I guess a new challenge could reignite him though. Other thing is he's a much more forward thinking type of midfielder so he'd probably fit in better in one of the "ten" roles but again would need to get used to running a fair bit more and closing down - could work if Armstrong drops back into midfield but why change something that's working? I reckon whoever we bring in will be more along the lines of Mangala - pretty unknown but willing to work hard and somebody that Ralph feels he can develop.

Aluko and Smith have both been pretty bland and don’t really have much to say apart from the blindingly obvious which is very much like the Jamies, Redknapp and Carragher. Don’t mind Morrison, Dublin or Richards either but if anyone needed to go it was Jeff Stelling. Bloke used to be good but has obviously started to believe his own hype. All his moaning about VAR was tiresome, predictable, boring and in most cases plain wrong.

To make an obvious point stats only tell you what they've done and not what they will do. Inevitably Ralph would give him different instructions, he would have different options, different players around him etc etc. They're not a bad indicator when it comes to tackling etc but not too wise to base a judgement on stats alone. Not that I know eff all about McKennie anyway.

Yeah, funnily enough I was doing some work on this last week. Work for a pretty large employer and sickness has dropped to 50% of what it was pre-lockdown and the pretty much the only sickness being recorded is long term stuff. As for Hancock - what planet is he on? You could spend a lifetime listing the contradictions and inaccuracies of his position, although to be fair, his position will probably shift soon so there wouldn't be much point.

I subscribed to "The Athletic" last week on the £2.50 a month deal. Been impressed so far and Carl's articles were very decent - informative and added something other than just regurgitation of the usual crap on the web. If I'm honest then Dan's two so far have been a bit bland - didn't reveal anything I didn't already know and neither did he venture an opinion which made me think. Hopefully gets better soon though.

You clever fella. Must have an ology

Way I see it Mckennie isn't going to set the world alight with silky skills and a great range of passing but then he'll be competing with Romeu and won't need to be the most skilful player anyway. Looks like he has stamina, can tackle, good in the air and used to a high intensity pressing game. Will probably pose more of a goal threat than Hojbjerg ever did so that's in his favour but ultimately we're looking for a workhorse that can close down the opposition, win the ball and give it to the four players in front of him as quickly as possible. Whether he's the best bet at 20M to do that is anyone's guess but he can probably do a decent job.

Not sure he's technically a comedian (although he does try to be funny) but John Oliver annoys the hell out of me. For those who don't know he's the one who does "Last Week Tonight" on Sky. I should be inclined to agree with him on most things given I'm a bit of a leftie but he shows such intolerance for anyone on the other side of the argument that it's hard not to despise him. Thing is a lot of what comes out of the programme is really interesting but John Oliver himself is a very unfunny and hypocritical host. Trevor Noah does a very similar show but does it infinitely better. Bill Maher is starting to grate as well and I used to really like him - think it might be that their opposition to Trump has made them far more polemical than funny. For that matter chuck in Frankie Boyle - was funny but now isn't most of the time.

To be honest I think the link is probably the workings of an over-active agent and/or a club desperate for cash. Since the summer he's been linked with Sheffield United, Brighton, Wolfsburg, Napoli and Roma (there's probably more too). As others have said, it's hardly a priority area right now either. Anyway, for those interested, here's a piece I found on Darwin Nunez that gives a bit more of an insight into his game: https://footballbh.net/2020/04/07/darwin-nunez-201920-scout-report-tactical-analysis-tactics/ Looks like he has a lot of the things Ralph likes in his forward players so possibly there's something in it......but probably not.

There ain't much YouTube stuff on him but the bits I've seen are OK. Not a player with any outstanding attributes in that he's not a huge big target man and neither is he a quick little player with bags of tricks. So from that point of view he doesn't offer us anything blindingly different to what we already have but he does look to be a decent finisher.

I know, I watched the game which is why I said he hadn’t started a game yet. If you want to play pedant at least have a read of before replying. Ta

Been reading up on Ntcham - don't think he's started any game for Celtic this season (not that there's been many games). Celtic have quite a few midfielders and are looking to trim the squad so it probably wouldn't be a hard deal to make if that's what we're looking for. Ntcham appears to be a much more forward thinking player than Hojbjerg so wouldn't be a like for like replacement. To be honest bits I've seen haven't been that convincing - tends to jog a fair bit rather than break a sweat but maybe I've seen the wrong clips and games.

As 99% of football fans, we would just like to say it would be great if you could take your middle class pretentiousness elsewhere.

Well I did notice that Hinteregger played some games as defensive midfielder in his youth team and early RB Salzburg career but that seems a long time ago and I'm not sure he's mobile enough for 4-2-2-2 formation. Several reasons why it won't happen - wrong age and too expensive being the obvious ones but at face value certainly looks a good player. Anyone who can chip in with goals from set pieces is going to love JWP corners.