VectisSaint

May have been a bad night for injuries, JRod, JWP and possibly Maya Yoshida.

Not certain that Yoshida will be 100% either, looked like he may have hurt his rib(s). He played on but saw him whince a couple of times.

Not sure once counts as multiple. Might have known you'd have a pop. But he's looking a bit leggy, what happens after an injury. Gave the ball away appallingly once, and his shot was abysmal, still made numerous chances and interceptions. JWP also playing well (again). Romeu and Bertrand guilty of dallying on the ball too often in defence. Redmond having a very good game. Shame we don't have Boufal instead of Tadic. Well done Jack Stephens so far, only slight blot was the corner give away which wouldn't have happened if Forster had been awake.

Pelle certainly wouldn't. Too cold. Mane wouldn't have been playing.

You're right, sorry, he was 17 (born 27 Jan 1994, signed 5 Apr 2011), my brain doesn't work any more, going senile :-)

He was 16 when he was signed. Academy certainly includes under 18s, so yes he does count as Academy, even though he was originally at Argyle. Promoted to first team at same time as Shaw, Ward-Prowse and Chambers. Difficult for central defenders to break through at the same age as wingers, full backs and midfielders. Forgot he made his first team debut 5 years ago though. I think only Pele has won a World Cup aged 17, he was somewhat special, and was closer to 18 when he actually won it (Norman Whiteside was younger when he played in the Finals) http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/18176183

I think anyone would be surprised. Apart from van Dijk we have no-one else that we would get £20m for at present (Bertrand at a push maybe just). Your "valuations" are based on what we would ask, but to sell a player you have to have someone willing to pay, and no-one would pay the amounts you suggest, no-one, not even in these crazy times. That's no reflection on the players, just football economics. It works differently in the imaginary world of FIFA17 I am sure.

Anything known about when Boufal may recover from his "injury"? Last group game for Morocco tomorrow.

You missed at least 2 tackles in quick succession in the first half then, early on, and he won several headers. Broke up play several times. That's why he was MOTM, not just because of his goal and assist and numerous other good passes and general all round play. I'm not his biggest fan, but credit where its due, today he was by far the best on the park. Really beats me what game you were watching or indeed whether you were watching a game at all.

Good result and importantly performance today. JWP had his best game in a Saints shirt and was excellent (from one of his biggest critics). Yoshida showed why Fonte really won't be missed. Just hope VvD's injury does not keep him out of Wednesday, we are light without him as clearly Gardos remains unready as he didn't even make the bench today. Hojbjerg was very industrious and worked his socks off, but some terrible passes got us into some bad situations. Someone really needs to sit down with him and help him with his shooting, needs to learn to take his time and that power is not always the solution, got into some terrific positions but barn doors must feel safe tonight. Well done Saints, now at least the gap to 18th is back into double figures which always feels like a safe gap to me. I guess Fraser's goals to shots ratio must have improved with the two dollies today. Mind you Leicester were woeful but you can only beat what is put in front of you.

Of course, having not played a pro game since last season (except PL2) we would sign him and he would walk straight into the team for a semi-final. It really makes you wonder what planet some people inhabit.

Les says a lot of stuff.

Bad: Wigan's second, A ugust 2012 (Kone). Appalling error when we were pushing for an equaliser late on to get back in the game. This was the time when he was prone to errors like this quite regularly, much like Yoshida is supposed to be now. The days when many on here thought he was rubbish and would gladly have seen him sold (the days that many seem to have forgotten about now). Good: Many good games, especially in the last 3 seasons.

Actually Stephens at least probably is the long term answer, that's why he is still here and being developed. He's not the short term answer, perhaps that's what you meant. Yoshida is both, though I would hope we have someone else lined up as well.

I find it hard to go along with this view. Andy Townsend said he had a deal sorted, because footballers don't hand in transfer requests if they haven't. When I questioned this wisdom I was told that he (Townsend) was the expert because he was an ex pro and that tits on message boards cannot possibly know more than Andy Townsend. [incidentally, in case of doubt, I am not calling you a tit]

Liverpool are winning :-) Match thread these days really don't have anything that gives anyone any idea of what is happening.

Would be interesting. Total lack of leaders. Who would be Captain? I suppose Gawd help us, it would be JWP. The only other potential on field leader there is Yoshida. Once you take VvD, Fonte, Davis and Romeu out of the team there is no one left that has the leadership qualities needed on the pitch.

Oh dear Whitey, clearly you have been spending too much time deciding how many cavalrymen will be killed by kicks from horses each year, rather than watching games. All four goals against Spurs for example were savable (that's not to say Forster should have saved all four but an average PL keeper would have got to one or two of them). Ironically a lot of people on here blame Forster for the Burnley goal which cost us 2 points last weekend, when in fact it was one of the few this season which he really didn't have much chance with because of the deflection (though some argue with a modicum of sense that his starting position was not the best). The metrics gathered in the OPTA Stats that are being used as the basis of the analysis being argued may not be statistically significant to a statistician, but they are an indicator that what most people are observing (that Forster makes very few saves) is borne out by the metrics to an extent. What you cannot use these metrics for really is to say categorically that Forster is the worst. The metrics indicate that he is the worst this season (and second worst since the stats began, a few years ago) but in truth the difference between his metrics and those of Bravo for instance and some of the others at the bottom end of that scale, are minute and therefore not statistically significant (the difference between Bravo and Forster is less that 1%). But to try to dismiss the basic metric (shots save against shots not saved) on the grounds that the sample is not statistically significant is pushing it a bit. It will be interesting to the figures again at the end of the season when the number of games will have almost doubled. The basic point is that at present any shot on target has almost as much chance of resulting in a goal as being saved by Fraser (46% vs 54%) which is a fair indication of someone not doing their job very well. The interesting stat to me is that this is a trend for keepers in the PL over the last few years. Is this because the standard of keepers has fallen, or is it because strikers are better, or what? We are seeing less saves in the PL these days on average than we were a few years ago. Personally I don't think it is the former, not when we have keepers such as De Gea, Cech, Lloris and Courtois, unless it is the huge drop off of quality once you take these out of the equation. Incidentally arguing that the quality of strikes makes the metrics insignificant is really weak, the quality also applies to the shots saved. Some of the ones Forster is able to count as saves this season have been absolute dollies, but these still count as saves.

No, wasn't joking But admittedly I did mix up the BBC article with the Guardian article read earlier which showed that Bravo wasn't the worst. That was Forster, almost the worst in the history of the PL Stats (2nd only). https://www.theguardian.com/football/who-scored-blog/2017/jan/17/claudio-bravo-worst-goalkeeper-premier-league-manchester-city Last season he was 3rd best. Something has gone wrong, perhaps the rumour of him carrying an injury is correct.

Because they were trying to make the point of how bad Bravo is. Then they realised that there was someone worse. They left him off because otherwise the impact of their point would be diminished. Forster has the second worst saves per on target shots since records began apparently.

No surprise to those who have watched him this season. England's No 1, not even England's No 5 or 6 at the moment. A good few of the saves he has made have been very straightforward. As for McCarthy who knows, should have recovered from hamstring by now. But news from the Club is as ever deafening, mustn't let anyone know.

This is about JWP. No idea who you're on about.

Well, I would argue that any tit knows more about transfers than Andy ****ing Townsend. Even you. Just because he's an ex pro (and former Saint even though he is in denial about the latter) doesn't mean he knows how things are working with Fonte, things have changed a helluvalot in the 20 years or so since he retired. I wouldn't have made a point if you had quoted anyone else that I can think of by the way.

Ah the old chestnut, no one who posts on a forum (other than you of course) knows anything about football. We look forward to your next expert comment. Quoting a tit like Townsend says it all really.

It will probably actually have the opposite effect in truth. The big clubs will have even more money to spend on players from the selling clubs like us, paying silly amounts for players that do not attract the absolute top money now.