st alex

Would really like to see Cork, JWP or Wanyama score their first goal for the club this season.

Much as I'm alarmed and disappointed at the exodus this summer I do think at this rate we'll really struggle. This is what I'm taking solace in at the moment. The only real example I can think of recently of a similar thing happening was 2 years ago when Swansea enjoyed a successful season. http://www1.skysports.com/football/live/match/238146/teams Their team was managed by Brendan Rodgers and contained Caulker, Scott Sinclair, Sigurdsson and Joe Allen who all left, however they've managed to replace them and continue to stay in the league and at times attack the top half. Again this season they've lost Pablo Hernandez, Michu, Ben Davies and Michel Vorm. But with a couple of decent additions on paper they still look like a good team http://metro.co.uk/2014/07/26/will-swansea-city-dip-into-the-transfer-market-again-this-summer-4810975/ (I don't know if those links will work, but can always copy & paste).

Well if Chambers goes, that would leave us with one senior full back (having never seen Targett play I'm not confident he will be nearly good enough). And if Lovren goes as well, as is likely, we'll be left with just 4 first team defenders, two of which are Hooiveld and Yoshida, who to be honest are both Championship standard, even Fonte only really excelled with Lovren alongside him. With that defence, and an attack consisting of Gallagher and Pelle (a striker who's never settled at a club and who at 29 has scored just 85 goals in his entire career) then unless something drastic happens and we sign some seriously decent players then I can see myself quite easily finding something more appealing to do on a Saturday than watching us get relegated next year. I also think it's more likely Tadic turns out to be another De Ridder/McCann/Arias/Forte/Sarmento than the ready-made midfield maestro that we've never been able to sign since perhaps Keegan. No matter who we sign, we've let too many proven players leave. New signings tend to have a success rate of roughly 1 in 2 I'd say. So for every good signing we make we sign a player who's rubbish. For every Jack Cork there's a Pulis, for every J Rod there's a Tadanari Lee. Even some of our more 'successful' signings in the recent past have actually been pretty poor like Ramirez, Mayuka, Skacel, Kosowski, Idiakez, Belmadi. A team of average foreign players the wrong side of 27 will quickly get us relegated.

Yeah I think it's just Pelle, as Tadic was signed from FC Twente. Perhaps a better example would be Paul Williams & Paul Telfer who join Strachan from Coventry when he joined? Still it does seem quite unusual as there's no real link between Liverpool and Saints to trigger all this interest, plus it's been strongly suggested that they're interested in signing a total of 4 of our players, 2 already having left (Lambert & Lallana) and Lovern supposedly on the verge of a move and interest in J Rod. It feels as if there should be a limit on how many players you can sign from one club before the FA sanction a merger between the two.

Weird that Burnley have ended up with three young strikers from Southampton in Vokes, Jutkiewicz & Ings. All of whom have at one time or another have shown tremendous promise and who are all allegedly Saints fans.

The reports I've seen are suggesting a season long loan, in which case I can't really see him having much future at Saints. I'd have thought he'd be threatening a first team place by now, especially since centre back is one of our weakest positions in terms of depth. I'd have thought that after a (by the sounds of it) very successful loan spell at Swindon last season we'd look to loan him out to a championship team until Christmas and then hope that he can come back and challenge for a start in our team in the latter half of the season if he did well again.

I think a lot of them, i.e. Club Photographer involve working during the match so a couple of season tickets isn't even that great a perk, just something to give away (or sell) to friends or family.

Not from the world cup, but in terms of young English players would/could Eric Dier, Steven Caulker and Tom Ince be any good? We've not had a great track record at buying expensive exotic players and in recent years some of our best signings have been English players in their early 20s (e.g. J Rod, Clyne, Cork).

Surprised that the hand ball shout wasn't on the hightlights (on in any match reports), I know it was early on, but it looked like (from the Kingsland North) quite a clear handball from their goalkeeper and should have been a sending off? Referee completely lost control of the match by the end, as bad as Villa were and as bad as we were thought he also deserved a mention.

I use a few photo agencies for photos of players in my line of work, and since getty have the credit it would look like they've labelled it wrong, although it's usually easy to spot since if they searched for Luke Shaw and a dozen images came up of Luke Shaw and one picture comes up of JWP you should be able to tell it's a different person, and if they look even a little different check the numbers on the kit (as that will probably be a cropped shot where a number was visible on the shorts), pretty sloppy.

Will definitely need to bring in some defenders over the close season, as that now leaves us very thin on the ground at the back, Seaborne, Butterfield & Richardsson were our limited depth in that department.

We are now mathematically safe. Wigan could win their next 2 games against Arsenal and Villa to go above us, but that would mean Villa would loose their last game and remain below us.

Saw this thread whilst looking for pictures of the old lido in Southampton. Can add this to the nostalgia list now, since it's now been knocked down: http://www.oceanvillagesouthampton.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/Mocha-Marina-Coffee-in-original-intercontinental-ticket-office.jpg

The Metro had us linked to this guy a few days ago. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simon_Kj%C3%A6r

I thought Gazza looked very confident and assured in his first couple of games for us. Since coming back after being dropped he's not looked quite as good. However I still think he's our best keeper. It wasn't until Gazza came in that I realised how bad Kelvin's kicking is. It took Kelvin quite a while before he looked convincing for us, he used to make howler after howler (i.e Ray Jones' goal etc). I think Gazza will learn from his mistakes and be a better keeper for them.

Here's one. http://www.sendspace.com/file/88gjw5

Wonder if Telfer will play.

Generally De Ridder's crossing last season was pretty bad, he looked good at times, but failing to make much impression in the Championship, it would seem unlikely that he'd do too much in the Premiership. I worry though that Adkins seems to struggle to fill this position, he was almost a replacement for Forte who was woeful. Of the wide men we have left, Puncheon, Guly and De Ridder, none of them fill me with confidence. I expect Tanadari and Rodriguez to play more of a wide role next season, but would like a true winger with pace and quality.

I think its far batter than the previous one. Still not amazing mind. Why is it that all clubs go with the same company for websites, is it some sort of cost cutting measure? Wouldn't have thought it would be contractual since Man City use someone else.

Could have kept this open as well. At least could have reused the building for something. http://www.disused-stations.org.uk/n/northam/index.shtml

This song might be better suited to Saints? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Bells_of_St._Mary%27s_%28song%29

Yup. Pretty much the same as saying anyone wanting a standard ticket needs to bring their driving license to prove that they aren't eligible for concessions, only to then tell anyone who turns up with a driving license that that it's not good enough and they need to bring their birth certificate (which no one carries around with them). The whole point of an NUS card is prove that you are a student and eligible for concessionary rates.

There's no way you can positively identify any of the people in that picture. They're all tiny, blurry and facing away from the camera. Anyone know where this was taken?

MOTD here as well: http://www.footydaily.co.uk/2012/05/match-of-the-day-13052012-full-video-download/

Sharp's better.