Midfield_General

Not one of our signings has improved on what we had. And what we had was fucking dogshit. Therein lies the issue. (Mads obviously gets a pass as it's too early to tell)

ABK hasn't actually gone yet. 'A deal is reported to have been struck', so it's promising, but we've been here before with him. Similarly with Edozie and Aribo, there's obviously some proper interest but nothing is signed yet. Hopefully they will all go asap this week.

If I was Sullivan, after their terrible end to last season and absolute humiliation at home last night I'm not sure Fernandes at £50m+ would be the signing I'd be banking on to win the fans over. Their fans are going mental and want a marquee statement of intent. They are also less than impressed that acquiring a stream of players who have been relegated with us (JWP, KWP, potentially Fernandes) seems to imply a lack of ambition from their board. They also really don't like JWP, which obviously has no bearing at all on whether Fernandes is any good, but they just associate him as a failed signing from us for fairly big money which they don't want to repeat and football fan logic doesn't always make sense. If we stick to our guns pricing him at circa £50m I just can't see him going there. It's way too risky for them.

Oh cool. When's that happening then?

For the avoidance of doubt, the exact words of Russell Martin (managerial honours: one 13th place finish in League One, one 15th place and one 10th place finish in the Championship, one Championship play-off final win) were: "I’ve been happier with a performance when losing than I have sometimes when we have won, playing really poorly, and I always make that really clear to the players. Winning ugly every now and then is fine, but you don’t get away with it for long." It's a quote from this interview with the Guardian: https://www.theguardian.com/football/article/2024/aug/16/russell-martin-southampton-premier-league A counterpoint would be José Mourinho (managerial honours: winner of three Premier Leagues, one FA Cup, one League Cup, two Serie A's, one Coppa Italia, one Supercoppa Italiana, one La Liga, one Coppa Del Rey, one Supercoppa Espana, one UEFA Conference League, one Europa League, one UEFA Cup and two Champions' Leagues), who said: "Some coaches prefer to sell the idea of having a philosophy, but I think, the philosophy, you have to sell it after you win. First, you win, then you sell the philosophy and then you prove to everybody that your philosophy is correct, your philosophy is great, but you have to win. "If you try to sell your philosophy but you win nothing then what is the point? [If you say] 'I have a philosophy, I have an identity, my team plays very well', that's not true because if your team plays well, they win [trophies]." https://www.si.com/soccer/2019/03/24/jose-mourinho-trophies-jurgen-klopp-philosophy-win Anyway, this is the Will Still thread. Will Still seems sound, doesn't he?

In that top photo it looks like he's worn his full kit during the flight. Had no idea he was a full kit wanker. We don't need someone that unfashionable at the club. Move on.

Yeah the contract is the main reason. As soon as it was clear he wasn't going to sign it was obvious the club wanted him gone this window, as he would start to depreciate after that and it would have made no sense at all for a club like ours to allow that. I think Spors knew / decided this as soon as he came into the club. One of his key beliefs is that you create the market for your players, i.e. set the narrative early as to what they are worth, and then the market will follow. Sure enough, soon after he joined we started getting the statements out of the club that Dibling was a £100m player. He knew straightaway that he would be off, so he started the game early, getting a conversation out there about his sky-high perceived value so that when the window came around that perception had already been in place for a while. Then perception becomes reality. No-one ever thought we'd get £100m, or that he was worth anywhere near that, but with that headline figure floating about it meant that it was easier to make potential buyers believe that offers of £40m+ actually represented some sort of bargain.

Out of the frying pan springs to mind

Getting ugly for West Ham Keeper’s head’s gone on crosses We want 9!

No mate, did you not hear - he's been packed off to fucking Everton 🤣🤣🤣 Poor bastard. But if some desperate gimps are actually going to pay £42m plus 20% sell-on for a kid coming up to a year left who's career total is 2 goals and 2 assists, then you're going to mug them off for it aren't you?

It's hearing the steady stream of common sense like this that is the reason why I'm starting to develop the first twitches of a man crush on the modest, straight-talking, Tintin-looking little scamp. Very early days but so far he just feels like a great fit for the club and the fans - for me the most natural fit since Ralph came in.

Probably for the best. Seems a smashing lad, sadly crap at football. Welcome to the Mad Man

Not trying to be an MLG style pedant but making an approach doesn't necessarily mean they've put in a bid. Could mean they've just contacted the club to register interest and find out what the asking price is etc, in order to weigh up whether they want to make an official bid.

We beat them 3-2 at home in the league cup last year. THB, A Armstrong and Bree scored. We went 2-0 up then somehow let them get back to 2-2, before we won it in the 89th minute. Looking back at the stats, we had 78% possession and had over 800 passes to their 230. They had 22% possession and only 2 shots on goal, and scored from both of them.

And lest we forget those three little letters: J P T

The weird thing was that a lot of people seemed to have a problem with the man himself being boring. Like they objected to the tone of his voice. As if that had some impact on his abilities as a manager. Truth is we were incredibly spoiled after a period of having Poch and Koeman as our managers. In hindsight they were two borderline world class managers and anyone we could reasonably expect to be able to get would have struggled to follow them. You have to wonder if we’ll attract managers of that calibre again.

I for one am stunned that football fans could possibly act in a way that is tribal and not entirely supportive and empathetic towards their fellow man. It's just such a new development. Stunned, I tell you.

I take it all this got sorted out last night then like the Armenie Football chap who is definitely ITK said it would? Can't wait to see Spertsyan line up for us on Saturday, looking forward to it!

Meghoma signed on loan 48 hours ago and goes straight into the starting XI for a critical CL qualifier. Big call.

Yes, fair points

He was shite against Ipswich

We just need Spors to sell him the project and the wonderful club that is Saints, maybe show him round West Quay He won't be able to help falling in love

What's Mkhitaryan up to? He'd do

It seems you have a suspicious mind

I’m going to stick my neck out and say a decision won’t be made tonight.