Saint Charlie

As this week has already seen countless rumours, and the summer window draws closer, it is time to re-evaluate who is an ITK amongst the SWF population. As we know, there are numerous ratings of newspaper stories looking at the proportion of transfer stories which actually come to fruition – allowing readers to decide which publications they would prefer to believe. Now the time has come for the ITKs of SWF to stand up and be counted. From today – I will be monitoring the “snippets” which are posted on the Forum and providing official ITK percentage scores to each poster, in the hope of finding the true ITK by the end of the transfer window, September 2014. I did a similar exercise privately during the January window to test the feasibility of running the search for the true ITK, and can now announce the results. These are based on the percentage of ITK statements which turned out to be true by the close of the window. January ITK Ranking mehball - 100% K-Billy – 80% Guan – 80% Monk – 75% Sanjay Sanchez – 40% Fitzhugh Fella – 12% View From The Top – 0% Matthew Le Tissier – 0% Glasgow Saint – 0% MLG – 0% All current scores have been reset, so there is an opportunity for some of the 0% ers to recover, and also for others to join in. What qualifies as ITK? An ITK comment must be made prior to it appearing on any published source and must have a degree of certainty in what you say. You do not have to name your source when questioned by other posters. What do I have to do? If you are a “lesser known” poster (below 500 posts) who wishes to challenge for the ITK crown then please make yourself known on this thread so I can track your posts. Otherwise just keep proving to everyone how ITK you are and watchout for the bi-weekly rankings to be published via this thread. Best of luck to all.

Davis and JWP in CM would be worrying. Remember Everton away last season where they just walked through at will? Hopefully Schneiderlin makes it. Will have a big influence on the result IMO - he does so much relatively unoticed defensive work whereas Davis and JWP are tidy players but not defensive minded despite the areas they ocassionally play in.

Complete sense from Lambert as usual. Will be a massive blow if Pochettino went and a huge boost if he signed a new deal. He has improved some of our players immeasurably. Everyone being players and fans.

Simple: very good players playing at a club that isn't in Europe.

£10m?

People will need very clear remits...

Looking like Deano is nailed on for another promotion, although he must be frustrated that he hasn't started many games. Would think he is a good character to have though and a hard worker so good luck to him and would be nice to see him play at SMS again. Meanwhile, his old pal Papa Waigo N'Diaye is still at Al-Ettifaq in the Saudi PL and recently scored a hattrick as they beat last season's Champions Al-Fateh 4-1. Here is the aftermath of his second goal:

He was the last player before the two centre backs so certainly not an area to play such a careless pass in. Especially after conceding via a poor pass 30 seconds before. It was very poor.

Carroll doesn't deserve to go. There are also huge question marks about his injury record and he hasn't made a squad for ages.

The thing that made the Guly one worse was the mental aspect of doing it just after conceding the first goal through a woeful pass. Surely he should be more alert in that situation. Yes he assisted for the third, but in the main he showed no tempo or urgency and the pass IMO summed it up. He is undoubtedly very lucky to still get on the pitch in a PL game as has never really made any contdibution to us getting a result at this level. Was far, far too casual yesterday compared to the team style.

Fact is that cash spent on wages is generally proportional to success in football leagues.

He runs to chase the (semi pointless) lost causes but when he has the ball he does nothing. Not really what you want from an attacking midfielder. The mistake for the second goal was horrendous, especially given the way the first was conceded. At the end of the day, his contribution to Saints is probably on par with someone like Chaplow or Danny Butterfield. Did well at a lower level but I am amazed he is still here. Also it seems to be fashionable for fans to pretend he is decent but reality is he shows nothing in games to suggest he belongs at the club. He didnt even seem bothered when he got the ball today, just wanted to get rid as soon as he could.

Two assists from Ramirez today, one of those very good. You cannot compare him to Guly who generally offers no upside. His brainless play for Norwich's second undid anything positive but its his attitude today that was worse than his play. You cannot stroll through a PL game. Especially when you arent a very good PL player.

Guly isn't a disgrace. But he isnt very good.

Guly showed for the second Norwich goal why he is a joke figure amongst supporters. He never has any urgency or tempo apart from when chasing lost causes and after the team concedes such a poor goal I couldn't believe how casual he was for the second just a minute later. He does himself no favours. Otherwise good win against a woeful Norwich. Morgan, Clyne, Jay and Lambert all good. Ramirez also had some great moments before being forced off with a knock. But mostly when the team is on top.

Quite clearly Cortese was an excellent Chairman, whose results (by which he should be judged) were excellent. To suggest otherwise is baffling. If Krueger does nearly as well then great. Good luck to him.

Lets hope so. I can't see beyond him joining Chelsea this summer. Its all fits. Cole coming to the end. Mourinho desire to spend. Club needing to sign home grown players as Lampard, Terry and Cole come to the end of their careers...and Shaw being an exceptional talent who all the top clubs want. Getting him would be a major boost for Chelsea over their rivals. Of course I would love him to stay, and Im sure he is happy here. But the promise of CL football and playing for your home club under a Manager like Mourinho and with a team of world stars would be hard to resist surely? Plus, we have no idea how the new structure would view it. They might see a certain offer as being too good to turn down. Lets hope he stays but for certain he and the club will have multiple offers this summer and it will be hard to keep him IMO.

But further up you said Chelsea is a done deal? Which is it?

Lambert clearly struggling with confidence. Think the England stuff has affected his club game, he was playing with freedom before and just enjoying being a PL footballer.

We will easily get 30m. If not then whoever negotiates the deal is a plank.

There isnt anyone Shaw's age who is as good as him, hence why all the top clubs would pretty pay anything to get him. He is phenomenal.

He clearly will go to Chelsea this summer. And we will be paid very well I'm sure. Frustrating that the top academy players we produce have a habit of being almost too good.

Future scenario: Stripes come back and are heralded as club considering fanbase. Days afterwards fanbase moves onto the next futile bee in the bonnet complaint moaning that the club doesn't listen. Club cannot win.

Would raise an interesting point if someone like Lambert got injured after 5mins - not sure you could expect Gallagher say to play 45 + 85 on consecutive days. Either pick him fresh for the first team squad or give him 90mins in the U21s. Or both if you scheduled the U21s games better. Its a bit silly to have an U21s game on the day before a league game. Would have thought with the injuries that Reed might get a bench spot too, but if he played 90 today then surely he wouldn't.

Plus, as the man himself said, he has a year left. So for him there is no rush. Should he want to he could wait and see how the summer plays out before making a commitment or otherwise. Would be a massive boost for him to sign though, and to the people who say the season is over, our form between now and the end of the 38th league game could have big implications for a number of players and the Manager - do they see that there is still room for progression here?