Sidney Fudpucker the 3rd

I totally agree. Caulker on loan for a season with an option to buy seems like a far better business decision than James Chester for £8m. If anyone can get his career back on track it's Koeman. I can remember talking to some Spurs fans who thought letting him go to Cardiff was a crazy decision.

Sign him up!

Funny, last season people were quite keen for him to come to us. Different story this season after his woeful season at QPR but if anyone can get the best out of him and get him back on track it's RK. He was strongly linked with Liverpool only a couple of season ago. I was beginning to think he was out to try and beat Nigel Quashie's record for being relegated with different clubs. ;-)

You could well be right about the 2 extra fixtures but we'll have to wait and see. Sorry, but I don't see us finishing top 10 at all. We did incredibly well given the departures last season but I think the loss of MS, NC & TA will prove far more costly that that of RL, DL, CC & AL. A number of teams seem to have strengthened well. We've replaced but I don't believe we've strengthened. Of course there's still time for this to change and other teams signings may not prove to be the instant success they hoped for. We'll have to see how things unfold but I'm expecting the likes of Newcastle, Stoke, Palace & WBA all to be far stronger this term. I would love to be proved wrong but think we're in for a bit of a rough ride this time.

I think we'll finish somewhere around 14th. We've lost too much quality this time and with the added fixtures I feel it's going to be a long hard season. I'm sure we are trying very hard to bring somebody in. If we were genuinely in for Chester then it's very disappointing that he's chosen WBA over Saints.

Anyone else heard we're about to make a move for Martins Indi? The only things I can find are rumours from the January transfer window.

I think there'll be plenty going on behind the scenes. Just because there's nothing in the press it doesn't mean there's nothing happening. The Toby signing was kept very quiet last season. Nobody really knew who Gardos was when we signed him. Our scouting network is huge and I wouldn't be at all surprised if we end up with someone whose name hasn't even been mentioned on here. Oh, and Ron Vlaar around Christmas.

I've just read something that said the only club who've enquired about him are Newcastle.

I was referring to the fact that we've made a lot of money from Liverpool by selling them players that cost us little or nothing at all. If we pay silly money for Chesters then Hull will have made a lot of money out of us in the same way we've made a lot of money out of Liverpool. ffs.

Not adverse to us signing Chesters but not for €10m! That's crazy money when you think that we'd agreed a price of about €8m for Toby. If they get €10m they won't have done badly out of us. They only paid £300k for JC. They paid £6m for Long and then sold him to us after 6 months for double that. Their fans must look at us in the same way we look at Liverpool.

Good post. Not sure who we'll get. I guess it'll end up being a surprise like Toby was last season. My main concern is that Fonte can be a bit late with some of his challenges. He got lucky last season as there were a couple of challenges that on another day he would've walked for. He got lucky, all it'll take is for that luck not to be on his side and he'll be off. It's not only about finding a suitable partner for Fonte. It's about having cover for him should he get suspended or injured.

I saw them play last week. They're going to find it very hard going in the Championship with the squad that they've currently got. They've not really added any quality. There's a couple of decent players but they looked a million miles away from the teams who will finish in the top half. The addition of Gallagher would certainly give them something. Interestingly, Cody Cropper said he was really impressed with the set up at MK Dons. In his words 'It's very much like Saints but a few years behind'. Could be the ideal place for Sam to get regular football.

I've always thought it would be interesting to see an England team that didn't include any players from the big 5. I'm convinced that the English players who play for the big clubs think it's their given right to play for their country. In reality, I think an English player at a smaller club would relish the chance more and may therefore put in a better performance than some of the big name players. Just look at how well some of our players did when they were given the chance. Many of them looked far better than the England regulars. I suppose this raises the question. Who would be your starting 11 if you couldn't use anyone from Man U, Arsenal, Liverpool, Man City or Chelsea? There would certainly be places for the likes of Bertrand and J-Rod. I still believe Jermain Defoe has something to offer so he'd be in. Then there's the likes of Berahino, Stones & Barkley. You can put a very good England team together made up of players from teams outside the top 5.

Problem solved. I booked 2 tickets and gave the Outlaw's address in Sint-Annaland for delivery. :-)

Seems unlikely given that her first post says 'Southampton' underneath 'Moved to England'.

This is a forum, a place for conversation. Seeing as people were talking about Ron Vlaar it seemed topical. I'm not claiming that it's a great piece of journalism, it's just topical and may have been of interest to some people. Sorry, I wasn't aware that things had to meet with your seal of approval before being posted.

Found this on an Irish website. Ron Vlaar was hot property last summer having had a good World Cup. However, he was never that big of a superstar at Aston Villa and his under-par 2014/15 season only proved that. Vlaar lost the Captain's arm band when Paul Lambert was sacked in February and Tim Sherwood came in to rescue the club's season. But, whilst some of the Villa Park faithful would testify that their centre back was never what the hype and paper talk suggested, even the most cynical wouldn't have expected these sort of stats. Opta stats from Oulala.com show just how ineffective the Netherlands international was last season. He averaged 0.55 tackles per game in the Premier League. That's right: Ron Vlaar was making a tackle every two games for Villa in the league. His stats were that shocking that even Mario Balotelli was winning more tackles per game. Raheem Sterling too. Vlaar is now a free agent, his contract having expired, but, with form like this, he might not have a crowd of clubs lining up for his signature

Exactly! Maybe a useful player with a bit of experience who could play in Carling Cup games alongside someone like Gardos and give Fonte a rest.

Just found this piece on Vlaar on an Irish website. :-/ Ron Vlaar was hot property last summer having had a good World Cup. However, he was never that big of a superstar at Aston Villa and his under-par 2014/15 season only proved that. Vlaar lost the Captain's arm band when Paul Lambert was sacked in February and Tim Sherwood came in to rescue the club's season. But, whilst some of the Villa Park faithful would testify that their centre back was never what the hype and paper talk suggested, even the most cynical wouldn't have expected these sort of stats. Opta stats from Oulala.com show just how ineffective the Netherlands international was last season. He averaged 0.55 tackles per game in the Premier League. That's right: Ron Vlaar was making a tackle every two games for Villa in the league. His stats were that shocking that even Mario Balotelli was winning more tackles per game. Raheem Sterling too. Vlaar is now a free agent, his contract having expired, but, with form like this, he might not have a crowd of clubs lining up for his signature.

Superb! I'm on holiday in Holland when we play. Just need to sort tickets and transport from Bergen Op Zoom.

Exactly! I'm actually intrigued as to what is meant by 'Dont try this new persona crap youve got going on'? But I certainly won't be losing any sleep over it. For some reason I became the target of his abuse a few years ago. I've just added him to my ignore list. If he doesn't like what I've got to say then maybe he should do the same?

People with long memories will also remember that you spent months accusing me of being a skate. How did if feel being proved wrong? Who's hiding behind a keyboard? As I've said before, if you want to meet face to face to discuss this I'm more than happy. C***y!

I think it was about the same time you became a complete ****!

I was talking to him at a friendly here in Ireland last night. MK Dons were playing my local team Cabinteely. I asked him how he knew so much and he said 'I'm still in regular contact with the lads. I've only just moved out of my apartment in Southampton'. He's currently staying with family in Coventry. His grandparents and cousins live there. He and commutes to MK. When the travelling gets too much the club put him up in the hotel that's built into Stadium MK.

We'll really struggle to replace Toby but Van Dijk looks like a great option. I reckon there'll be a few Prem clubs in for him. Sunderland and Newcastle are already being linked. Interesting talking to Cody Cropper last night about the Toby deal. He reckons that Toby definitely wanted to sign for us and that Les Reed's comments about the player preferring Spurs over Saints was the easy option to tell the fans. The stumbling block was that Saints were being asked to pay more money than originally agreed in the form of paying up the remainder of his contract at AM. We weren't prepared to do that and Spurs were. I questioned why we'd gone back with a vastly improved offer if we weren't happy about paying more than agreed and he said, Koeman really wanted him but it was too late as Spurs had already agreed to AM's demands. He talked openly about the way Southampton work and how thorough they are in transfer dealings. He said, Nothing ever happens quickly at Southampton because they are a very cautious club. They've been caught out in the past so won't just buy players to add depth to the squad. They want to know everything about who they're signing, their past, their personal life, everything. This led on to a discussion about Artur and Dani. He said there's no doubt about Artur's ability but he's a complete headcase. His mentality just didn't fit with what the club are trying to achieve. When I said 'I guess it's the same with Dani' he just shook his head and said 'He was just a lunatic, he had to go'.