goodymatt

I’m hoping our asking price means we keep Tino for this season

We must be in with a good chance, unless there is any PL interest? Think I’d rather sign Downes, who knows the Martin system and who we have looked at before, than Harry Winks.

He could be decent at Championship level. MOTM against Germany recently and was Portsmouth’s player of the season in league one. However, it’s a big gamble as he was the worst GK in Europe’s top 5 leagues last season at stopping shots on target. You’d think that would have dented his confidence, especially after being dropped. He is decent at the ball playing side that Martin will demand from his keepers, this might lead to him being given the shirt to lose. I would get rid of McCarthy and bring in an experience keeper to challenge him properly.

He’s be their top earner then, that’s surprising given the money they spent the last 2 PL seasons. Fair enough!

I wouldn’t be surprised if Fulham offered a sensible transfer fee and could beat the wages he was on at Saints last season. They have higher record fees than us I think. Question would be if Prowsey wants to go there. As I’ve said before, it would be sad to lose our 20 year relationship, captain and Mr. Southampton to a historical yo-yo club that’s been in the top flight one season. I don’t think they will be battling relegation next season though, but you never know!

Martin’s first interview was just up on the main website but has now been taken down. Bit weird https://www.southamptonfc.com/en/news/article/martin-convinced-by-saints-vision Daily Echo have rehashed it on their site if anyone wants to read:

On one hand, it would be very disappointing to lose Tino after spending a year plus fixing him. On the other hand, if I’d had a major injury like that I think I’d want to sign that big contract ASAP, just in case I had further troubles or wasn’t really the same player afterwards. He still has 3 years in his contract and we hold the cards really, he will be itching to play football again. Is being a back up to Trippier bad for his development (playing less games) or better for him to work up to speed and improve his stamina issues etc. you can make arguments for both I suppose.

Doesn’t mean we won’t sell but good to see Jacob confirming the obvious, that we would not sell for £12-15m.

Surely £12-15m is a non starter, whether the player wants to go or not. I agree, given his potential and how important he could be to our chances of promotion, it’s £30m minimum. Of course his injury history puts doubts on value for that price and therefore a deal shouldn’t go through. This is not a player we need to sell, I can’t understand why we would entertain selling at half our valuation. Had Tino not been injured for a year I’m sure his plan was 2 years with us and then move to a big club. It’s the usual timeframe for talents passing through and we would have been looking for that £36m value at least. Ryan Fraser, we were linked with him before the January window. I hope that is agents rather than us having a genuine interest in a player with Prowsey wages that hasn’t played top level footy for a while, trains with their B Team and seemingly has an attitude problem. He wouldn’t fit Martin’s system either. In summary, please make it make sense for me, I’m struggling

Daily Mail also claims we are having a recruitment meeting today.

If players come back on Wednesday as rumoured, that’s 37 days to get us playing his way. He needs to manage the outgoings and incomings to fit his style and we still don’t have a coaching team to support him yet (let’s hope that’s in place in the comings days, not sure how it works without). It’s a big ask to hit the ground running isn’t it? September fixtures look like our toughest run of fixtures for the entire season so dropping points in August might give us a bit of a hill to climb. So much uncertainty and change ahead, intrigued to see what we are actually going to look like as a team by the end of the window.

Tella stays?

This article confirms the different compensation values, so we are haggling over a £500k difference. Legal battle likely and backroom staff is still not resolved. Maresca is also claimed in this article to be our first choice. Which makes you wonder why we didn’t just wait for City to end their season, unless he was already lined up for Leicester when we first approached him.

I would be gutted to see us lose our captain and Mr. Southampton to a team like Fulham who are 1 year in the prem. Why not wait and see if we make it back at the first attempt if you love the club? I can understand moving to one of the big boys or a Brighton/Villa/WHU who have ambitions to be the best of the rest. Also a ‘close to £30m’ fee doesn’t feel like good value to us.