S-Clarke

I'm glad it's not just me who doesn't see the fuss around Dennis. All I saw from Dennis was 6 months of decent form, went to the AFCON, came back and was not really a threat for Watford for the remainder of the season. I wouldn't feel comfortable splurging £20m on him anyway, given that they'd bought him for £3.6m and he hasn't really done enough to warrant over a £15m valuation increase.

One of the best posts I've seen on here for a while, I can't really disagree with a lot of what you say really. I think everyone had the same questions over the selection, my main gripe though was the HT change and not actually bringing on Adams. I'm with you in that I like Ralph, I think players have improved under him and we've had some good times with him, but there is certainly this undertone of stubbornness and overthinking which is hurting him and us. I want to see him go back to basics somewhat, go back to his original principles and pick a balanced team. It's underestimated how much difference a 'balanced' team can make with players in their natural positions. I think my overriding emotion with Ralph is frustration, because I think we can all see the potential of what we could do…but too many own goals (both figuratively and literally) are being scored, and he is prone to creating his own problems. Tomorrow will tell a lot I think, not just for Ralph's immediate future but also the likes of Adams and other players in the squad in terms of where we see them in our plans. I'm looking forward to tomorrow but quite apprehensive about what it may bring if I’m totally honest. I think a change now is the wrong time, I’m also with you on the desire to give him a full transfer window and see how we look throughout September, but I feel a bad result tomorrow may hasten any decision.

He's got 2 years left on his contract, so maybe we can do a season long loan and then pick him up for a a smaller fee next summer? (negotiate a buy option into the deal or similar). I agree with what you say though, I know there are calls for defenders to have experience etc but like you said it's not just the number of games, it's what they can bring that's different to what we have. So he's certainly not another ball playing/technical centre back, he's more of your traditional organisor/communicator type who wouldn't venture too high. You'd argue he'd be perfect for a 3 as well, with the more agile/quick CB's flanking either side in ABK and Salisu. Mings is similar, but has a bit more about him physically I think. Lascellels is an option, but a little bit down my list now people have brought up the two above!

Another good shout...! I think he's decent, not the most spectacular technical ball playing CB - but do we need that? We need an organiser and communicator and he would be levels above who we have in that regard. He's a good age, not too old but lots of PL experience. He's probably not a CL centre half, but we don't need a CL centre half. He's still young enough to have England international aspirations as well, so the promise of first team football here could work. Arsenal have Saliba, Gabriel and White as their 3 CB's, you'd say with that crop he's 4th choice so he may want to leave to play games.

You need to post more, that was a great summary. I think there is an acceptance that we are signing players who aren't ready from day 1, but you do start to question what on earth is it we're getting them ready for. Salisu took a year, Broja a month or so. I accept that the pressing triggers in a 4-2-2-2 take some time to master, which is part of the point he was talking about, but maybe Ralph is just making it too over complicated.

We released Hoedt, but I think we got a small fee for Lemina (maybe 3-4m?)

Well, there are rumours Gerrard wants him out. Didn't play at the weekend, suggestions that Konsa and their new guy, Carlos are the two first choice. If we're looking for an experienced PL defender then there aren't many options to be honest, it'll be a case of capitalising on situations like this if there's something in it

They're giving it a go, but I'd feel a little uneasy with that approach. It's a real slap dash approach, and they looked all over the shop at the weekend - no real chemestry at all. One game and all that, but what they did last season is out of the window as this isn't the same team and they'll have to work out what's what with an unknown group of players. Isn't that going to make it 16 new additions?

This is what you'll start to see happening now. Teams in the champ will start to see their better players picked off, so clubs will be in the market for replacements and may get desperate towards the end of the window. Armstrong will probably be high in some clubs thoughts seeing what he did in the Champ previously. I think Watford are going for Villa's Davis though.

I get the right side, left-side argument, but I don't think we're in a position to get perfection at the mo! I'm sure we can deal with a left footer on the right side (i'd probably put mings right side). It can't be much worse than it is today, that's for sure. Don't forget we've got ABK as a right footer too, and if we do persist with 3 at the back that'll be Salisu - Mings - ABK, that is a pretty powerful and mobile 3 if we can do it.

That's actually an interesting shout and certainly not a bad one. He'd walk into our team tomorrow, no worries about that at all. It'll be interesting to see what happens.

I've always followed this view as well to be honest. Not just at Southampton in particular, but all football clubs. Man Utd are a great example of this. They've gone through so many managers, in some cases the players have downed tools to force the manager out/make his life harder. Those players stay and still perform shit under the next one. And rinse repeat. Managers are seen as the quick and easy fix and often it leads to a bit of a bounce, but if the divisive characters remain in the changing room then you’ll get groundhog day again. We've changed a few players in recent years, so there's more of Ralph's choices here than originally and this summer has certainly been a step in changing things up, but there is still a core of players who have failed under numerous managers - and some of that core are still part of match day squads.

A McCarthy suitor no longer in the race. That's some come down from Kasper though.

He's not been totally useless, not at all, but I can't say I've ever enjoyed watching him personally. One of the most infuriatingly frustrating players we've ever had in that attacking position. He had a bit of a golden spell in 2018, but apart from that he has been poor in my opinion. It probably hasn't helped that the team regressed as soon as he came into the door, it would have been interesting to see how he looked in a squad with Mane and co, but he just hasn't stepped up in my opinion.

Not sure that is the approach we should go down. The fact he's not in Palace's team, who are are competitors really, is quite telling. I don't want to saddle our squad with more squad players, who we bring in has to better than what we have in that position and I'm not sure Tomkins is really any better. Certainly not quick and has a fair amount of injuries. CB's with PL experience is quite a limited market for ourselves. I wonder if we could go for someone like Jamaal Lascelles? Was captain for newcastle, many years PL experience but still only 28. Down the pecking order at Newcastle now. I think he's better than Tomkins but probably not much in it.

I think generally our signings have been better in recent seasons. Certainly a few more successful additions compared to our windows when every player we signed was pretty shit. I think KWP, Perraud, Salisu, Tino, Adams are examples of good additions who have become useful and important players. Jury is still out on Lavia, Aribo, and the other new guys, but I'd be surprised if Aribo and Lavia don't join that group of successful additions. The problem is that we have still been making some poor big calls, in a time when our money was previously tighter. Lyanco, Diallo, Theo, Mousssa, Adam Armstrong. They've joined the group of the previously bad signings in Redmond, Elyounoussi etc and it's still weighing us down a bit. It's a bit better as we don't have Hoedt, Lemina and co around but we are still in a little bit of a mess with failed signings littering the squad. I'm not sure if the previous picks of Lyanco, Diallo etc were down to lack of funds so we just blinked on whoever we could get for less than £10m, so hopefully that won't be the case anymore.

Jack signed his new deal, in secret obviously(weird) at the end of project restart I believe. They basically reacted to him having a couple of good games (at home to Man City being one). Those contracts, along with Theo, really hamper a lot of the good work Martin and co have done. The fact they were done in secret is even more odd.

It's the same problem we had with the unsellables batch 1. We pay them too much in wages which doesn't match their ability, so clubs aren't willing to pay them the same and the players don't want to take a paycut. They'll wait it out. for example I think Stephens is on 50k ish a week, which is ludricous for a Championship level CB. It's no wonder there are no takers.

Well, this escalated quickly. I hate these sort of leaks though because it's unprofessional from whoever has done it. It's all too easy for the manager to bear the brunt of everything, whilst he's not faultless, neither are the players. There have been players stealing a living at this club for many years, under many different managers, so I just hope it hasn't come from one of that crop. Really not ideal timing given that it's 48 hrs before an important home game, and we're still trying to get signings in.

We've spent over 50mill, is that not investing? I'm sure some fans will be kicking and screaming in 24 months when there are links of Lavia going somewhere for big money, ditto ABK etc. And the window hasn't closed yet!! Have a moan if we are weaker on the 3rd Sept, but to hit the club with that now when we've said we still need to make additions is a bit too soon. No one seems to have patience anymore or understand our model. We buy young players of a good level who then become the players at the level we can't attract or afford. That's not going to change. We had a period of time where we spunked £100m on supposed proven players like Boufal, Hoedt, Carillo, Lemina, Elyonoussi etc etc and that fell flat on it's arse because 1) we use a lot of transfer fee and wages to start with, and then 2) if they're shit, we're saddled with them as we cannot sell them and we end up making a loss, and it hinders our movement in the market thereafter. This approach is risky in the sense of immediate quality, for sure, but it's less risky financially because if 1 or 2 aren't a success we haven't thrown down massive transfer fee's or wages and they wouldn't be too difficult to move on. But our model is and will always be buying new players, developing them to a level where top clubs want them, selling them for a profit and then going again.

Little bit more confirmation on this one - Saints winger Tella agrees Burnley loan Southampton winger Nathan Tella has agreed to join Burnley on a season-long loan. The 23-year-old academy graduate has made 33 Premier League appearances for the Saints. He made 14 last season mostly from the left-wing, but he can also plan on the right and as a second striker. Tellas was once in Arsenal’s academy before moving to Southampton in 2017.

Don't mind me if I don't pay an ounce of attention to any opinion Charlie Flaming Austin has. The same player who downed tools for us, and had some of the worst performances from a southampton striker I can ever remember. If I was Ralph I'd probably hate him as well.

Not sure if this is misguided optimism or not, but I can see another 3 maybe 4 new additions (with 2 or 3 going out). I think we're pretty close to a new full back to provide cover, maybe even first choice at RB with KWP going to LB. (if he's not badly injured). We will almost certainly buy another striker. But a new number 10 and a new CB will only come in if we shift a few of this lot - Redmond/Moussa/Theo/Tella/Stephens/Valery/Bednarek/Lyanco etc. It's possible, I think the next couple of weeks will be quite busy. We got a lot of our business done early which we haven't been able to do before, but it's almost always the case the more sought after positions get filled later in the windows. If we had all the money to throw at more proven players we'd have done it by now for sure, but by waiting it out you can sometimes get changes in circumstances with the fees and even availability of players on loan etc.

Martin was the disappointing one for me last night really. He let his frustration boil over and he shouldn’t have. I can see why he’s frustrated; the club have invested money in improving the team (Something we’ve all been crying out for and moaning about previously), we’ve lost the first game and fans are already throwing vitriol on social media and demanding more, more, more. He probably feels a little resentment to people who criticise what he views as them pushing the boat out (in relation to the ownership and investment in the team and backroom). But whatever the frustration someone in his position has, you can't go into stuff like this and throwing the fingers at the fans, if they're right or wrong it never lands well. He'll be regretting how he came across today I'm sure.

I think this forum and social media in general will always bring out the more 'vocal' fans (lunatic fringe!!! joke), you'll never get those sorts at a fan forum and the questions will always be a little more muted than you'd see on here. I agree that some of the negativity and content posted on here and social media in general is frustrating to sift through at times, especially when people take 'gossip' as gospel and spin it to mean the worst possible news, or they make up/readjust the truth to make their own argument sit a little better. I can see why people are a little bit apprehensive, that's probably a better way to put it. We go into this season on the back of losing pretty much every week for 3 months. I'm personally happy that the club haven't sat on their hands and have tried to make changes on the back of that, but the apprehension comes from the lack of experience in the signings we've made and the fact we are still having to start players like Moussa and Valery, that doesn't scream huge progress. I know the buck stops with Ralph and as with most football fans, changing the manager will fix it all, but I do think we need to give this a bit more time as there have been changes to adjust to. But like you say and something i also agree with, the end of the window will look different. It often does. The club aren't daft enough to finish the window thinking that Adams and Armstrong are going to 'make the difference' up top, as Ralph keeps alluding to. So we need to show patience, but I can see why people find it difficult to show patience when we've been losing for months - but all I'd say is that we're approaching this season slightly differently, forget last season and let's see where we are come October before we all start jumping out of windows.