S-Clarke

I'm with you, I don't have any questions in terms of how serious it can be and I'm not one of those who thinks the entire thing was made up on day 1. But to me, this feels like it's being prolonged now, and like you...the stats aren't adding up to me? There's still a lot of fear mongering out there, mainly put out by the SAGE guys if you read it. We were told that vaccines are the way out of this....but now we're starting to hear, as per last year ''testing is the way out of this'' - what is it? If we've all been jabbed, why is testing the key again? Surely there has to come a point when we all get back to normal? If the scientists have their way then It feels like this is going to be an endless cycle of the same for years upon years upon years. Opening up, closing down, opening up, closing down. ''Infections are rising, mutation number x - we all need a new jab, new lockdown required''. Rinse/repeat etc.

If i'm honest, I didn't expect anything else. Getting a new sponsor in this climate would have been challenging, I doubt anyone else would have offered that value. Sponsorship is sponsorship, no idea why it's a disgrace. If it allows us to keep a player or to sign an additional player that will improve our chances next season on the field, then what's the problem?

I think he's decent, you're not going to get much better for £10m. He definitely needs better players around him though, he couldn't burden the load all on his own shoulders. But he's very effective in the right partnership/with the right players around him.

Sounds like we must never criticise Southampton players or call them shit. But, we can call the opposition shit. So, if we lose at the weekend, who is actually shit?

Standard Lemina really, in and out of the side, 1 or 2 games where he stands out a little, but mixed in with a load of avergeness and 'missing in action' performances. I think we could poss get 7-8m fee wise from someone as a going rate. The Fulham agreed fee is 4-5m I think. But yeah, your question is valid - who else could be interested? If he does come back, it may well be yet another loan I guess.

We may still have Lemina to shift as well.....again! Might be able to get a couple of million extra if we are able to sell to someone else.

Elyonoussi is an interesting one as I feel like the club are going to give him a shot. I don't think he's suited to this league though. If he's happy being on the bench he'd certainly add some of that missing depth, but how impactful he can be is questionable.

The injuries Liverpool have had are a convenient issue for them to hide behind. The reality is that they have been regressing since the start of 2020 - in all area's, not just the back 4. I don't think many expected Thiago to downgrade their midfield and game plan as much as he has either, totally the wrong player for them. Real Madrid didn't have their first choice defence last night, but Liverpool didn't really do anything against them. Looks to be a year without the 'famous European nights' at Anfield next year.

Seems to have been the case for the last few windows. Seems a bit daft that Utd want to keep him around, but don't play him. I think he's looked like an accomplished player when he plays, needs game time at his age. I imagine this summer he'll make that clear to the club.

You can't ignore that he's been an absolute liability in recent games though. It was embarrassing how he was failing to deal with Wood at the weekend, and he was absolutely pulled apart against Man Utd. His average stats for interceptions are up there with some of the better players in this league, but his recent games in isolation have been really poor. I like Jan, i think he's been a decent CB for us - but he makes me really nervous atm.

Sadly I don't think he's going to be playing at this level for us. I can see him heading out to a L1 club to rebuild his career and climb back up the leagues. There was a potential PL player there at one stage, feels a lifetime ago now though.

If the wages are decent, then I have no real qualms about it. Don't expect tons of goals, but his movement does open space and create opportunities for others. Automatically our attack flowed and functioned better with him as part of it. Players like Ings and Redmond are better when he's around them, in my opinion. He has always lacked a football brain, but he does have good technical ability on the ball - let's not forget he has played at a very, very high level during his career - a very, very good PL /champions league level player at one stage. It feels like a decent fit for him to end his career here to be honest. I don't think there's any doubt in this one, it feels guaranteed to happen and will probably be announced before the end of the season.

Big fan of Diallo, a really good example of how our scouting has improved in my opinion.

Pretty much because of what Ralph has said previously, this is just how I see it playing out. ''We can't buy ready made players, we can only buy players who take time to adjust - not ready from day one etc'' - so that's why I think getting Theo on a freebie is an easy fix for an immediate Ings replacement, with Redmond and Adams up front. Whilst they spend some money on a Diallo/Salisu type striker who will take a few months/year to get up to speed. We also need to factor in Bertrand - if he goes...which is possible, that's him gone with no fee. So a large portion of that Ings transfer will need to go on a left back as well. To be fair to the club, our scouting has improved - so I have hope that whoever we bring in will be decent in time, as Diallo has proven as the shining example from this summers recruitment.

My fear here is that the club feel they can replace Ings by signing Theo on a free to provide the 'immediate' replacement, and then getting a young/untried player (who needs time to bed in) from a lesser league on a cheapo deal. I'm sure the club will also sell the idea of Redmond as a striker to us as well. It's a recipe for relegation if there ever was one.

As soon as I saw that Wolves midfield I thought they'd get trounced.

The standard of this Everton v Palace game is just beyond bad.

But we did, so the point is moot. Why are we focusing on being 2-0 down to Burnley? We won the game, 3 points, job done. Now planning for next season.

Agreed, too much is made of 'resting' players. I'd argue that a week is more than enough 'rest' time between matches, and any more time out and you're kinda playing in the realms of losing match fitness. Keep the same key players, get some momentum, take that into the Leicester game and leave everything on the pitch.

I think all that really does is illustrate how poor our squad is and how little depth we've ever had to play with. That's one of my only real criticisms of Ralph, thinking a small squad was a sensible idea and probably putting way too much faith in the academy lads, who lets face it, are way off the level required in the main. The chat from Ralph is that we want to address the depth this summer, my only worry is that in order to facilitate that we'll have to take two steps backwards (sell some key players) in order to add and move forward in squad depth size. It's a really difficult position to be in tbh. West Ham have a much better squad than us, much more experience. Bar 4 or so key players in our group (whom you notice when they are missing) the rest is either pretty average or just inexperienced. So when you hit a situation whereby 3 of those key players are missing, you are in big, big, trouble. I'm not sure who could do better with a front two of N'Lundulu and Adams, with Stephens in CM and Bednarek at RB.

Could be a bit of an 'after the lord mayor's' show for them, you often see it play out like that. Would be good to get some momentum again and I think it's fully possible.

You overrate our squad and players if you think those finishes are average with this lot. It's pretty much par the course. I'd say he over achieved during 2020, so I for one judged him over a very large period and he was actually getting to the 60 point ball park. Obviously we couldn't ever get that during an actual season because we don't have the depth, but the 2020 form alone shows you that he's extracting the absolute maximum from this bunch.

Looks like being one of the worst weekends of the season for Fulham. Could be curtains for them soon. I hope Newcastle continue their shitness though, as it will make the end of the season interesting.

It was a shite and laboured start, we started too slow and just seemed a little off it. Stood off Burnley a little. Was not happy with those first 20 mins and I'm fairly sure Ralph wouldn't have been either. But overall that performance was a real positive. Lots of inventive attacking play, lots of chances created. The subs to me made sense, I'd have made them if I was a manager to be honest - not that I am. One of Burnley's tactics was pinging balls to the far post and isolating players against KWP. Putting an extra CB in there killed that dead, so that avenue for them was no more. At the end of the day Burnley's approach was balls into the box, so having as many CB's in the closing stages made entire sense to me. Our first win at home after what feels like forever was never going to be perfect, but we got over the line and showed a side that I haven't seen before from this lot (in terms of recovering from a very low ebb). It was always going to be a nervy end, it would have been more suicidal to just throw more attackers on and just carry on as we were hoping for the best - If we'd have dropped points from that approach I'm sure Ralph would have been crucified (in essence, that would have been going like for like and playing the same way - a criticism which has been put on his door for the last few months). But he did alter things today in order to see the game out, and for some reason that's still a problem. I still think we're on for 40+ points quite comfortably this year, and with this squad and with the disjointed injuries we've had this year, that's probably around right.

He's been a bit of a mess for weeks tbh.