S-Clarke

It's exactly right what he's saying, it's not massively likely...but the best chance a club of our stature has of getting there is to constantly plug away, season after season, get your structure right and your long-term plan right and you never know - one season the glass may smash and you get through. But having a consistent top 6 club is more realistic for us. And it's something I never thought I'd ever see 6 years ago.

I think Pastor has just unintentionally 'come out'.

Not necessarily, if the scouting is top notch then you go out and get another player who has the same attributes as Clyne, not quite at the same level right now - but with the coaching he develops and turns into someone as good as Clyne is now. Same with Morgan, or Victor. We can't go out there and buy ready-made, that's not what we're about. If we lose Morgan for £30m, I'm sure Clasie is being seen as the replacement at about £15m. He has a ton of potential, and it's important to remember that good coaching comes into effect here - how well a player did at club x, doesn't necessarily translate to how he'll do at the new club. If they're coached well and brought along well, we could even end up with better players than the ones who left over time. It's a sound way of doing it for a club like ourselves, there may bumps every now and then, but we're never, ever going to be a club that will buy a ready-made £30-40m player. In the same way that we're never going to be able to say ''No thanks'' to a £30m offer for one of our players.

Well that's not going to happen. If he hasn't scored by the end of August the knives will be out, just as they were when he first joined us.

I think for most it would be a no-brainer. Keeping Morgan would be enormous, he is a CL level player without question and one of the best players in his position in world football. Clyne is a very good player, but a hell of a lot more replaceable than Morgan would be. But to be honest, I don't want either to go!

It's a minuscule thing to focus on really, I don't agree with what you are saying at all. I'm not saying Cork is a bad player, but he was the same player as plenty of others we had. He wouldn't have changed anything. But he was a good pro and a decent player, so he's not going to look poor for his new side. I believe Cork did get given a few deadlines and the club made the decision to get as much as they could, rather than lose him for nothing, as he was clearly not going to stay beyond this year. I don't see what anyone has done wrong here. He's a totally different player to JWP or Davis, in my opinion. As poor as they've been latley, they're a lot more agile and suttle on the ball and are able to play that number 10 role a little easier than someone like Cork, who wasn't the most technically gifted player in the world - and he'd probably admit that. But if we had a midfield of Morgan, Wanyama and Cork I don't exactly think that would help our goal threat, it would probably hinder it further. And whilst Europe would be massive for our progression, it's not the be all and end all if we don't make this unexpected step this year, which let's face it - it will be an unexpected step based on where we all thought we'd be. I think we'll still do it, got a feeling we'll be 6th next Sunday, but whatever does happen it won't be because of Jack flaming Cork.

No, it isn't a gamble. ACL injuries aren't as career ending as they once were, he's had good support through the year and looks in good shape now. Either way, even if he's not quite as good, the club is in a much stronger position than it would be if his contract was running down. But if you say giving him a new contract is a gamble, then surely going into next season with a few months left on his deal is an even bigger gamble? He comes back, starts scoring, clubs see he's returned - off goes a £20m value player on a free transfer. The club would be ripped apart by people on here if that happened.

Jack Cork is not a number 10. He is a Morgan/Wanyama type midfield player (Reed like as well). He would only have played through injury and suspension, he was not first choice in those positions which is fair enough - as you said, Morgan is in a different league. We will have had as much goal threat as we have at the moment with Jack Cork in the side. He is not the savior of football. He left for first team football, he could have stayed and signed a contract, but he wanted to play every week. No one did anything wrong, but of course a bad patch of form will bring trash like this to the surface. Because that's all it is. Player leaves club and does well elsewhere shocker.

Morgan 5.. I just cannot believe that goal scoring and goal threat are being used as reasons why we should have kept him. Tadic 7

No he hasn't.

Lol, so if we hadn't signed him up all we'd have seen on here would have been - ''Bad news, club can't keep anyone, we're going down, we're not showing any ambition'' And as he has signed up, we hear (probably from the people who'd have said the above, I might add): '' This is a gamble / I would have waited / hope we don't stop looking for another player / We can't rely on him anymore / Doesn't mean much with him extending his deal'' Couldn't make it up, this place is classic sometimes.

http://www.transfermarkt.co.uk/daniel-sturridge/verletzungen/spieler/47082 He's made of glass.

That wasn't the same situation at all. He signed a new deal in the summer of 2013, and left in the summer of 2014. So we had another year, on a bigger contract, which allowed us to sell him for a much bigger fee. Whatever happens in a years time, we're in a much stronger position.

Lol i saw that and thought WTF as well. Nice one OS.

Don't go all Ed Milliband on us.

Probably, but you'll still get the usual ''Oh he only signed because he was injured and we had no real competition'.

Oh good, a bit of good news which has been needed! Hopefully this signals the start of a couple more contract signings....dare to dream?

Other than that, a really realistic signing.

Not at £120 p/w, no.

To be fair, last night they played an extreme tippy tap frustrating game with a team full of exactly the same player, just different names.

This is a bit odd, turned up on Emmanuel's twitter feed (pretty sure it's his account) and was then deleted promptly. Luckily someone took a screen grab!

So, is there a new deadline now? - So basically, what I can kind of sort of extract from that is that he's given us his decision and he wants to stay, albeit with slightly altered terms. To be fair, Utd and co have probably run a mile after his performances these past 6 weeks.

He's out until November this time, they think they've got to the route of his problems - but at the end of the day he's always been made of glass, talented player, but Liverpool fans say they need to replace him in the summer as they can't rely on him anymore.

http://www.dailyecho.co.uk/sport/saints/news/12943577._/?ref=mac Uh oh.

Most Liverpool fans have given up on Sturridge, and I'm inclined to agree with them.