Barsiem

We seem to have been a bit screwed by duckworth Lewis here... We scored 8 an over over 20 overs. Gloucestershire need to score 8.4 an over over 9 overs to win. Surely it should be higher given then have less than half the overs to retain their 10 wickets?

Reading between the lines with how transfer fees tend to be leaked, I'm guessing Lavias fee will be £40-45m guaranteed, with £10-15m in add-ons

What spinner would you have selected instead out of interest? I think Ali was the right call. We didn't have any real alternatives. It's not necessarily the greatest idea to chuck a youngster into the 1st test of an ashes series. It's going to be tense tomorrow! What a game it's been so far. Big question marks over Bairstow though given his performance behind the stumps. Even if he averages 50 with the bat it's not going to compensate for the chances he will miss if he continues like he has the last few days

We're pretty much a one man team atm... If Vince plays well we win, if he's out cheaply we lose

Even if you're right (which I personally doubt) you'd be hard pushed to say his first foray into senior management was in any way a success. So why should he walk straight into another role when there are so many other candidates out there? I could understand him being appointed as an assistant again & then eventually graduating to the managers role, but straight into the top job I just don't think is justified

Oops!! Shows how much attention I pay to whatever league Saints aren't in 😂

It's honestly nuts that Selles is in consideration for any manager job, let alone one at championship level. At least with Jones you could point to his great work at Luton in two different spells. Just shows how a manager's profile and "experience" is valued so much more than their actual record

I don't know Caicedo's game very well but given the amount he's valued at Lavia is surely better value. His ceiling is so high as well but I guess the downside is whether he'll take a couple of years to get to a similar level. Still hopeful we can get £50m min for him I wonder if the Arse are preparing for not having Partey available if they want both Rice & Lavia.

The way some of you write players/managers off is crazy.... I've just looked it up & apparently Onuachu played a grand total of 405 minutes for us.... Or exactly 4 & a half games in total. 5 starts, and 6 appearances off the bench of less than 30mins each. This coming to a new country, league and playing for a team that was franking diabolical and completely disfunctional. He may well move on, but if he stays I'm still reserving judgement on whether he's actually any good or not and certainly not writing him off at this stage. He was top scorer in the Belgian league so clearly can find the goal at the right level. He may well be great in the Championship after struggling in the PL like players like Solanke have been at Bournemouth. And I certainly don't think any of us have seen enough of him in a Saints shirt to say otherwise

We're going well against Kent, who I see have put coverage of the match behind a paywall!! £6 to watch the match

Where has he said that?? As others as said he doesn't suit the way we play, but definitely a good option for any club happy to play him as a proper winger

Anyone else finding that the YouTube stream is stuttering constantly tonight? Really hard to watch for me atm

He's not eating up overs though if he's going for 10+runs per over every game... his lowest run rate this season so far is 9 runs per over. I like him a lot but he's been poor for a couple of years now. Looks a long way away from the player who was picked for England.

I know it won't last, but Vince is currently averaging 175 in the T20 this year!! Opening the batting and after 5 innings that is pretty incredible. I think we need to drop Crane. He seems to have gone backwards in the last couple of years. Compared to Dawson it's night and day. He might be another one who could benefit from a change of scenery ala Briggs as he's stagnating here

Do we have a thread for players we tried really hard to sign but didn't?? If so then whoops this post should be in that thread. We tried very hard to sign Quincy Promes about 5 or so years back... Looks like we dodged a very big bullet by failing to land him https://twitter.com/DeadlineDayLive/status/1663591111665893377

Yeah you're probably right. They still have Kante as well so not exactly short in that position

I could certainly forsee them buying him and loaning him to West Ham, who will need a Rice replacement. I still think Chelsea is his most likely destination though, and given Pochs record of bringing on youngsters that'd be a good move for him IMO

It also illustrates the discrepancies between the haves and the haves nots in this league. By rights Chelsea should be bottom of the league with about 4 points given how they've been run this season, but an awful year for a club like that still means they are comfortably safe in the league and can afford to keep all of their talent. We've had not nearly as awful a year (although still awful) and are bottom and relegated...

Nowhere near thankfully... More like a 4/5-0

TBF it was also a very impressive display by Somerset. Great bowling and fielding by them. Craig overton alone took 3 wickets and a further 4 catches! Batting got easier, so it was a bad toss to lose. Let's hope it's a blip rather than the tone for the campaign

I hope we do sue. If Everton got a points deduction it'd be the difference between finishing 19th or 20th this year

My predictions (which are always wrong but hey ho): Lavia c£50m + young player in exchange to bring total transfer value closer to £60m - will be to Chelsea or Man City as they have lots of great youngsters JWP - £25-30m to Villa, West Ham or at a push Newcastle (unlikely though) ABK - c£20m to mid table prem team or back to Germany Tella - I think he'll stay but if he goes it won't be for less than £20m. We have no reason to sell unless he forces a move so Burnley will need to pay over the odds Salisu - £10-15m. Not sure where though.... Maybe France? KWP - £20m to West ham or Villa Moi - free transfer We could possibly lose Adams or Stuart Armstrong as well, but I'm expecting them to stay. Don't think we'll sell Alcaraz unless we get a stupid offer

I don't think RH would have kept us up, though I think we would have put up more of a fight than we have. I don't think he was enjoying the job for some time, and I think he was waiting to be pushed tbh for the payoff he was due, which we should have done in the summer. Let's not forget that RHs record as manager for the whole of 2022 was absolutely abysmal. We needed a new manager at the helm, but got two appointments hopelessly wrong.

I'm sure early days Ralph wouldn't have tolerated it, but he was pretty much broken by the end of his time here imo... As was the club

The article itself infers this was indeed happening under Ralph, and that neither Jones nor Selles sorted it out when they took charge