david in sweden

of course the artificial surfaces are to help solve the climatic problem...3 foot of snow in winter doesn't help keeping pitches in trim - does it ? I agree the standard isn't what it was, and partly because many of the best talents are being bought up quickly by foreign clubs. At the moment, there are at least half-a-dozen Swedish players in teams at the top of the Dutch league, as well as a few in Germany and other countries. Only the better ones may get to play in the Prem. and rumour has it Man.U will buy one of the Elm brothers (Rasmus)? ...in the summer. John Guidetti left Sweden as a 17 y.o and played through Man.City's youth squads and is presently on loan to Feyenoord and has around 20 goals to date. It's a transitional period in the Swedish side at the moment, a few old heads still around, and the youngsters " aren't quite there " yet. Still ..it will be interesting in Euros as I always hate it when Sweden and England are in the same group - something always goes wrong !

if they pack a few thousand Saints shirts as extra baggage, selling them at the ground might pay for the trip...? what's their crowd attendances like anyway ?

don't think the YEN is so strong as it used to be ...?

I don't think I said that either - did I ? ....that was something in Nicola Cortese's interview ..e-mail him and tell him it's not possible. Like you I do think we will do better than survive, and midtable is possible - (even with some of this squad and a few new names,) but it will take quite a lot of changes ..and a few years to be able to... " do a Newcastle " with what we have now ...IMO.

That was a spontaneous tongue-in-cheek comment, and I don't think we'll make millions out of that one, but it's popular for Swedes to spend a long weekend in London - doing Knightsbridge on Fridays and Stamford Bridge or the Emirates on Saturdays. If we get Japanese flying in to watch Chung play at SMS ..we can always put them in the visitors end ..they'll never know the difference. ...but I do think it possible to build a good team on the backs of a superior youth squad, provided you support them with a few top class buys every season.

I agree with you . ..but he has few admirers on this site (as memory serves). I really liked him as a player, and as you say, as manager in 89/90 we finished 7th that season - his reward from the Board was a sacking for poor performance - and then they sold Rod Wallace to Leeds the following day for £1 million.

Exactly the point I've made on many previous occasions. But in this day and age..how can you hang on to a young player..whoo hasn't even made a proper debut, and has passed 20-21 ? Twenty years ago, few players got a debut BEFORE they were 21, nowadays it's the age when you have to choose. We let Andy Townsend go ..because he took too long to recover from a leg break, but he went on to success at Norwich and Chelsea and several dozen Irish caps. Chris Baird came as a 16 year old, eventually played in the Cup Final..and waited another 2 years to get a chance to play - and then only because of an injury crisis amongst defenders. £3 million pounds later, he became a regular at Fulham and even went on th captain the N.I. side. It's a lottery when you have to choose. Thank goodness we had the patience to keep Adam Lallana!

there are some anomolies here that people are failing to grasp. A bigger stadium will not (necessarily) guarantee a much larger income. OK - extend SMS - (if you like to ...38K-42K), but where do the fans come from? Comparing our crowds with the two Liverpool clubs, of any of the major London ones is not a fair comparison as the Hampshire catchment area has a much lower population. Even those who would like to come have the restriction of travelling / distance, economy etc, especially if they come from further afield. If we compare Saints following now - with one of our better seasons ...2002-03, Strachan was Manager. We finished an impressive 8th, James Beattie scored 23 league goals and we got to the FA Cup Final. 4 games had LESS than 30K, and 12 were in excess of 31K. This season just finished we averaged around 27K ?... and 23 home games brought in approx. 620,000 people. ...Nest season with only 19 home Prem. games ..if we average 31K per game, that will be only 608,000 It is quite possible that a lesser number of fans will see the 19 home games next season than saw all of the 23 home NPC this. Of course the club's income will be a little higher, as no-one expects prices to stay the same, but those who may "drop out " for economic reasons may be replaced by others who may not normally come so it may balance out. But as others have pointed out - gate receipts account for only 20-30% of the clubs annual income. It's TV money that will pay for the transfer fees and salaries + sale of the most promising Academy lad ..Who is the next Alex ?..and how much will he go for ...in 3-5 years time? Increasing the size of SMS to anything less than 40K doesn't make economic sense - unless you can be guaranteed to fill it to 90% every game...and bearing in mind there's only 19 games a season now. Yes - it would be great to sit in a 40K+ stadium....but the cost of the extension would take min. 10-15 years to recover-perhaps longer. The big income is in TV / media and merchandising. Sign another Japanese..or better still ...a Chinese. Are there any good players in India?. The big income in future ...will be sales of shirts in the Asian countries....and sales of travel package deals to visit SMS on a match day.

that's correct too, I had two other Steve's in the same sentence. oops! I shouldn't have forgotten him. Scored 40 seconds into his debut game at The Dell ..and on TV too!

yes of course..memory slip on my part. THX

We enjoy looking back at successful youngsters coming through (whatever past youth systems there were years ago) and the last 3 (Walcott, Bale and Alex OC) are prime examples of superior talents at a very young age. Now we look forward to seeing names like; Shaw, Stephens, Ward-Prowse, Sinclair and Moore appearing on future team sheets, but how successful can they be?. As a 50 year fan, my memory goes back to several generations of observing the progress of newcomers. Mick Channon (eventually) came into the picture after the departure of Martin Chivers to Spurs (1968) and found it easy to score goals playing alongside the rampant goal machine that was ...Ron Davies. Dennis Hollywood succeeded Tommy Traynor and settled in alongside old heads like Joe Kirkup, John McGrath, and Jimmy Gabriel in the same period. But it was no so easy for schoolboy full back stars Bob Mc Carthy and Roger Fry who found the step up much harder in a struggling side. (the late) LB Steve Mills, looked a class above everyone else in a struggling side, and his loss was never successfully replaced. Nick Holmes (then 21) was fortunate to come into an FA Cup winning team alongside the experienced Rodrigues, Osgood, Steele and Blyth, and grew in confidence thereafter, as did Colin Waldron alongside the excellent Chris Nicholl (whose reputation was tainted by his later managerial failure). Steve Williams was outstanding - even at 17 - playing alongside his hero World Cup Alan Ball and the superlative Ivan Golac in a side where Mick Channon was still scoring goals. Steve Baker was in the side at same time as Kevin Keegan,and David Armstrong as was Steve Moran. In the late 1980's. We saw a quartet from the best youth side SFC ever - under Dave Merrington - MLT, Shearer, Danny and Rod Wallace. Full backs - Dodd, Kenna and Benali gradually played themselves into the side thanks to the support of Ruddock and Osman around them, and (the later) England keeper Tim Flowers in goal. Wayne Bridge emerged to become a regular with great support from the great centre back pairs; Monkou and Lundekvam later Dean Richards and Michael Svensson. Whereas Crainie and Mills struggled to impress in a gradually-worsening squad, and never made it with Saints. The success of our new Academy stars may not depend on how good they are, but how they are " mentored " into the side, and those players alongside them.

Mmm.. you tried it and weren't any good, eh? The tough part is ..you're playing against ..yourself. There's no-one else to blame if you ***** up !

With the seven year absence... after the 27 seasons in the top division.. I just feel its back to Status Quo !

Whilst I always think I'm a realist, certain members of my family.. sometimes.. call me a pessimist. ¨ However, I was optimistic enough to think we'd finish " top six this season" (finished) mainly because I expected better performances from WHam and Leicester in particular (who spent a LOT of money pre-season). Both Blackpool and Brum were also in my calculations, and they made it. I am surprised that Brighton didn't do better - after last seasons run, but not surprised by Peterboro' who continue to leak goals at the back - despite continuing to score a lot themselves, (at one stage I really thought they go back down). But now - it's BIG league! I think that Norwich and Swansea (not an outstanding side last season) have shown that it's possible to survive in the Prem. Where they succeeded this season, (and QPR have almost failed) is to cultivate a good stable club environment both in and outside the dressing room and keep a stable squad. The nucleaus of Saints' squad is from the L1 days, and they will, naturally, in time move on; either through age or (lack of) ability to adjust to the higher level. Based on that I think we'll hold our own for two seasons, but the real test will be who replaces the present first teamers in 2014. We will (no surprises) buy in half-a dozen " more experienced players " between now and then - and hopefully see the balance generate up through the Academy ranks, or that concept will have failed. Though it is interesting to see that only a handful of players in the Prem's top six sides have come through their respective Academies, so it is by no means a foregone conclusion that future success lies there (either for them - or for Saints.) So assuming I'm still on track; I say midtable and survival for two years. and IF Nigel is still here (no reason to suppose he won't be) AND we handle the generation shift ...outside chance of a Cup or two, and at best a place in the top six thereafter 2015 - ????. To be more optimistic than that ?...consult Messers Cortese and Adkins.

simply that some fans will judge a player... before he's played a game... by the size of the fee. If it's too low, then he can't be any good and he's a free...then he's bound to be rubbish. you mean that you haven't read those types of posts over the bygone seasons.?

..scoring the huge amount of goals we did..and all those clean sheets. half of the Prem. League sides average only one goal per game over the whole season

I was expecting that we would have paid a fee to Hiroshima. I was surprised to hear afterwards that he was on a free,(or was that widely known beforehand?). Lee's signing actually goes to prove the point that some players acquired on a free can be a very good deal.

ANOTHER error(!)...put in down to my arthritic fingers and no spell-checker!

all sounds pretty sensible to me. I'd go along with those..except that with two dozen players already " named " by various media /fan sources as new signings, I wouldn't dare to double guess who NA might buy in. Probably none of them. After the signing of Chung ..and on a free..nothing would surprise me.