Lallana's Left Peg

Don't assume Cork will sign a new deal. And we're tracking midfielders because of that plus we know that there will be interest in Schneiderlin towards the end of the window when some of the big boys miss out on primary targets and start working their way down the list. The club is always scouting not just for need, but also for succession planning. Any other approach would just be negligent.

You pay a premium for players in the Premier League because they have already proven themselves at the level required. The extra value that adds to their transfer fee is clear to see. You can buy players of equal talent for much less from abroad, but what you don't have that guarantee they can perform in the Premier League. Saints have sold three players who have proved themselves in the league we play in and replaced two of them thus far with players who play in a competition far inferior. That is not to say they won't adapt and be productive, but also that is not to say that they will. No-one knows. It's impossible. We just have to hope that in addition to their talent Saints have managed to scout and assess their ability to adapt to our league - but I suspect they haven't because it's impossible.

At £40k a week he's literally taken up Lambert's old (reported) wage as well.

I hope Pelle can make the step up. Signings from Holland either go brilliantly or fail spectacularly!

He was a gun for hire who did his job well but we've moved on now and I suspect he knows that as well. Going to be hard to shift him because of his wages, and even then that it appears no other Premier League team wants him should given an indication as to his level of ability. I'm going to guess he remains with us to the end of August where he'll find a loan to a team that will only pay a certain % of his wages. At the end of the season he gets released.

That was last summer, when Norwich and Swansea both won the summer transfer window.

Headless chicken who spends more time cutting inside and hitting pearollers than he does passing it and crossing it. Appreciate he scored a winner against us last season but the amount of times he messes up Norwich attacks is baffling. If he can be coached out of it then he may be worth a punt but if he continues to play like he is thick then lets leave him alone and concentrate on buying proper footballers.

I think its a load of made up tripe. I think they randomly assign a value to the player more than anything else.

Are we really going to be upset for him tripling his salary? Would rather we focus on the players we've got than those we haven't.

I don't think we would have signed Tadic if there was a belief in the club that Ramirez was the man.

Tadic.

He was just on SSN. He spoke very well and dealt with all the questions very easily. When asked about players leaving he said that Saints are known as a club who make players better and they leave.

No English keeper can kick well, I've still no idea why it appears we are only after British keepers. There are loads of foreign keepers out there who fill the sweeper / distributer role very well and are good shot stoppers.

Agreed but we also have a lot of young players that have wage accelerators built into their deals which will eat into the wage space saved.

Would be a great signing for us but aside from wages being a problem the release clause of £8m means all the big boys are keeping him as their backup plan and he won't leave for a club like us (if at all) until he knows a better move won't materialise for him.

£15m for Osvaldo? Not going to happen. Plus we need to manage the wage bill properly. I can't see us being keen to spend more money to increase the wage bill from what we had last season. Doesn't seem sustainable to me.

Even then Colback is apparently on £50k+ a week and I wouldn't want to go near him if that is true.

Being present at the humiliating defeats away to both Sheffield Wednesday and Preston - getting beat so badly and in performances which appeared to lack effort and spirit that the club, hardly rolling in money, felt so bad they offered supporters who went to both games a free ticket to the Cardiff away game. We got beat in that game too, but I recall it was only by the odd goal. Ah, the days of going to away games where it felt like some sort of voluntary torture despite the feeling right before kick off of 'what if we got a point'.

Both Koeman and Tadic speak very well it must be said. Sounds like Tadic is very humble with his approach to the team as well. If he can add some Balkan spirit and grit in that part of the pitch the fans will warm to him a great deal regardless of his quality.

The appeal of the fee is tempered somewhat by the trepidation that we may not be able to replace him with someone who is as good. It's been nothing but an upward trajectory for the last 5 years where all we've ever done is replace by buying someone who is better. We may now be back at the point where that doesn't happen and as much as it always use to be the way during most of our supporting lives the idea just isn't a nice feeling.

I didn't bump / merge the thread!

Good for them. Because I reported it as news in March.

No but then the question posed is unrealistic too so if he is a Saints player then I'm damn well playing him over Yoshida and Hooiveld