Lallana's Left Peg

I do. Go for it.

Let me ask the question: Why would he?

The Dutch FA could make him a great offer he can't turn down, but he won't go crawling to them at the first opportunity they show any interest. He's hardly publicly positioned himself for the role over the last 12 months has he? If anything he has been very critical in a way someone can if they don't want the job. EDIT: And the current Barcelona Manager finished midtable with his previous club and got the gig.

He was a contender for the job in the summer of 2014 and the Dutch FA went in another direction. He has since improved his managerial standing with his work at Saints to the point that he is being linked with Barcelona. Whilst I think he would of course like to manage Holland the timing isn't right for him. I don't think it is a given he leaves to join them should the role be made available. In addition he has been very critical of Dutch football in general recently and he may feel he doesn't have the tools to succeed with the national team at this moment in time.

Firstly I wish your Dad all the best however whilst it would have been nice to receive a letter I don't think the club are obliged to give a refund at all therefore I would take that as a nice gesture in itself from the club.

I would not beat up Krueger (or anyone else involved) regarding the Veho deal. While it is very light income wise, it was the right fit for the club at the time - someone available at short notice, a local firm, and a step in the right direction. But right now we need to look at a deal worth £5m+ a season at least - certainly if this table is anything to go by: http://www.totalsportek.com/football/premier-league-shirt-sponsorship-deals/ That extra £4m a season would equal an extra 80k a week we can increase the wage bill by - and that is definitely very handy.

Alli has a bigger frame and is quicker / more powerful. The start to his career in the Premier League has been very good but at the same time he is also making some very wreckless and dangerous challenges which shows that he still has a long way to go. He is playing for a Manager that will give him every chance so it will be down to him, but had Spurs signed Wanyama...

He's been namechecked by Hodgson already in the past so he is already on the radar. There are others ahead of him in the queue though, however it's debatable whether or not someone with 5 appearances to his name in the Premier League should be one.

I think Les Reed said we structure the deals in such a way that the more the player on loan plays the less the club he is at pay for him. Stephens is at a good club and will have a tough time getting in that Middlesbrough team unless there are injuries. Gallagher needs to refine his craft - he is a big lad with a lot of upside but his general touch isn't great and that will really impact the degree he can influence a game. Turnbull plays all the time at Swindon but they appear to be crap this season. I'd expect several more from the U21's to go out on loan soon as well as they aren't getting too much from U21 football even if they are playing all the time.

I know the club likes to take the dignified silence route when dealing with press speculation but it does seem like the press find it remarkably easy to target the club with stories like this. Wouldn't mind seeing the club fight back a little at all if possible.

He's definitely a midfielder. I think he likes to get forward quite a bit though.

As someone who doesn't live in Southampton I rely quite heavily on Saints digital media output to see what is going on at the club and keep up to date with things. I personally think that what they do is outstanding and very well balanced all things considering. The work with the Academy and U21 news / games is brilliant and in general the features they produce every so often are of the right tone and varied enough to not become boring. The pieces are for the clubs fans and whilst they may not directly increase our revenue or fan base, they are something which keep existing fans engaged and there is a lot to be said for that. Gaining new fans isn't anything to do with the digital media output - you need other channels to introduce the club for that but there is no doubt that our media guys do a great job. It's the marketing department that needs to come up with ways to grow our fan base - the team do the business on the pitch more often than not and the media guys certainly produce enough output to keep fans engaged.

Things I would be interested in asking: 1. How work is progressing to increase commercial revenue to the point that we can at least be average for a club our size in the Premier League (especially important in FFP rules). 2. The players who aren't signing new deals - in the clubs opinion how much more are the players earning at their new club compared to what the clubs best offer to them was? And can any work be done to bridge this gap? 3. A few years ago the club (Les Reed) publicly stated that they didn't believe that loans were the best way to develop their young players. This attitude has noticeably changed in the last 18 months - why? 4. As the club continues to establish itself in the top half of the Premier League it becomes harder to provide a platform for young players to develop in the first team but the club is still based on the ethos of giving kids the a chance - what (if any) steps have the club taken to ensure this can still be the case? Or is it a matter of the quality of kids coming through aren't good enough? 3 and 4 may be related but as a fan I'd be interested to know the current line of thinking, especially as a number of current U21's are about to be sent out on loan and our first team squad has a number of players who don't play much and were recently purchased.

If the presence of debt allows us to avoid paying tax and means we can invest the money into the club (in any aspect) then I don't see the debt as being a bad thing. I am not financially aware enough to know if that can be done with £5m debt or £60m debt. If the bulk of our current debt is related to the new training ground then doesn't that mean in effect we haven't really paid for any of it a year after it was built? Or have I misread things?

Exactly the sort of drivel that comes from Liverpool fans which makes the rest of football laugh at them. Remarkably, as much of it comes from fans who have never seen them play in person as they do those born and raised in Liverpool.

It doesn't have to. Our sponsorship deal with Veho is up this summer and whilst it was a nice partnership it is now time to get a sponsor who can pay us market rate for our standing in the game. Likewise, I think new shirt deal kicks in this summer. There is scope for it to increase dramatically this summer.

I think that is fair but it does sort of go at odds with some of the holier than thou 'we run a football club the proper way' message the club has been sending out. Just because it is a 'soft' debt doesn't mean it is any less of a debt, it just means we are fortunate to have an owner who doesn't appear to want her money back unless she sells the club. It will be interesting to see what the plan is to reduce the debt while continuing to invest on the pitch. Commercial income must increase dramatically (£10m is pathetic for a club finishing where we do in the most financially powerful league in the world) and this is a big summer for the club (again!).

1min 8secs in: "Ryan Seager with the anal for Southampton" Bit rude but they are in Amsterdam I suppose.

I suspect Liverpool will get a lift from his arrival but without an established (well, performing) club structure behind him it will be interesting to see how that impacts on the effectiveness of his management style.

Can whomever manages public / media appearances for club officials please take ensure Krueger doesn't do anything other than for official channels again http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-3264148/Southampton-built-faith-beginning-don-t-just-buy-success-breed-insists-chairman-Ralph-Krueger.html He's seems to be doing very good work internally but he's just not schooled enough in our sport to talk at events like this.

Well balanced article - from my perspective I am not looking for him to dominate a game or wrestle control of it, but more I am just waiting to see him define himself as a player. A part of that will be settling on a position and then making it his own. At the moment he has gaps in his skillset playing as an attacking midfielder and a defensive midfielder, and it's not good enough at the level we need to play at just to be 'ok' at the moment (especially in the centre of the park). 100 appearances in and we're still not too sure what his best position is because we're not sure what sort of player he is, so that will need to come soon, but he should definitely be afforded the opportunity to find it.

We're probably not a big enough club to play the 'exceptional talent' card for kids in front of a work tribunal.

I agree with that but despite him being fifth in the pecking order there are three positions in the team occupied by those foursome at any one time and I can't help but feel that if Koeman really rated him he would have been more involved this season - even if not on the pitch then on the bench as a viable option.

From that Secret Footballer article: