Lallana's Left Peg

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:

From The Secret Footballer: http://www.thesecretfootballer.com/articles/the-secret-footballer/28604/jose-mourinho-suffers-and-spouts-rubbish-after-creating-his-own-problems/#slide-2

http://www.mirror.co.uk/tv/tv-news/

Game management and tactical awareness is one of the things that all players are appraised on when scouting them - in fact I think I read an article in the last few years where many scouts said it is now one of the most important things clubs look for. Wasting time has long been about, it's a valid part of the game as far as I am concerned and I don't mind it, even if it is unsporting.

When appraising Stek it's important to remember that we were after a keeper on loan to see us through a season and would understand that when Forster is back next season he is our number 1. So we had to get a keeper who is of a decent standard and understood he has no future with us after this season. I'd say Stek is pretty good under those circumstances.

It's a shame that the Saints performance will be overshadowed by Mourinho's faux meltdown in what is a desperate attempt from him to deflect attention away from the fact he hasn't got a grip on his football team.

I know both squads likely have absentees through injury but looking at it I just can't see what Dutch players would get in our team, and who beyond Janmaat, Blind, Wijnaldum, RvP and maybe Depay would get in our squad.

There aren't many in that Dutch squad that would get in the England team. And only a handful would get in our squad in my opinion.

All Managers are at it when it comes to pubic comments about players though. What stood Rodgers apart was his derogatory comment about the CLUB in the summer of 2014 when he questioned our ambition and implied we willingly sold Lallana et al because we no longer wanted to compete. Complete ****.

Hard to have any sympathy with this one - it didn't need to be this way if Wilson or the Bournemouth physio acted with any sense.

I don't think Clasie will have any expectations to score goals to be fair. It'll be interesting to see how he fits into the team. I always thought we looked best with two 'destroyers' in the holding midfield role and the player further ahead of them to be the one who stitches play between midfield and attack. But more recently Koeman has preferred Davis to Romeu which goes against that so maybe Clasie plays deeper even though a few on here have said he has been training to play in the advanced role for us. If he does play deeper it will be interesting to see who is preferred in the more advanced role - Davis or JWP.

That's not the point I was making - it is that the moment they play for England they are deemed to play at a level where others earn far more than them. So they see themselves as a player of that quality and consequently want to be paid that much - playing for Saints or otherwise.

No Reed either. Could be injured of course, but last week Martin Hunter told the BT Sport commentator that he expected several of his players to leave on loan soon. Could Reed be one of them?