Lallana's Left Peg

That's going to set some expectations again - I suspect the club must think they are close to a signing in order to say that.

Is that not what happened? Despite willing to pay more than the clause, we spent a long time talking to Atletico about it and the player left elsewhere. Why not make the proper bid for the player the moment we learnt of Spurs coming in? It was well documented they liked him, as early as May I believe. We dithered, there is nothing in the Les Reed interview that suggests otherwise.

So while we were dithering about with Atletico around the clause we allowed Spurs to come in with a bid (a very public one) and by the time we got our act together he already had his head turned and was signing with them. Sorry, but the club are not absolved of blame here. Still feel like this could have been sorted much sooner before Spurs were on the scene.

Yeah I bet threatening the selling club with legal action was a great idea for someone you wanted so much

My favourite Spurs zing in the transfer market: Petit signing for Arsenal instead of Spurs.

Yeah that sounds viable to be fair.

Interesting that Fonte would know. I always thought the club would keep transfer activity from players for various reasons, the only exception being when they want one of them to tap a target up!

It's a lot of clubs who are far bigger than us and would be appealing to our Manager. He is already talked of as a Barcelona Manager. If you think he is more likely to sign a new deal with Saints than move on after three years then I think you need to take your Saints tinted glasses off. It is far more likely, in my opinion, that he moves on after three years. I don't think his default will be to sign a new deal with Saints even if he doesn't have something lined up. He hasn't done it in the past, and I see no reason for him to do it again.

And in the time since he has left Feyenoord for Saints, do you believe his Managerial stock has risen or is it the same as when he left Holland? Thus, whilst I agree the pool of clubs he may leave Saints for is less than that which he would leave Feyenoord for, his Managerial stock has also risen which means he is more likely to get a better job. And I think you over-estimate how much of an attraction Saints are for a Manager like him - I could name lots of clubs I think he would leave Saints for. Chelsea Man City Arsenal Man Utd Liverpool Spurs Real Madrid Atletico Madrid Barcelona Valencia (though maybe not after his last experience there) Bayern Munich Dortmund Schalke Juventus Inter Milan AC Milan Roma Lazio Napoli Porto PSG Lyon Monaco Well over 20 there. Look who manages some of them now - Koeman will be a wanted man in two years unless he does something very wrong at Saints.

He was many pundits choice for Manager of the Season last season. He was linked to the Barcelona job during last season. He has let his contract run down before and left with dignity. I'd say there is every chance he leaves Saints when his deal expires based on his prior actions and his rising stock in management, which would suggest the original question asked by the poster is correct and he is more likely to leave at the end of his deal than sign a new one.

Well to be fair he left his last club without a club to go to.

I heard a bit about how this works when Man Utd purchased Anders Herrera - apparently he had to buy out his clause and Man Utd gave him the money to do that. Something crazy like that. Could be BS. Imagine having £30m dropped into your account

If the kids are good enough they will play. We had a 'golden generation' that has been taken away from us. Our Academy is outstanding but we won't always produce players who go on to be full England internationals in their teenage years.

Given that around 4 or 5 Saints Academy graduates make up the England squad at any one time I'd say that process is alive and well.

I'd ask him why the club sent so many messages out in the public domain about signing Toby and / or a legal position only for him to end up signing for Spurs. I suspect the answer will be that the player wanted to sign for Spurs no matter what however I fail to believe the club wouldn't be aware of that.

What is the difference between Palace paying Cabaye £100k a week and us paying Ramirez and Osvaldo over £100k a week between them? TV money means small clubs can pay big wages.

Capability has something to do with it as well.

I haven't seen Wijinaldum play, but what makes him different from Tadic who was also a goal and assist machine in Holland?

Think that was the only shot Kelvin managed to save yesterday.

We are victims of our own success - there are rules that prohibit us going beyond our means and the same rules protect the clubs at the top who can then tempt our players away with better wages. The same rules also mean it is just as hard to hold onto Academy graduates (well, homegrown players) and they attract a premium too. For a club of our size, our operating model is perfect - absolutely brilliant. The club invest all revenues received back into the team (and infrastructure of the club) so overall we have to accept that progress at this point will be through marginal gains and has to be underpinned via strong scouting. It also helps that we are now known as a very good club to develop at and one which the big boys like - that will help with recruitment as well. We just have to understand that progress cannot be quick now - the rules are against us.

Even in the game last night you could see Ramirez lacks that extra gear he needs both with and without the ball. He has a decent stride but once he starts dribbling his head isn't up enough. The Premier League gets quicker every year. It probably comes down to money - can you justify him in the squad at the wages he reportedly earns?

Well I know the £27m figure is true as the club publicly acknowledged it twice last year. But in terms of how Saints generally do things now, I obviously don't know.

Last summer we owed £27m in transfer fees for players already at the club (the likes of Lovren, Wanyama, Osvaldo etc.). It's quite common to stagger transfer fees over a number of years of course, but it just so happened that the way Cortese had managed the finances is that last summer we owed £27m in fees to other clubs. We had to account for that in our spending last summer. Of course, even if we are break even it doesn't stop us spending as spreading fees over a few years means we can still spend this year (though not to the degree I others think we can), but when people talk about profits from transfer activity from last summer they have to consider that £30m hole we had to fill as well.

I tried to translate the article, but the translation website I used said Koeman was Cow Man so I'm not so sure it's accurate - however I think Koeman said Newcastle is a big club with good players but the last few years they haven't done well and there is an issue with Managers and stability.

Yes but Koeman joined the club in a summer when we had to pay £27m in transfer fees for players already at the club (Cortese back loaded the payment structures for them). So effectively we're even.