Lallana's Left Peg

No. Are you saying that the behaviour of those players prior to joining Saints is fine then? Unless we want to come up with some sort of official SaintsWeb acceptable player behaviour charter when they are positioning themselves for a move.

And just to be contrarian, would you also sell Tadic, Mane, and Pelle who all showed somewhat disrespectful behaviour (in line with the above) at their previous clubs in order to Saints? Tadic refusing to sign a new deal, Mane refusing to travel for a game, Pelle telling Feyenoord he wants to leave them for Saints. And what about Tonny Vilhena, who has allegedly already been at St Marys for one reason or another and has just handed in a transfer request? Will you welcome him to Saints? I'm not saying that the behaviour is particularly nice, but we benefit as much as we have it at the receiving end.

If he's an attacking midfielder rather than central midfielder then that is fair enough. I just recall the stuff in January about him being Cork's replacement, so presumed he was a central midfielder in that style.

Well they can't want and sign both Wanyama and Schneiderlin.

Understood but am I to believe that the Manager of Feyenoord prefers Karim El Ahmadi to a goalscoring / assist making left footed midfielder with a lot of potential? As I said I don't know much about the player but I am familiar with Karim El Ahmadi, and so I do wonder how good he is.

FFP means lowering ticket prices doesn't make sense. We have £50m of 'soft' debt as a club (to our owner). I would suggest ticket prices won't lower until we have a stadium we can't fill at a high percentage. Until we expand, it makes sense to push the prices up as far as the fanbase will tolerate.

I know nothing about the player and I know Koeman has worked with the player before and is keen on a left footed central midfielder but I am curious as to how good he is if he can't get in the Feyenoord team ahead of Karim El Ahmadi.

He did, and it's very feasible that they have if you look at who left and who we signed.

West Ham are doing that because of their relocation to a stadium they won't be able to fill, not because of any other reason.

It's a lovely thought but lets not forget that we forced Schneiderlin to stay (either through necessity or lack of suitable offer) and he has been one of our best players this season and a key contributor. So really, the approach of letting anyone go who wants to doesn't really be at St Marys doesn't really work unless we think we can replace them and receive a huge offer. But then, that approach wouldn't be novel, it's just sensible and normal.

Well if any player is likely to do something outside what they have been asked to tactically and structurally, then it's Mane. But I don't think that is cause for suggesting he can't play in the same team as Pelle. We need that I think. Someone to break up the oppositions defence or be unpredictable and keep people guessing. He'll frustrate at times and obviously have some stinkers of a game, but there will also be the brilliance that helps us win games - we have to take the rough with the smooth with these players at our level.

Mane is a bit of a free spirit but that has produced many of his goals and assists this season. He has enormous upside and with good coaching could be a very very good player. Pelle is a different sort of player and if we had to sell one it surely has to be him. As for understanding, they are different types of player and I don't think the blame can be attributed to anyone or anything in particular.

To be fair it's a fairly important metric to judge attacking players on.

Will Wood has been one of the finds of the season from the Academy - definitely an emerging talent out of nowhere really.

Reports in Italy say Tevez could decide to move to Boca Juniors this summer. If he does that would surely mean any permanent move for Osvaldo is out of the window?

At this stage I'd prefer Mane on the wing than Elia, and if Mane is on the wing that only leaves Pelle and Long as our striking options - one is struggling and other isn't really that good in a striking role. So I don't really see the outrage at suggesting Gallagher is a viable option on the bench ahead of Elia.

He is on trial for them, which could give an indication he doesn't have a future at Saints for one reason or another.

Still thought we would win even after Reed got sent off. We're the better team in every respect - not just in terms of talent, but also our structure and set-up outside individual ability. That should be expected though given our Academy and facilities against that of Blackburn's, who themselves had a very young team and made the most of what they had. Over the two legs they defended well even though we missed several chances - they put forward a very good account of themselves. It's always hard to know who will 'make it' at Youth level - ability is just a small part of the equation (but perhaps one that gives you the most time for the other stuff to click). I usually see who is coasting through games (in a good way) as an indicator of how they hold themselves and manage the game and to that end I thought Targett, Wood, and Seager were very good. Slattery aside, this may be our lot for a few years as the current U18's aren't as good as previous years (though I appreciate Sims, Slattery, and Wood are now a part of the U21 set-up) and a few on here have mentioned that only a couple of the U16's were offered scholarships (the rest will come from other clubs and / or foreigners).

No, they don't count. I can't work out if Blackburn are just clumsy or a step behind fitness / speed wise, but they are big lumps who really leave their mark on the opposition when they foul.

Dangerous but Blackburn were kicking lumps out of us at Ewood Park so this is a little bit of payback.

His injury record appears fairly good until this season. I do wonder if the frequency in which he gets injured (which could just be a coincidence) will impact how far we stretch to try and sign him permanently. It's not the fee, it'll be the wages.

:lol: :lol:

Davis - Par Forster - Par Clyne - Par Bertrand - Hit Fonte - Hit Alderweireld - Hit Yoshida - Hit Gardos - Par Targett - Hit Schneiderlin - Hit Wanyama - Hit JWP - Par Davis - Par Tadic - Par Elia - Miss Reed - Par Djuricic - Miss Long - Par Mane - Hit Pelle - Hit Koeman - Hit

Shaw will be fine. LvG is going through a process of stamping his authority on the team and there are victims of the way he establishes himself. Shaw isn't the only one - Falcao, Rafael, and Di Maria are getting the same treatment. Mata and Herrera had it earlier in the season too. The article doesn't touch on Shaw's unprofessionalism in keeping himself fit and healthy of course, but that doesn't suit the narrative of the piece.

It's hard to say as we know there will be changes in the squad over the summer and we don't know what the clubs attitude towards the (likely) Europa League campaign will be.