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HarvSFC

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Posts posted by HarvSFC

  1. "TransferRoom is taking football’s transfer market into the digital age and making football transfers easy."

    "When selling a player you want to appeal to as many potential buyers as possible."

    Can we get anything from Ankersen. Get on the phone to his brother, because we're still finding football transfers hard.

    We just want to find one potential buyer for our deadwood.

  2. Newcastle announced their Singapore squad this morning before all the Isak news came out. Their official line for him was "Alexander Isak misses out with a minor thigh injury".

    Now and since, it has been quite well reported why Isak isn't going on the trip.

    Just to add to the theories for ours.

    • Sad 1
  3. Not the most encouraging display. Saw a lot of what we saw last season, many passengers in the team when we don't have the ball. Castellon worked hard the full 90 minutes and when we had the ball our players had no time with it, were being swarmed and being forced into making errors and misplaced passes. When they had the ball, our players would stand off, gave them time to do what they wanted to do and dictate and they also attacked direct and with pace, which we didn't really do.

    Can't play like today against Wrexham.

    • Like 1
  4. Build-up play has been nice. Shea Charles definitely been my favourite player to watch so far this pre-season, just looks so comfortable in the middle. Add Downes next to him and Fernandes in the Fraser position today and it's looking exciting. Bazunu's also had a good half, pulling off three or four good saves.

    The front four is just where it's lacking for me. They're all quite similar in that they all have the same weaknesses which stops them from causing consistent problems to the opposition. They're lacking in pace and technical ability. This has meant that Bazunu has worked a lot harder than their goalkeeper has. Hopefully Robinson and Edozie can add a bit more dynamism to our attacks in the second half and Stewart can provide the hold up play that Archer just can't.

    One other positive is that we're also mixing it up from goal kicks. Should have always been the case. The overly predictable, and every team knowing we were going to play it short every time has gone.

    • Like 2
  5. 41 minutes ago, Lee On Solent Saint said:

    Probably a very simplistic view, but if by some miracle selling Dibling to keep Ramsdale and Ferndades was the plan, then that would be terrific. Not that I ever expect it to happen.

    I'd definitely side with this. If we have to make one big sale this summer, although you could argue that Sulemana surprisingly became our big sale this window, then it'd be Dibling of the big three. I think he's the least suited to a Still team of the three and while his ceiling is probably the highest of them, his form from Martin's sacking was the lowest and I'd say there are still question marks over him fulfilling that potential. So, if we could get a good fee for him, allowing us a bit more financial strength in keeping the other two, then I think it'd suit.

    But, then last time we sold Livramento, Ward-Prowse, Lavia and then Tella. Getting good fees for all, but didn't allow us to keep any. 

    • Like 1
  6. I just can't see how you can defend Martin after the inept setup he took us into the Premier League with last season. We had a lack of quality, but we could have at least put up a fight, if he put any effort into fitness training.

    • Like 21
  7. I thought we may have been able to use Ankersen's brother's transfer get together thing to offload a few of our unwanted. But, doesn't look like we can even add that to the small list of benefits of having Ankersen attached.

  8. Of course there's different reasons for why Trafford was picked, high potential being one. But, he was also picked ahead of Ramsdale after impressing at a Championship side who were winning every week, while Ramsdale was playing well in the Premier League, but picking the ball out of the net and losing every week.

    Burnley also retained Trafford for the Championship and rejected bids from Newcastle for him last summer.

  9. 24 minutes ago, trousers said:

    Ah, ok, perhaps my memory playing tricks on me then...  How many games did he start,, out of interest? (and how many of those non-defeats were draws Vs wins?)

    Cheers 👍🏻

    Stephens started 17 of the 46 Championship games that season + 3 play-off starts. 

    We won 10 of those + 2 in the play offs. 4 draws + 1 play off draw. 3 losses.

    In the 17 league games, we conceded 24 and kept three clean sheets. Two clean sheets in the play-offs, conceding 1.

     

    • Like 1
  10. Obviously, we have to try and put last season to the back of our minds as quickly as possible going into a new season with promotion as our aim. But, last season was so awful, I don't think any player other than the two who don't deserve to be lumbered with the rest of the shite in Ramsdale and Fernandes deserved to be offered a new contract this summer.

    We didn't just get relegated, we very nearly equalled the worst Premier League points tally of all time. A record that never looked like being beaten until us last season, it's so bad. While, not only that, but this group of players won just two league matches in a 38 game season.

    I just think the players need to prove themselves at the club again this season after the last before we start securing their future here. A harsher message needed to be relayed to them. Two consecutive Premier League seasons this squad has gone down without a fight and the good players are leaving at the ends of their contracts, while the mediocrity is being retained.

    • Like 1
  11. I was disappointed to read this news earlier. I had hoped these charitable contracts for players who like being here (because we're their best offer), but aren't really improving the starting eleven had ended. I had especially hoped that the Stephens lovefest within the club had left with Martin.

    We're constantly being told that the squad is too big and that we need to sell before we buy. We even have an abundance of centre-backs - THB, Quarshire, Wood, Edwards and Sanda without including Stephens. Yet, we seem to be intent on persevering with these players and renewing their contracts each year. Last summer we gave McCarthy and Armstrong new contracts and two games in McCarthy was deemed not good enough and the same happened to Armstrong in January. No lessons being learned there. 

    I also don't buy the argument that he's a fantastic leader. We all were able to witness him let the team down again and again last season with his needless red cards, he was a liability in the team, and he was supposed to be the leader on the pitch. And while we don't get to witness much off the pitch, standards weren't exactly high last season. Fitness was poor and you didn't have a clue what they were doing in training because the same thing happened on the pitch every week. He captained a team to 12 points. Nobody's putting that on their CV. He was a centre-back in a Martin team getting destroyed every week. The perfect person to stand up and say, "you know what, this isn't working, we just aren't at the required level to play this way in this division." Instead, they were more interested in singing each other's praises.

    Ultimately, all we as fans want to see is for the club be progressive again. But, this just feels like holding onto more of the failures of recent times and the recent times have been abysmal, barring the one play-off season.

    • Like 10
  12. For the first time in a while it feels as though the manager can also be an asset in getting us results. Even going into the first day. Wrexham are on a high of consecutive promotions, have momentum, were well financed in League One to cope with this level and will be further well financed this summer. However, they have a bit of an old school manager in Phil Parkinson, who hasn't fared too well at this level previously at more established sides. Parkinson has his way of playing, and you'd hope Still does his homework and works out a way to counter Parkinson's tactics.

    It isn't just a case of the players either turn up, or they don't. Like it felt at times under Martin. If the players didn't turn up, they just got routinely beat, like against Sunderland, Leicester twice and many times last season. Under Martin you always knew how the team were going to play. There weren't any adaptions. We still tried to pass it around our own areas and played us into trouble, hence why we got thrashed in those games. Hasenhuttl was the same, if the players didn't turn up then they got smashed, see the two 9-0s. The hope for next season is that if the players aren't having good games, then Still can switch it up and adapt in game, change the momentum and get them playing well.

    • Like 5
  13. Should've known better than to believe that Belgian man regarding Edozie. According to his reports two years back we sold Lavia about 10 times before he eventually ended up at Chelsea.

    If Edozie does stay, fine. But, I don't think he fits the physical profile we're looking for this summer. Of course not every player has to be an athletic monster. But, I think Edozie very much goes in the other extreme, of looking fairly weak and fragile and could easily get knocked off the ball in the league above. Needs to hit the weights.

  14. Edozie's one of those with question marks over him going into next season. He could be good, or he could fall down in the pecking order and become a Championship squad player again.

    Wouldn't be too upset to see him leave. Think it's clear we need a lot more end product from the wide positions, which we haven't had over the last year.

    • Like 1
  15. Solak said we could sign three players before we sold anyone. The first being Quarshie and the second being Downs. Two players that we could get in early, as weren't too difficult to sign.

    Then, when we start making some sales, hopefully we can then start moving for the more established/marquee signings that are a bit more complicated to sign. But, with the wage budget being reduced and transfer budget being increased by the sales we should have enough financial muscle and pull in the Championship to attract those to us later in the window.

  16. On 01/07/2025 at 07:30, Chez said:

    19 league goals in 31 games isn't bad. Five more in the efl cups. Brum played very much like us under Martin. Complete domination in terms of possession first, creating chances second. He's a decent player. Caused us problems two seasons ago. Brum were incredibly strong last season. The centre halves they signed were top notch. All the talk is of them signing players good enough for the PL. Under the new owners they mean business. If they get one or two of those type of players, I fancy them to win the league. 

    One of their centre halves is an ex-Saint academy man in Christoph Klarer. I was interested to see how he'd do there, and he seems to have done very well.

    Birmingham have already signed England U-21 goalkeeper James Beadle and are signing frequent Saints linkees Demarai Gray and Bright Osayi-Samuel, who both should be two good Championship signings.

    Think they'll be up there next season. We could do with them sacking their manager in the play-offs and going for someone like Wayne Rooney again.

    • Like 1
  17. "Marking his arrival across the Channel with a goal in a riveting 4-4 draw at Liverpool."

    That was three months after his arrival in a dead rubber match, although he did score two, so they have also slightly downplayed him.

  18. There's always going to be some apprehension regarding our transfer dealings under SR, until they have consecutive successful windows, which so far they've failed to do in their three and a half years in charge. Of course, it's nice and good to sign some young and up and coming players, but we can't purely look in that market if we want to go for promotion. It would be repeating the mistakes of the summer of 2022 again when signing Bazunu, ABK, Lavia, Mara, Edozie and Larios, and only one of those proved to be any success. Hopes still out for Edozie, three years on.

    We need to mix these types of signings with good, marquee ones, who are ready to improve the first team from day one. Like Ramsdale last summer, and like Downes and THB, for this level two years ago.

    11-12, we had young stars like Lallana and Schneiderlin. But we also had the experienced pros of Davis, Fonte, Hammond and Lambert. Even Fox, Richardson and Hooiveld played good and important parts. That was all solid recruitment and a top budget, which we won't be able to replicate, but can hope to see something similar from Spors and SR this summer.

    • Like 5
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