Saint86

FTSE 250 ended 2% down on friday.

"Much like Southampton, Athletic Club have largely improved season-on-season in recent times. When they won the Markus Liebherr Memorial Cup at St Mary’s in 2011, Marcelo Bielsa had not long been in charge of the side, with striker Fernando Llorente tipped for a big season, and young midfielder Ander Herrera making his breakthrough at the club. Despite leading Bilbao to the Europa League final and making it into the round of 32 the following season, Bielsa left his post at the end of the 2012/13 campaign. He was replaced with Spaniard Ernesto Valverde, who has taken Bilbao to three consecutive top-seven finishes in La Liga, as well as Champions League qualification and a Spanish Super Cup title. In that time, Bilbao completed a new stadium, with the impressive San Mamés opening in September 2013, boasting a 53,289 capacity. And Blibao have become a symbol of progress in that time under the guidance of Valverde, taking the team to a fifth-place finish in La Liga last season, which included progression to the quarter-finals of the Europa League, as well as a Spanish Super Cup success. Read more at http://www.saintsfc.co.uk/news/article/2016-17/20160621-athletic-club-pre-season-friendly-profile-3147360.aspx#40eyVvePfAhG4vI1.99"

I raised Valverde a while ago in immediate response to K Billy's "mystery man" comment... It wasn't dismissed or denied. I reckon it could be him. We have solid links with Athletic and we are playing them this pre season, not only that but we are involved in the set up of their club, they have always relied on bringing through local kids, they play our style of football and they love Matt Le Tiss. Would be excited if he is the man. But, he hasn't even been linked elsewhere so no idea. Will claim itk though it it does happen

Get your tin hats out guys, praising Nigel or anything from the Cortese era is near suicidal on this place. Nigel is a legend for me!

Get your tin hats out guys, praising Nigel or anything from the Cortese era is near suicidal on this place. Nigel is a legend for me!

http://www.saintsfc.co.uk/news/article/2016-17/20160617-gallery-steven-davis-southampton-career-3145389.aspx The title alone on that page from the club. FFS. Why is a basic understanding of English not required in media? The people are put in a perfect position to influence young minds (talking media generally), and yet all across the media sector we give these roles to drop outs and idiots with no actual brains or intelligence.

Sorry mate, but that is pure rubbish. Saints will continue what they have always done... Sell for a profit and bring through the next batch.... and repeat. Naive to think that we can't do that as the 6th best team in england.

This summer is all part of the current 5 year plan. Everything is going exactly how the club have predetermined!

People who vote to remain better understand that they are voting to be part of a European super state; with one foreign policy, one army, and a political elite that control their lives but that they can never vote out of power. All the while it will suck more and more of each nation state's independence, powers and industries away. It is the socialist dream and people are either sleep walking into voting for it because they don't see it coming, actually want it(?!?!?!), or naively think we can just "get out" before it gets that bad. We should be getting out now and build our links with the rest of the world. The commonwealth alone is a 3rd of the worlds population ffs, we have far more in common with all of those nations and they represent a far wider market range rather than the sick man of global markets in the EU. Madness to stick with Europe whilst it drags us down and then end up leaving when we'll be in a far poorer position to do so. I don't if its fear, apathy, or just mass lefties. But I hope to god the country votes out.

Amazes me that people think he isn't a good player. Honestly think our fans need to learn to move on! I loved watching lallana for saints, and I love watching him for england. 2 of the best players on that pitch were our academy players. We should take pride from that and enjoy it!

So is the mystery man Elnesto Valverde of Bilbao? He is 52 though which seems to go against Guan's "young" hints. Only other ones that I can think of that might be in the running but haven't been mentioned are Loew and Dunga (just fired and total gamble).

All in all, that is pretty tasty! Its a shame the everton home game in November will be moved, don't want tired legs for that one

Technically we still have a manager I also said that we need to go after our targets before the new manager was in and got lambasted for it. The simple fact is that Koeman knows our transfer targets like the back of his hand and its important that the club get in the keys one first. It also goes to show that its the committee and black box that make these decisions, not Koeman. Something else i was lambasted for

So, are people going to be genuinely upset if we vote to leave? Like seriously?

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-3638718/Sevilla-confirm-Unai-Emery-exit-Jorge-Sampaoli-jets-hold-talks-club.html Emery has paid his exit fee at Sevilla!

I really don't think there is a meltdown tbh. Annoyance at the lies from both sides, but trust that we will recruit well has been earnt over previous seasons. People are eagerly awaiting who our new manager will be, and what we'll spend the wanyama and possibly Mane money on.

IKR, fans can't accept that he was partly pushed and was party guaranteed £21m over 3 years plust nearly £200m to build his own squad. And that ignores the fact that he actually rejected their first offer (of 5 times his saints wages). We let him go / pushed him out the door. Fan's need to get a grip, Koeman gave us our best ever prem seasons.

I am a civil engineer, so look at things from an infrastructure planning perspective (I should add that there is bulgarian, croatian, german, greek and spanish people in the team and everyone gets along very nicely and doesn't mention the referendum! ) But seriously. What was the figure quoted? 1.6million net immigration? It is not possible to build houses at the rate of 8 per minute to track current population growth. Let alone build new schools, hospitals, increase roads and train transport, power etc. Be practical here. Even if everyone who comes into the country contributes (such as all the highly skilled members of my team!) It doesn't pay for these things over night. On top of that, you need to train new teachers, new nurses, new doctors, new engineers to build the above. etc etc etc. Yes, long term it may be good. But we are putting massive and harmful stresses on our society and infrastructure. Its not worth it. We need control of immigration and our own borders, and we need to introduce targeted immigration centred around key skills. In addition, you slander immigrants from outside the EU. Not really called for. And a great proportion of the doctors and nurses propping up the NHS are from ex commonwealth countries! Rather have them than any number of waitreses. If we are choosing. But that comes down to what you think is contributing? Do you want power, roads, schools, hospitals.... or do you want coffee? There is a limit to what the country can take, and people see that debate as racist far to often.

Was interesting tonight. Firstly you could tell that Cameron is obviously the more polished stage speaker. He's had the practice, the training etc. Farage has suffered over the years from being demonised in the press pretty much non-stop, and i think that showed in his defensiveness and awkwardness. I did feel that those two girls that attacked him as racist missed (or had no interest in what he said) his responses. And in fact his argument that he would rather see more commonwealth immigration which is currently harmed by the EU immigration essentially overriding it was interesting. It was good to see Mr Boparai having a go at Cameron for immigration figures being out of control and harming his access to medical care, education, housing etc. It made the two girls seem even more stupid given they'd previously said that Farage was a racist and no one in ethnic minorities supported his arguments. Still, not a great showing from him. Cameron largely danced around all the issues, he can't hide the fact that his deal is useless, that we have now been threatened with punishment by the EU whether we remain or leave. I think the only point he has any leg to stand on his change to immigration benefits where they must now pay in for 4 years to get anything out. Still this is too little to late and it was nice to see the audience boo him when he said he had no forecast on future immigration figures. At the end of the day, i think its telling that the last general election was 52% to Ukip and Tories. We know that most tories will vote leave, Ukip obviously will, and then a fair chunk of labour will. We also know that the "silent tory" and fear of bring branded right wing or racist keeps the poll figures hidden. The government know they are losing, hence the house hold leaflet drop at the start and the purposeful misinformation throughout and keeping the argument centred over tiny topics like the aspects of cameron's deal and the economy. In truth people are voting on whether we want to be part of a european super state, whether we want to continue with 55% of our laws being made in brussels and how we feel about our ability to rule ourselves and trade with the rest of the world and commonwealth. I think people are also being scared into believing that Europe is key to our security, when in fact controlling our borders will handle a lot of that, and NATO is the defensive alliance, not the EU, no matter how much we want to tell ourselves otherwise. If we leave, we can stop worrying about this, we are the worlds 5th largest economy, 12% of it depends on the EU, and over a gradual break away we will be able to trade with a far larger and more diverse set of economies. Sadly, my wife's sister and mother have paid no attention to the politics debates etc and are voting according to the government leaflet earlier on. I honestly wish that if people didn't know how to vote that they wouldnt! rather than voting for status quo without understanding what it means. We'll see what happens.

Perfect summary Red. Very well said. It also doesn't look good that the club are using as many sticks possible to tarnish Koeman when in reality there was some degree of friction behind the scenes with some players and Les Reed and he's probably had a bit of a shove in the back given the compensation packages offered. In reality, for the compo being offered we can pay a manager on twice what we originally offered Koeman for 2.5 years, far greater than the average tenure in the top flight. Not bad business, but a shame people are unable to give him an amicable departure since he is our best ever prem manager and gave us some great seasons.

It says a lot when even Poopey don't go to these measures!!! It is ******* hilarious mind I think Koeman's god fed up with everyone else and gone on holiday and told em to sort it out. Maybe even has his eye on the dutch job. Pretty solid poke game by RoKo.

The penny is dropping. The club have done a PR job on koeman like so many others. It even extends to "ITK" snippets on here. Rather than an amicable departure he joints the list of everyone else leaving saints being a disposable scumbag. Coincidental that that is almost exclusive to people that leave saints. Just or lies from the club. I have no issue with koeman going if he won't extend. But there are right ways and wrong ways to do it! A thank you and farewell is better than tarnishing a man's image when we're actually forcing him out regardless. Sent from my Nexus 9 using Tapatalk

You are a total mug. He speaks perfect English and there has even been a video posted to that effect. Sent from my Nexus 9 using Tapatalk

I think it's a good post. But I think the point you miss is that saints fans resent being told he's going to Everton because you're a big club. It's a stupid argument. Koeman was going to stay with saints after your original large offer, so you upped it to a ridiculous level. He's joining you because of the money. If anything that tells you that saints are the more attractive prospect. Sadly (and wisely) saints don't overspend and are sustainably run so we're not going to pay him more than he's worth, especially if he's had his head turned. Their are plenty of good managers in the sea so I am eager to see who we get. We could well still be laughing. Meanwhile Everton need to get over this "big club" malarky, it really doesn't count for anything when you haven't won anything within the lifetime of most of your players. It comes down to recent history, fanbase/stadium, set up and money. So yes, you are big, but not much between you and half the premium teams. Maybe you'll change that by sliding money around, maybe you won't. Sent from my Nexus 9 using Tapatalk

What they need to do is sign all of our key targets before Ronald takes them to Everton with their mega bucks. That is seriously key.