Wes Tender

Yes, of course emotions can run high when it seems on face value that a very successful side is being systematically dismantled, but is that a valid excuse for the puerile name-calling, the unfounded accusations against the owner and the board? Under these circumstances, people can and did jump to conclusions that have largely proven to be groundless. So why shouldn't it be brought to their attention that the sensible position was always to wait and see how things turned out and to take at face value the assertions that were made by the board that the players who departed would be replaced. In an ideal fantasy world, we would have kept the players that we had developed and added to, and then tweak the team further to improve it year on year. But anybody who believes that possible, even had we kept Cortese and Pochettino, is pretty naive. One -club players like Le Tiss, in teams at our level are an anachronism. The default situation which applies right up to Man Utd, Arsenal et al, is that no player cannot be bought if the price is right. One can't really fault many of our fans for not realising this I suppose, as even Ricky Lambert sought to blame the board for him and them leaving, rather than acknowledging that he and they all left because of the lure of personal glory and vastly higher wage packets. As you say, anybody who really is outstanding in this season's campaign is likely to be targetted by the bigger clubs once more. Are the board to be blamed again if we have to sell them? Even if many find that scenario unacceptable, there is little we can do about it, is there? It is up to the footballing authorities to do something, but they won't, in case it upsets the glory clubs.

It is illuminating, reading back through this thread and refreshing my memory as to the hysterical nature of many of the posts. Also some posters should be ashamed of their personal and childish insults aimed towards KL. We have replaced the manager, we have replaced the players who have left. We have added additional players to enlarge the squad with back-up and are still looking for a further couple of players before the window shuts. It was claimed by many that we would be nowhere near as strong at the start of season as we were when we finished the previous season. On paper, it is arguable that we are, although one match isn't enough to make a reasoned judgement either way. I hope that some of those hysterical posters have a good look at themselves and learn to be more circumspect the next time around. But then again, I don't think that most of them are the types to take these sorts of lessons on board.

I have to agree to a certain extent. Although Hodgson was at least brave enough to acknowledge that we had Lallana, Lambert, Shaw and Rodriguez if he was fit, all capable of being good enough to be selected for England, choosing Clyne or Chambers was step too far if it meant selecting one less player from the glory clubs. Most people would acknowledge that both Clyne and Chambers are better than the has been Johnson, but Hodgson will feel a lot better now that our ex-players are with Liverpool, Man Utd and Arsenal. But we have a couple of years to bring through the next generation for the European Championships, so it will be interesting to see how he reacts to that situation.

*Yawn*

http://www.squawka.com/news/how-did-dusan-tadic-do-on-his-southampton-debut-against-liverpool/161213 http://hereisthecity.com/en-gb/2014/08/18/ex-liverpool-man-picks-southampton-and-manchester-city-signings/ Here are a couple of links suggesting that our new boy got off to a pretty good start for us. Whether he will reach the dizzy heights of team of the year remains to be seen. Of course, as usual with your unique ability to twist things, I never said that Lallana would be a doddle to replace, did I? Any more than you have said that he would be impossible to replace. Regarding your debating "style" (which is a bit of a oxymoron) you haven't explained yet what the relevance is of where Tadic comes from. As you very well know, the mention of Messi was a sarcastic reference to show that had we signed him, you wouldn't be worrying whether he could pinpoint Southampton on a map.

A post from Giordano on the Townsend thread, discussing Townsend's ability to run with the ball at his feet:- So it seems I am not alone with this opinion. Feel free to go and pour scorn on him for holding opinions that don't meet with your approval.

There goes hypo, brown-nosing his mate fry. Don't you have anything more interesting to add to the discussion? No? Quel surprise!

As usual, Fry demonstrates his normal lack of objectivity in favour of a vain attempt at point-scoring via his typically snide, supercilious riposte. No effort to debate whether Tadic is as capable of dribbling a ball as effectively as Lallana, he just sees it as an affront that somebody dares to question whether he could be replaced by a player costing a third of the price. And what has it got to do with anything where Tadic comes from? Would you be looking down you nose at Messi or Suarez, just because they probably didn't know where Southampton was? Or have you just got a thing about Serbians? Croats like Lovren, presumably OK, but he probably didn't know where Southampton was either. And also typically, there is the total lack of comprehension demonstrated, where if somebody just suggests that another player can run with the ball at his feet like Lallana, it is taken as a dig at the greedy badge-kisser.

Doesn't Tadic do that, then?

Surely that has more to do with us firstly getting a price that we cannot resist accepting and secondly whether we or the player want to stay or go. If J W-P has a really good season, I would expect that we would be very happy to keep him for the next few seasons, unless the manager had other plans or J W-P wanted to leave and we got stupid money for him. The media are starting to build him up as potentially the next Beckham, and if he delivers on that early promise, then it will be difficult to keep him here, but he won't go cheaply either if several glory clubs wanted him.

You only have to look at the opinions on Townsend here to see how it won't be acceptable as a reason for Krueger breaking his promise about not selling Schneiderlin. Were we ever seriously considering Schelotto, or was he just proposed as a makeweight that Inter wanted shot of? Yes, pushing Clyne further forward is an option, but Regarding whether the academy has an option for RB, then this article suggests that Jack Stevens might be a possibility. http://www.cornishguardian.co.uk/Torpoint-star-set-Premier-League-breakthrough/story-22787508-detail/story.html However, we would have to leave it to the manager to decide whether he was ready to make the step up, or whether he would just be cover at the moment.

It was plainly a ludicrous statement for Smith to make. Did anybody identify this player who is alleged to have been pulled out of the academy by his parents? Where has he gone instead? His parents probably realised that their kid wasn't good enough for us and decided to use this as an excuse for withdrawing him before he was let go by us, in order to save face and spare their poor darling the embarassment.

You have been far and away the poster making the most extreme accusations against the board which have since proved to be groundless to this point. Frankly, I'm surprised that the responses to your claptrap have been on the whole quite polite. Even in this post, you accuse Krueger of changing his mind over selling Schneiderlin due to fans' unrest, when you have absolutely no evidence for such a claim at all. The situation is clearly that several players had reached a standard whereby we could not prevent them leaving for the top clubs, but we achieved really quite inflated prices for them. It wasn't a fire sale. KL was not cashing in on her assets. We have subsequently replaced those players and indeed added to the depth of the squad. We are still looking to buy more players to further strengthen the squad. The club is not for sale in the short term at least, we have a very good manager and what KL Liebherr does with her money is her business. There really is no particular reason to be that concerned about how the club is being run on her behalf and certainly not the shrill over-reactions that we get from you.

If he's any good, how come Liverpool haven't tapped him up yet? Wasn't he in the Skates' defence when we scored 7 goals against them?

It's increasingly worrying that we are persevering with this chase of the mediocre Townsend, unless of course it's just to wind them up. When push comes to shove, we have a player they want and on the face of it they have a player we want. And if a player and money swap happens, I expect that Krueger will get it with both barrels from the fans and the media for reneging on his promise that Schneiderlin was not for sale. I'm sure that there are plenty of other decent wingers out there that wouldn't necessitate the sale of Schneiderlin as part of the purchase and that would have the added benefit of not having to deal with Spurs and the odious Levy and his sidekick

Yes, egg running all down the faces of several people who assured us all that he would never play for us again.

You bet it will. £20 million? All this crap about personal terms having been agreed between them and the player is just pie in the sky if we don't accept the price they're prepared to pay. Ditto the tribunal stuff. Restriction of trade, my arse. We aren't disallowing him from playing football with us and we are his employers. We might be prepared to sell him in January, provided that a) we have a replacement for him and b) they or somebody else offers what we want for him. But by then, Pochettino will probably have been sacked and he can then think more seriously about Arsenal.

As you say, a very fine line between winning and losing and we could have won that match as it was, but for some good goalkeeping from Mignolet. Had Rodriguez been as fit as he was last season, that alone would have made it quite likely that we would have beaten them on the performance they put in, even without our last year's players.

I see it as being complimentary to us that they are highlighting another of our academy players and forecasting that he will be as big a star as the others they mentioned. OK, they put the slant on it that he will follow the paths the others took in moving to bigger clubs, but then that is almost inevitable. The message that gets across to the wider football audience isn't that we will suffer from losing him, but moreover that Southampton have done it again, kept the conveyor belt of young English stars chugging on. Let the Mail produce another article if they want, highlighting the next stars who are close to following Ward-Prowse into the team and then onto better things eventually. It's all free publicity for us, raising our profile yet again. I think that Ward-Prowse might be a bit different from the others in that he has a father who is a Barrister, therefore not the usual family background and probably a bit more circumspect about the timing of his son's progression. In many ways he would probably do better to stay here until his mid 20s, and then make a really big move, with luck, having enhanced his reputation with England national team credentials and a string of man of the match performances for us. I think he's a sensible lad, whose head won't be turned quite so easily by the bright lights and the ego boost of playing for the top clubs, anyway not until he has enjoyed himself here, close to family and friends first.

Good. It was a pathetic offer which should be met with the derision it deserved. I have been worried that talk of us wanting Townsend for £10 million and Spuds offering £17 million, conveniently equated to the £27 million we valued Schneiderlin at. Otherwise it is in the public domain that we value him at £27 million, so how could anybody be so ridiculously stupid to reckon that we will say £17 million, yep, we'll take that? I'm still anticipating that they will come up with some swap deal, but personally I don't want any of their players, or to deal with them anyway.

This puts a different spin on things. But please learn the lesson Rickie, that there are those who have an agenda when reporting news in the media, either for clubs like Liverpool, or against clubs like ours.

Why would a Championship team possess the level of coach to hone Gallagher's technical skills and we wouldn't? OK, he would possibly improve by playing regular first team football, albeit at a lower level, but I just don't see that coaching comes into it much.

Agreed. The best form of defence is attack and he would have been a handful if playing to his best

Agreed. The best form of defence is attack and he would have been a handful if playing to his best

They seemed to play pretty well as a team against last year's runners up. Or were you referring to Liverpool? OK a few speculative through balls that weren't read and which will succeed when the players have established more of an understanding of each others' play, but otherwise a very competent team performance from us and our new players. I have had a happy few minutes reading some of the comments about how good we were from the Liverpool fans' forum, especially our midfield, which they acknowledge dominated theirs for most of the match.