Wes Tender

And the two signings in under a week have left you confident that we can get the business done before the start of the new season, hasn't it?

Agree with the other positions we need to fill, but we haven't made a bad start, have we?

Replacement manager for Pochettino - Check Replacement attacking midfielder for Lallana - Check Replacement striker for Ricky - Check For the moment, just Shaw's replacement to be found, maybe Lovren's might need to be found too. But I feel that the dark shadows are starting to lift and that there is some light starting to lighten the gloom. Whether these players and the manager are better replacements for those who left remains to be seen. But it cannot be dismissed out of hand that they are, before they have even got a few games under their belts.

And frankly this is amongst the most juvenile put-downs without backing it up with any counter argument that there has been on here for quite a while. None of the points he made were that unreasonable as opinions. I know that your opinion is that the three players we lost to the glory clubs are irreplaceable, but if you aren't prepared to even accept the possibility that they just might be bettered by those who replace them, then your viewpoint is rather blinkered. Try reading it again and this time observe the "if","possibly", "there are grounds", before you go off at half-cock. It is making you look stupid.

Spot on. In Pochettino's case though, he maybe thought that Spurs raised his profile to the extent that if he does well there, then he could be in the frame for one of Europe's top glory clubs. But like you, I don't think that he has made the right move with Spuds, as their expectations are too high for their resources, and if he doesn't make it past Christmas, although he will be quids in, his reputation will have received a massive knock.

One can't make a reasoned assessment on whether Koeman will be a better manager than Pochettino was until he has had some time to prove himself, and yet it is apparently perfectly acceptable for people to express the opinion that the players who have left cannot possibly be replaced by better players. Don't you find that ironic? And equally it is just as valid for people to think that Koeman is an upgrade on Pochettino, as it is to express the opinion that Pochettino will do really well at Spurs, neither of them having managed a game yet for their new clubs.

Spurs was the poison chalice for Pochettino because of Levy. Levy's past record of sacking managers if they don't achieve success within a fairly short timespan makes comments about him probably not lasting long there fair comment. I'm not upset that he has gone, as I believe that we have replaced him with a better manager. Lallana is now longer a big fish in a small pond as he was here. He will almost certainly be spending more time warming the bench there. Do you really need to have it explained why people were angry at his leaving? Most of the anger was because of the way that he left. The same bile has been aimed at Lovren for precisely the same reason. Shaw will be the best left back probably in the World for the next decade. It won't be long before he follows Bale to Real Madrid, or Suarez to Barcelona. He will always be a product of our academy, like Bale, so good luck to him. These players and Pochettino might be a big loss. That depends on who we get in to replace them.

It is probably true that if one starts off a project thinking that the likely result will be failure, then you are well on the way to it failing before you even commence. Cortese was derided initially for his ambition and then grudgingly it has been admitted that his positivity was infectious and drove the team to achievements that have surprised a lot of people. Regarding the points you make:- a) I don't agree. We might spend less on the players we have or will sell, but that is not surprising, given that we have achieved exceptionally inflated prices for them. But our expenditure will also be on other players needed to add depth to the squad and to replace the players who have left because they are not deemed good enough any longer. There is no evidence yet from the board that they will not spend that money. b) Surely this is the same as point a), isn't it? c) Has there been any evidence yet that the manager will introduce academy players who are not yet ready. Every time an academy player has been introduced so far, eyebrows are raised and there are dark mutterings that he isn't ready. And yet that applied to Walcott, to Bale, to Oxlade, J W-P, Shaw and Chambers. Where is the evidence that we "have to" use any academy player yet? d) Of course transfers are risky. But equally Lovren who you cite was risky too, as he was under a bit of a cloud at Nice and we took a gamble on him. So somebody wants to buy him because of his form here and yet he could easily revert to his form at Nice, in fact his behaviour recently indicates that he might be a loose cannon. As I said earlier, if you buy players with the character of Davis, Fonte and Cork, you are on safer ground, but probably not as exciting. Of course it is better to keep the players you know can perform, but then that is a fantasy, as if they are that good, then they will be attractive to the top teams, as we have found out. But based on your argument, that is also a risk for those top clubs too. e) I understand that we do indeed have an excellent scouting network. Your list of better internationals is amusing, as we got Lambert from the third division, Lallana and Shaw from our academy and took a gamble on Lovren bearing in mind he was out of favour at Nice. Schneiderlin was also a gamble on a raw kid, who we developed into the player he now is. A good spot by our scouts, eh? Players like that won't go to a top ten PL club? There are only 7 clubs above us at the moment and they can only accommodate so many players each in their squads. There are more players who want to play in the EPL than there are places for them. They might use us as a stepping-stone to better things, but then such is life. F) As you say, most argued that we lacked squad depth, so I'm sure that is also plainly apparent to the board and the manager. As well as the vastly inflated fees that we have commanded from the sale of those who have departed, we also have a large sum of money from the broadcast rights. You don't believe that we will spend most of it on improving the squad, whereas I do, although it might be prudent to keep some of it back for the January transfer window. As you say, we will have to wait and see.

I'm guessing that he meant Lambert, who more often than not had been our leading goalscorer? And I agree with you about Strachan. What could he have achieved with the Liebherr money, considering what he achieved under the pauper Lowe regime.

I don't mind your post, because it is accepting that it is indeed possible that we might yet produce a team that is better than the team that finished the last season, although in your opinion it is unlikely. And you back up your opinion with reasoned arguments and accept that we will have to wait and see how things turn out. I agree that I might possibly be over-optimistic, but then I pride myself on being a fairly good judge of character and believe that from what I have seen of Koeman so far, he strikes me as having a lot more about him than Pochettino did, more honest and open too. As good as those players seemed for us, recent events have proven that as important as team unity is, the behaviour of Lovren and Lallana in particular has been disruptive, so I am almost relieved to see them go, if Lovren leaves as well. If the likes of them can be replaced with such players who are true professionals with the character of Davis, Cork and Fonte, we won't be doing too badly if they can play a bit too. As I have said before, it might take a while to bed in the new players, it might not. These players allegedly wish to leave because of the imagined lack of ambition of the board post-Cortese and yet were unprepared to have the common courtesy to hear the new manager's ambitions for his new team. That tells me that they for pure greed, rather than for the excuses they tried to get us to believe. Although some of our fans have also already predicted relegation because they believe it is unlikely that we will be able to replace the players who have gone, I am entirely happy to give Koeman and the board the opportunity to prove what they say, that they aim to continue our upward trajectory.

Quite possibly, but if anybody saw how calm he was in the televised interview and then read the headlines from the Express, then they would reasonably reach the same conclusion that I did, that the article was way over the top in terms of Koeman's feelings on Lovren's behaviour.

As usual, you haven't read my comment properly. It is a personal opinion based on a published statistical comparison between the two players which show that Tadic has been more productive than Lallana both in number goals and assists, during a shorter timescale. The element of doubt that I clearly introduced, is to factor in the possibility that a player scoring in the Dutch top flight might not equate to a player scoring in the PL. But then again, Lambert was reckoned to be unilkely to be able to score in the PL just because he knocked them in for fun in the third division and then the second division, so perhaps if Pelle can knock them in for fun in Holland's top flight, no particular reason why he can't do it for us here too. Notice the use of the "perhaps" and "no reason" as caveats before you accuse me of stating my opinion as fact. Lallana; big boots and an even bigger head.

More chance of him standing out with us in my opinion than Lallana has playing for Liverpool, so quite possibly.

According to the red top rag The Express, Koeman is "furious" with Lovren's behaviour. Watch the bloody interview you cretinous journo! He wasn't furious, apoplexic with rage, or anything you care to fabricate in an effort to impress your gormless readership. He was calmness personified throughout. Mildly irritated sums it up for me, but that doesn't cut it for shrillness, does it?

Well, apart from getting in very possibly a better manager, I think that we might well have already signed a better player than Lallana. I believe that if we got Pelle in, we could just have a better striker than Lambert. For me, although Shaw might well prove to be the best LB in English football for the next decade, it is not inconceivable that he could be replaced with somebody else better right now, somebody more experienced and with a decent shot on him. I'm not convinced that Lovren cannot be improved on either. Schneiderlin is the one player we could struggle to replace and it is not even clear whether he will leave us yet. But otherwise I see no reason to suspect that we might not be able to build a better team to start the season than the one that we ended it with, especially having added other players to strengthen the squad's depth, providing more competition in some areas. You've already written off the possibility, but we'll just have to wait and see, won't we?

A great interview performance from RK. A pity though that he didn't tell those tw*t journos that he was sorry, but he would not be commenting on other clubs or their managers unless there was some relevance to Southampton.

Just to complete the irony, there ought to be a suggestion from them that when he was at the World Cup, he had probably been tapped up by some of the Barcelona players, telling him what a marvellous club it was and how happy he would be there on the bigger stage and the increased limelight that Barca would bring him over Liverpool.

A chorus of "one greedy bastard, there's only one greedy bastard" ?

Suarez' leaving speech:

Yes. You obviously think not, so perhaps you will tell us why you think that, with no prior evidence that the club have failed to replace players who have left. In the absence of any information to the contrary, I assume that Krueger still holds his position on the board of the club. You seem to doubt it for some reason.

So you think that somebody who aspires to be a professional journalist does not need to be capable of writing an article at least comparable grammatically to the standard achievable by an A-level student? Interesting. In my opinion, if a journalist isn't capable of writing something that is grammatically correct, then my estimation of their abilities as a journalist are considerably diminished and I find myself giving their views less credence as a result. Regarding his opinion that the fans were digsgruntled about the PR aspects from the club, I suspect that he may have formed that opinion from fans' forums like this one. But that always gives a false impression, because some of the malcontents tend to shout a bit louder than those who see things in a more balanced and circumspect light.

That had better read £30 million each if they want to consider Schneiderlin and Chambers.

After arguably the most difficult start to a season for any team, we had clawed our way up to 15th at the time that Adkins was replaced by Pochettino on 18th January. When we again played Man City shortly afterwards on 9th February at home, we beat them 3-1 with the following team:- A Boruc, J Hooiveld, D Fox (F Richardson, 71), N Clyne, M Yoshida, S Davis (J Ward-Prowse, 80), J Puncheon (A Lallana, 61), J Cork, M Schneiderlin, J Rodriguez, R Lambert Subs not used: T Lee, V Forren, R Chaplow, K Davis Pochettino finished the season only one position higher at 14th. So no, my point stands, that arguably even without Shaw, Lambert and Lallana, there have been improvements in other areas of the team that make it stronger than the team that Pochettino inherited. Lovren wasn't even our player at that time, but we must hope that if he goes, his replacement will be an improvement on Forren or Hooiveld at least. I reiterate, I have no doubts in my mind that we will strengthen in those positions, but we are a long way off relegation if we didn't.

Perhaps it would be instructive for you to look back to the beginning of our first season back in the Premiership, when we played Manchester City, to gain some perspective.This was our team:- K Davis, J Hooiveld, D Fox, J Fonte, N Clyne, J Ward-Prowse (S Davis, 65), J Puncheon (B Sharp, 86), A Lallana, M Schneiderlin, G Do Prado, J Rodriguez (R Lambert, 55) Subs not used: P Gazzaniga, D Seaborne, L Shaw, F Richardson And have Man City strengthened since then? Have a look at their team that day and I would say not. Ward-Prowse had just been introduced into the first team and didn't look out of place then. When you consider that we player Kelvin, Hooiveld, Fox and Guly and look at our substitutions and subs bench, it is quite an eye-opener compared to what we have now, even without Lallana, Lambert and Shaw (who was only a sub then and pretty well an unknown quantity). Factor in also the subsequent two changes of manager since Adkins. I am sure that we will strengthen in all those areas you suggest and have made a damned good start at it with Tadic for Lallana. But talk about relegation/bottom at Christmas if we don't strengthen in all of those areas is just nonsense.

Godwin's Law!