Wes Tender

But his agent is President of the Agents association or something along those lines. Unfortunately, as much as I would love to see the c*nt suspended (preferably from a rope) I doubt whether it will happen. But I have said before that it would be lovely if the club refused to deal with him or any players on his books in any other future transfers.

It was these types of legalities that I was unsure of. Is it absolutely the case that we can sell him to a club that he doesn't want to play for? But in another lighter vein, I wonder whether when he is sold, we will see the full page message in the Echo thanking we fans for our support. Will he be advised by Nivea Boy on how to go about this, the huge photo of him and the two line message?

We are overtaken by events

Well, the c*nt has finally been backed into a corner and forced to put in a transfer request, so his greed in attempting to gain the transfer by effectively displaying the unprofessional sulk has not paid off, thank God. At least that will save the club a few bob. But whatever we do now, no way should he be sold to Liverpool under any circumstances. With luck his transfer request will bring in other suitors with clout and money and there can be a bidding war to raise the price.

Pretty fair, I'd say. Looks like we might keep Virgil after all, or at the worst sell to Chelsea instead of the Scousers. At the most optimistic, we might even get Christensen as part of the deal. If we get the Lemina deal over the line and maybe another CB option too by the close of the window, I'd say that we had a pretty decent window, what with keeping the other players that we were rumoured to be selling.

http://www.express.co.uk/sport/football/837999/Virgil-van-Dijk-to-Liverpool-Southampton-transfer-news-gossip The list of bygone legends predicting Virgil's move to Scousehampton grows longer by the hour, and has extended even beyond ex-Scouse players. Quite what Stuart Pearce's information prowess is on matters like this is a mystery; probably as accurate as his penalty shooting was. Like a few diehard remnants of the Scouse fan base, probably he hasn't been told that even Herr Von Klopp is backtracking on his chances of signing Virgil.

A very much better performance from us this afternoon, but when I saw the starting line-up, I thought that our chances ought to be improved. This was arguably pretty close to our best starting eleven and is what MP ought to have done on Wednesday. With our strongest defence, we kept it tight at the back, had a relatively strong midfield and with Redmond and Gabbiadini, some threat up front. Also with Bertrand and Cedric playing, there was scope for some pace out wide, with some prospect of good balls into the box. We matched them pretty well in the first half and there wasn't much between the two teams. Although the match wasn't very exciting, particularly in the second half, we looked quite comfortable throughout and Forster was hardly tested at all, thank God. I fretted a bit after losing half of our defence to Yoshida coming off presumably because an injury and a tactical change I guess when Cedric came off for the youngster, Flannigan, but they held firm, contrasting to the abject surrender on Wednesday. Part of this could be down to retaining Romeu to add muscle in midfield with Davis. Whilst it was difficult to praise any player performance on Wednesday, today several looked a lot better. MOTM in my opinion was Stephens, with Cedric, Bertand, Romeu, Gabbiadini, Redmond and Davis also putting in good shifts. Seville are very good opposition finishing fourth in the top Spanish division last season, but I don't know enough about them to assess the strength of the team they fielded today. But in their last match they beat Arsenal. It would be nice to think that MP was still experimenting more broadly on Wednesday and had more of an idea of his best team today, which if so, bodes a little better for next Saturday's opening match of the season. We still need additional options at CB and defensive midfield, but there is time enough to arrange that. Mind you, we might still have Virgil available at CB on 1st September or soon after.

Where you say that we won't see a different team, which team where you referring too? We had about three or four different teams out there during the 90 minutes. Had MP chosen to start or finish with what he considered to be our strongest team, we would have had a better idea of how we will fare against Seville.

Yeah, sell him in June and let every other club know that we have all that dosh burning a hole in our pockets when we come to buy a replacement. That would be bright, wouldn't it?

This is because of several reasons, most beyond our control. Liverpool have transfers overshadowing the start/end of the season, as do other glory clubs. Liverpool's board have acted in a shoddy manner. Do they look second rate as a result? Underhand and unethical maybe, but second rate? Transfers of players isn't as simple as you would like them to be, you know. When we sell a player and have to buy a replacement, then it is a bit like buying a selling house where there is a chain. It helps to have somebody in mind to replace those who leave and their clubs likewise won't sell until they have arranged replacements too.

It is rumoured that Chelski might offer Christensen as part of a swap deal to get Candreva from Inter. I wouldn't be against us selling Virgil to Chelski and getting Christensen as part of a swap deal.

I doubt that Liverpool will have the last word if that is against our wishes. We are not forced to sell even if Virgil insists that he only wants to sign for Liverpool, and probably in view of the way that they went about tapping him up, we ought to refuse to sell him to them under any circumstances anyway. It is less than a month until the transfer window slams shut so we should stand firm and leave Liverpool and Wassermans with egg all over their faces having learned that we are not a soft touch. If they have not signed a replacement CB by then, more fool them. If they have signed somebody else, then Virgil will realise that his hopes of going there even in January are diminished. I would hope that Wassermans would then advise him to buckle down at Southampton for fear of diminishing his value to other clubs, and his agent should look to sell him further down the line to a bigger club than the Scousers.

Presumably Virgil got into bed with that bastard Agent from Wassermans, who turned his head. according to Yahoo Sport quoted in an Express article.

Please see my post above. You also conclude that the just because the majority of the squad was represented last night at various times in the match, that conclusions can be drawn about how the first choice team will perform together.

I don't disagree with much of what you said about last night's match, but basing the paragraph above on what you witnessed last night is just ridiculous. Although the players taking part in the opening matches were on display last night and might not have performed well, that had a lot to do with the fact that at no stage of the proceedings was the first team assembled together as a unit. At no stage did we play our strongest defence together, our strongest midfield together, or our strongest attack together. Indeed, had we done so, I suspect that we might well have beaten Augsburg's strongest line-up.

I thought that generally they were poor, but we made them look half decent because we were even poorer. If they were so hot, they wouldn't have lost 2-1 to Middlesbrough on Saturday, would they?

What a totally inept performance. One of the most boringly frustrating matches I've seen in a long time. This was supposed to be a bargain buy one, get one free arrangement, but even if this was the free game, we have been overcharged. Play like this on Saturday and we will be regally spanked by Seville. I'm concerned that Pellegrino hasn't done enough research into last season's matches, or he would have been able to have more idea of what combinations of players gel together and which don't. Earlier there was a makeshift look to the back four, which was exposed enough to ship two goals. Stephens and Yoshida are more solid from their understanding of each other's game, but separate them and you have the appearance of two strangers at the moment. The midfield had some muscle to it with Romeu and Hojbjerg, but lacked the guile that Tadic or Boufal could bring. Having taken off both Romeu and Hojbjerg in the second half we totally lacked muscle and size with Clasie and Davis, replacing the bulldogs with a pair of terriers. Yes, Pellegrino has to experiment in pre-season to work out his best options, but this performance will have probably left him with more questions than answers. I don't think that there were more than a couple of players who earned praise for their efforts this evening. Oh, and Forster was woeful, although the defence in front of him didn't help. We need a lump in midfield like Wanyama and either Virgil or his equivalent as the defensive rock.

Koeman switched his agent to Wassermans and then all of a sudden, despite Koeman pledging allegiance to us until his contract expired, he then went to Everton. Virgil Van-Dijk's agent is Wassermans and despite signing a six year contract with Saints, all of a sudden he is militating for a move away. You don't see any connection here? I suspect that it was them who put both Koeman and Van-Dijk up to this, and they are the bastards who have probably orchestrated Van-Dik's stroppiness. Apart from playing hard ball with Van-Dijk and absolutely refusing to sell him to Liverpool, we ought to make it clear that we will not be doing any future business with Wassermans too.

Let's word the poll vote for either "holding firm on him staying" or ""surrendering to pressure for him to leave against our wishes"

Agree entirely. There will come a point when Liverpool will be forced to blink first and buy in an alternative CB. When that happens, it will become clear to V V-D that his future does not lie with Scousehampton and that if he wants to further his career in the future, he will have to buckle down and prove that he is worthy of playing for one of the giant clubs next season. This is high stakes poker and we hold a very strong hand, which grows stronger with every day that passes towards the transfer window slamming shut.

Just to make things more interesting, now it is rumoured that Koeman's Everton are after Hoedt too. This will have the poor red Scouse plastics going into meltdown, as they are convinced that if we sign Hoedt, that would be to replace Virgil when he goes to them and that there would be more pressure on us to keep him if Hoedt falls through. It must be even more galling to them that it is their deadly rivals alleged to be making waves. Although there is an attraction for Hoedt to play for team that has a fellow countryman as its manager, there is also the possibility of him playing alongside a compatriot with us if Virgil stays.

Whether Virgil leaves or sits out his sulk by himself, we will still be with two what you consider to be substandard CBs. Ideally, we will sign Hoedt and then presumably only be without one CB that qualifies as being decent in your opinion, whether that would be Stephens, Yoshida, Bednarek or Gardos alongside him. Of course, it might be that Pellegrino looks at having three CBs, one of whom could be Bertrand, so that allows other options. And then again, there is still some time to get other signings across the line to address situations that might arise before the transfer window closes. If Virgil stays and we sign somebody like Hoedt to partner him, that looks a good situation. If we sign Hoedt but lose Virgil, I wouldn't be that concerned with either Yoshida or Stephens alongside him, or Bednarek or Gardos if either prove themselves to Pellegrino. Both Yoshida and Stephens were improving with matches under their belt last season. Bednarek is raw, but might prove to be an astute signing for the future. Gardos doesn't look to be a good enough prospect, but who knows?

Why are we hurting ourselves? Because Virgil might be a disruptive influence on the other players? Allowing him to leave by throwing his toys out of the pram would be far more disruptive to the other players because it would send them a signal that they could follow suit. As others have pointed out, what would hurt us far more is allowing a greedy agent and an unscrupulous glory club to orchestrate a media frenzy to get us to sell a player against our will and at a time of their choosing. The additional damage will be to the integrity of the board, the options available to the new manager who was promised that we would not sell players from under his nose and to the fan base who would feel betrayed by us caving in, especially if it was to Scousehampton once again.

Why should they? We are a top half PL Club, playing all the glory clubs twice a season at least. Their scouts can assess his prowess against top opposition. The only gamble with him would be his bad attitude and the unprofessional way that he has conducted himself these past few weeks.