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The January Transfer Window 2019!


Kieran1uk

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Agree with Pilch, in January it's put up or shut up if players are available who you really want. Never going to get a bargain in January and it's a sellers market for decent players.

 

I like the look of the lad from Genk, looks a bit "Balesque" to me. Elabdellaoui has a poor record when he came over with Hull and screams cheap panic buy to me.

 

If the club think Che Adams is who they want they need to lay down some hard cash, at least market rate which is 15 million+ in my eyes.

 

We are far from safe and could really do with at least a couple of exciting young players who are doing the business now & raring to go.

 

We come off looking really cheap right now.

 

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Why couldn't we of secured a right back before we let Cedric go? Surely this is the logical thing to do? Why leave everything to last minute it makes us look like a bunch of clowns......

 

It's almost as if there was a political equivalent in the country

 

 

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Southampton in talks to sign Olympiacos right-back Omar Elabdellaoui for £6m after failing to lure Joakim Maehle from Genk:

 

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-6646533/Southampton-talks-sign-Olympiacos-right-Omar-Elabdellaoui-6m.html

Weird if true seeing as a couple of days ago Ralph said:

 

"It doesn’t mean we don’t take any player but it’s a young one we try to build up for the future and there are a few players we are looking at.”

 

27 isn't a young player for the future. Its effectively swapping one 27yo RB for (based on his career) a worse 27yo RB.

 

I hope he isn't ****ed off as from his comments throughout the window i.e looking to add quality, will replace Gabbiadini, definitely signing someone etc, he clearly expected a bit more - and has earned the right to expect that more than any of our recent Managers.

 

If we couldn't get who we really wanted at RB in Jan then why loan Cedric - its not like we need €500k - the cost of bedsit in London? We could have kept him and sold in the summer once more options were available to sign a young up and coming player as stated as the aim.

 

Getting rid of the players we have totally makes sense, but our process of actually signing players remains a cluster**** - but then again, Ross Wilson has overseen a few of those as Head of Recruitment

 

Of our four main targets, JKA, Mepham, Maehle, Adams it seems we just can't afford any of them, or are unwilling to pay what is needed to get the deal done. We won't get any of these in the summer either as their prices will go up if they keep doing well.

 

 

We can brief the Echo of being "hopeful" of signing good players, just like we used to brief Jeremy Wilson, but that doesn't translate to actually signing good players.

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Weird if true seeing as a couple of days ago Ralph said:

 

"It doesn’t mean we don’t take any player but it’s a young one we try to build up for the future and there are a few players we are looking at.”

 

27 isn't a young player for the future. Its effectively swapping one 27yo RB for (based on his career) a worse 27yo RB.

 

I hope he isn't ****ed off as from his comments throughout the window i.e looking to add quality, will replace Gabbiadini, definitely signing someone etc, he clearly expected a bit more - and has earned the right to expect that more than any of our recent Managers.

 

If we couldn't get who we really wanted at RB in Jan then why loan Cedric - its not like we need €500k - the cost of bedsit in London? We could have kept him and sold in the summer once more options were available to sign a young up and coming player as stated as the aim.

 

Getting rid of the players we have totally makes sense, but our process of actually signing players remains a cluster**** - but then again, Ross Wilson has overseen a few of those as Head of Recruitment

 

Of our four main targets, JKA, Mepham, Maehle, Adams it seems we just can't afford any of them, or are unwilling to pay what is needed to get the deal done. We won't get any of these in the summer either as their prices will go up if they keep doing well.

 

 

We can brief the Echo of being "hopeful" of signing good players, just like we used to brief Jeremy Wilson, but that doesn't translate to actually signing good players.

 

Dont disagree with any of that.

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Very underwhelming. IMHO If you want your first choice targets then you should pay top dollar for them.

 

You mean like £19m for Carillo, whatever it was for Hoedt and Moi etc? They were targets and we paid top dollar. The issue isn't money, nobody can seriously suggest we haven't splashed the cash, the issue is scouting players that are good enough. I'm not sure if Maehle or the guy playing in Greece would improve us.

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For a few windows now we have been very much in need of strengthening but we seem to drag out negotiations in the hope of maybe getting a deal over the line that we haven't paid full price for. I think we probably do have a little bit of money to spend but I don't think we have any desire to pay the proper money required in January to get our main targets. We've shown a pattern of not really commiting to signings in January as we obviously believe it's poor value which would be fine if we hadn't just let a load of our players leave. If we get injuries this could come back to bite us considering how close we are to the relegation zone.

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I may gain a reputation as being too optimistic in this thread, but is it possible that we have leaked our interest in this Norwegian bloke as Gent are dragging their heals as they think we are desperate. We always assume we are being used to leverage deals on this forum (eg. Maddison) but people rarely discuss the idea we might do it back.

 

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I may gain a reputation as being too optimistic in this thread, but is it possible that we have leaked our interest in this Norwegian bloke as Gent are dragging their heals as they think we are desperate. We always assume we are being used to leverage deals on this forum (eg. Maddison) but people rarely discuss the idea we might do it back.

 

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Yep that's far too optimistic, you should be in full#meltdown mode by now :lol:

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That's a different point.

 

Improvement would be great. But losing players who have been awful isn't a negative.

 

So if we need a win on the last game to stay up and it's 0-0 with 10mins to go, it's a positive thing to not have Gabbiadini on the bench?

 

Or if Valery gets suspended it's a positive thing to not have Cedric as an option to cover?

 

OK

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Weird if true seeing as a couple of days ago Ralph said:

 

"It doesn’t mean we don’t take any player but it’s a young one we try to build up for the future and there are a few players we are looking at.”

 

27 isn't a young player for the future. Its effectively swapping one 27yo RB for (based on his career) a worse 27yo RB.

 

I hope he isn't ****ed off as from his comments throughout the window i.e looking to add quality, will replace Gabbiadini, definitely signing someone etc, he clearly expected a bit more - and has earned the right to expect that more than any of our recent Managers.

 

If we couldn't get who we really wanted at RB in Jan then why loan Cedric - its not like we need €500k - the cost of bedsit in London? We could have kept him and sold in the summer once more options were available to sign a young up and coming player as stated as the aim.

 

Getting rid of the players we have totally makes sense, but our process of actually signing players remains a cluster**** - but then again, Ross Wilson has overseen a few of those as Head of Recruitment

 

Of our four main targets, JKA, Mepham, Maehle, Adams it seems we just can't afford any of them, or are unwilling to pay what is needed to get the deal done. We won't get any of these in the summer either as their prices will go up if they keep doing well.

 

 

We can brief the Echo of being "hopeful" of signing good players, just like we used to brief Jeremy Wilson, but that doesn't translate to actually signing good players.

 

Typical saints under this management (I.e Kat, Gao, Ralph K, Les and Ross). Year after year we are let down.

 

Time come out of this window weaker than when we started, whilst in a relegation battle, is a joke. Fair enough to get rid of those who aren’t part of the plans, but they needed to be replaced with a player or 2 with quality.

 

Beyond the starting 11 (even that’s debatable in some positions, I.e RB) we are disgustingly weak.

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Weird if true seeing as a couple of days ago Ralph said:

 

"It doesn’t mean we don’t take any player but it’s a young one we try to build up for the future and there are a few players we are looking at.”

 

27 isn't a young player for the future. Its effectively swapping one 27yo RB for (based on his career) a worse 27yo RB.

 

I hope he isn't ****ed off as from his comments throughout the window i.e looking to add quality, will replace Gabbiadini, definitely signing someone etc, he clearly expected a bit more - and has earned the right to expect that more than any of our recent Managers.

 

If we couldn't get who we really wanted at RB in Jan then why loan Cedric - its not like we need €500k - the cost of bedsit in London? We could have kept him and sold in the summer once more options were available to sign a young up and coming player as stated as the aim.

 

Getting rid of the players we have totally makes sense, but our process of actually signing players remains a cluster**** - but then again, Ross Wilson has overseen a few of those as Head of Recruitment

 

Of our four main targets, JKA, Mepham, Maehle, Adams it seems we just can't afford any of them, or are unwilling to pay what is needed to get the deal done. We won't get any of these in the summer either as their prices will go up if they keep doing well.

 

 

We can brief the Echo of being "hopeful" of signing good players, just like we used to brief Jeremy Wilson, but that doesn't translate to actually signing good players.

 

Agree with all of this.

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It doesn't look great - but I have more confidence in our squad than I did a few months ago - but concerning that we have weakened a squad that's already struggled for a few years now.

 

Admittedly those that have gone I don't think are much of a loss, apart from Cedric and that's only if we don't bring in a replacement, because he's largely terrible. I'm fine with Valery at RWB, as long as he doesn't get sent off as Ramsey is clearly nowhere near ready to play in the Premier League yet. I guess in that position JWP could also do a job, but it's a gamble for sure.

 

We seemed to be wanting a CB all window but that seems to have gone quiet, personally I've been surprised that we haven't been linked with any attacking players really apart from Adams. If Redmond gets injured then we're going to suddenly look very blunt IMO.

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If we couldn't get who we really wanted at RB in Jan then why loan Cedric

 

What if RH wasn't happy with Cedric's supposed 'don't really want to be here anymore' attitude and it was affecting the 'all for one and one for all' ethos that RH has instilled in the squad? Might the pros of ditching him not outweigh the pros of keeping him in that scenario?

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It is concerning that, if Austin departs, we are one bad tackle away from having to rely on Shane Long or an unproven youngster for goals until the end of the season. It's a risky business to slim down a squad that's as low on quality as ours. Our first XI is clearly good enough to stay in the league but beyond that we suddenly look extremely thin. Got to hope Ralph can keep up the intensity of performance from now until the end of the season - we've taken a gamble that's for sure.

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What if RH wasn't happy with Cedric's supposed 'don't really want to be here anymore' attitude and it was affecting the 'all for one and one for all' ethos that RH has instilled in the squad? Might the pros of ditching him not outweigh the pros of keeping him in that scenario?

 

He was nothing of the sort according to Blackmore.

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It is concerning that, if Austin departs, we are one bad tackle away from having to rely on Shane Long or an unproven youngster for goals until the end of the season. It's a risky business to slim down a squad that's as low on quality as ours. Our first XI is clearly good enough to stay in the league but beyond that we suddenly look extremely thin. Got to hope Ralph can keep up the intensity of performance from now until the end of the season - we've taken a gamble that's for sure.
Yep. Playing with your premier league place like that is a dangerous game.
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Got to hope Ralph can keep up the intensity of performance from now until the end of the season - we've taken a gamble that's for sure.

 

Personally, I'd rather take the gamble, with Hasenhuttl at the helm, than chug along in 'going through the motions' mode under Hughes.

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Personally, I'd rather take the gamble, with Hasenhuttl at the helm, than chug along in in 'going through the motions' mode under Hughes.

 

Completely agree, but if we'd have done the same transfer business under Hughes we'd be sunk for sure.

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People keep on saying that. Do you have anything to confirm that?

 

Actually i’ve been having a look at this because the issue of funds is brought up so often from both sides of the argument that I wanted to know what the truth actually was. Looking strictly at transfers since we came back to the Prem you have the following figures year-on-year (all figures taken from https://www.transferleague.co.uk/southampton/english-football-teams/southampton-transfers)

 

2012-2013 – First season back in the prem – I’m not including costs of players this year as we obviously needed to strengthen to become a Prem quality team and this could skew the figures unfairly. For reference though we spent about £32.7m bringing in the likes of JRod, Clyne, Yoshida and Gaston.

 

2013-2014 – Buys = £37.5m, Sales = £1.75m, Net = -£35.75m

 

2014-2015 – Buys = £67.9m, Sales = £92.6m, Net = +£24.7m

 

2015-2016 – Buys = £39.2m, Sales = £36.5m, Net = -£2.7m

 

2016-2017 – Buys = £57.8m, Sales = £65m, Net = +£7.2m

 

2017-2018 – Buys = £35.4m, Sales = £89.7m, Net = +£54.3m

 

2018-2019 – Buys = £59m, Sales = £22m, Net = -£37m

 

Add up those Net figures and you get a total of +£10.75m however for some reason that site hasn’t included Carrillo in their figures so you can take off another £19.2m for him. We also know we are obligated to buy Ings in the summer which takes off another £20m. Subtracting these 2 figures gives a final Net figure of -£28.45m.

 

This suggests that in terms of transfer activity we are already in the red. Add on top of that the costs for replacing managers, costs of improved contracts / wages and the money spent on Staplewood and I think it’s fair to say that we’re not exactly swimming in money.

 

The increased TV and prize money for being in the premiership obviously helps cover these costs and the shortfall but I don’t think it’s enough to give us some bumper transfer kitty that others seem to think we should have. I don’t believe the owners have / will be putting in more of their own money to cover transfers either.

 

What this all means is that we are in the current situation where it appears we need to sell before we can buy (the bloated squad size is also a good reason for this). I’d imagine the biggest reason for this is that we still have a number of players we bought for considerable amounts out on loan that we’ve not recouped any money for in regards to their fees and yet we have still needed to replace them with further signings. Between Boufal, Carrillo, Clasie, Hoedt and now Cedric you’re talking about £61.8m worth of player signings that we’ve got nothing back for yet. Once we’ve sold some / all of these in the summer I’d guess we’d then see the fees we receive for them spent on new players to improve the squad.

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Actually i’ve been having a look at this because the issue of funds is brought up so often from both sides of the argument that I wanted to know what the truth actually was. Looking strictly at transfers since we came back to the Prem you have the following figures year-on-year (all figures taken from https://www.transferleague.co.uk/southampton/english-football-teams/southampton-transfers)

 

2012-2013 – First season back in the prem – I’m not including costs of players this year as we obviously needed to strengthen to become a Prem quality team and this could skew the figures unfairly. For reference though we spent about £32.7m bringing in the likes of JRod, Clyne, Yoshida and Gaston.

 

2013-2014 – Buys = £37.5m, Sales = £1.75m, Net = -£35.75m

 

2014-2015 – Buys = £67.9m, Sales = £92.6m, Net = +£24.7m

 

2015-2016 – Buys = £39.2m, Sales = £36.5m, Net = -£2.7m

 

2016-2017 – Buys = £57.8m, Sales = £65m, Net = +£7.2m

 

2017-2018 – Buys = £35.4m, Sales = £89.7m, Net = +£54.3m

 

2018-2019 – Buys = £59m, Sales = £22m, Net = -£37m

 

Add up those Net figures and you get a total of +£10.75m however for some reason that site hasn’t included Carrillo in their figures so you can take off another £19.2m for him. We also know we are obligated to buy Ings in the summer which takes off another £20m. Subtracting these 2 figures gives a final Net figure of -£28.45m.

 

This suggests that in terms of transfer activity we are already in the red. Add on top of that the costs for replacing managers, costs of improved contracts / wages and the money spent on Staplewood and I think it’s fair to say that we’re not exactly swimming in money.

 

The increased TV and prize money for being in the premiership obviously helps cover these costs and the shortfall but I don’t think it’s enough to give us some bumper transfer kitty that others seem to think we should have. I don’t believe the owners have / will be putting in more of their own money to cover transfers either.

 

What this all means is that we are in the current situation where it appears we need to sell before we can buy (the bloated squad size is also a good reason for this). I’d imagine the biggest reason for this is that we still have a number of players we bought for considerable amounts out on loan that we’ve not recouped any money for in regards to their fees and yet we have still needed to replace them with further signings. Between Boufal, Carrillo, Clasie, Hoedt and now Cedric you’re talking about £61.8m worth of player signings that we’ve got nothing back for yet. Once we’ve sold some / all of these in the summer I’d guess we’d then see the fees we receive for them spent on new players to improve the squad.

 

If you use Transfermarkt's figures for those seasons instead, you get a net transfer spend of about -£5.5m as of 18/19 (i.e. not including Ings, as we don't know how the cost of his transfer will be offset by sales during the 19/20 season).

 

If all the things we've been told about the way the club is run are true (i.e. no debt, no money taken out by the owner) and there's been no kitty built up over 6 seasons of cost-neutral transfer activity and bumper revenues, then we must've been subject to some quite staggering financial mismanagement.

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I'd guess that we probably had for this season a budget for transfer fees of around 40-50 million and most of that has been used up in purchases in the summer. There might be like £10-12 million left to spend.

 

The outs have not really generated any cash yet, they are loans, so we might generate a decent kitty in the summer if those loans turn into permanent transfers. (Gabbiadini, Hoedt, Boufal, Carrillo, Clasie, Cedric, Carillo + maybe Austin) we could generate like £50 - £70 million there, plus clear like £300 - 400k from the wage budget, and might have a planned transfer budget again of about £30 - 40 million to add on top.

 

(depending where the funds for Ings is coming from)

 

Which could all set it up nicely for the summer but makes the big fees being demanded by clubs now more problematic.

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If you use Transfermarkt's figures for those seasons instead, you get a net transfer spend of about -£5.5m as of 18/19 (i.e. not including Ings, as we don't know how the cost of his transfer will be offset by sales during the 19/20 season).

 

If all the things we've been told about the way the club is run are true (i.e. no debt, no money taken out by the owner) and there's been no kitty built up over 6 seasons of cost-neutral transfer activity and bumper revenues, then we must've been subject to some quite staggering financial mismanagement.

 

True. About the only Premier League team you'd take us to be able to outbid in the transfer market is Huddersfield. All others, including Bournemouth, seem to have more money available for transfers than we do. When you consider that we sold van Dijk just last January and we've sold Tadic and Gabbiadini since, that is shocking.

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If you use Transfermarkt's figures for those seasons instead, you get a net transfer spend of about -£5.5m as of 18/19 (i.e. not including Ings, as we don't know how the cost of his transfer will be offset by sales during the 19/20 season).

 

If all the things we've been told about the way the club is run are true (i.e. no debt, no money taken out by the owner) and there's been no kitty built up over 6 seasons of cost-neutral transfer activity and bumper revenues, then we must've been subject to some quite staggering financial mismanagement.

 

Has this included agent costs and loyalty bonuses?

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True. About the only Premier League team you'd take us to be able to outbid in the transfer market is Huddersfield. All others, including Bournemouth, seem to have more money available for transfers than we do. When you consider that we sold van Dijk just last January and we've sold Tadic and Gabbiadini since, that is shocking.

 

What leads you to that conclusion? Just because they've spent more, doesn't mean they can outbid us, it's just that we have different targets. To prove this you need to show where we've both bid for players, and we've pulled out due to not being able to compete financially.

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West Ham close-in on Maxi Gomez:

 

West Ham are close to agreeing a deal with Celta Vigo that would see striker Maxi Gomez arrive in the summer. Gomez will remain at Celta Vigo for the rest of the season.

 

The compromise means West Ham are expected to pay less than the £43.3m release clause - it is thought the fee will be around £40m.

 

(IF they avoid relegation & IF they want either of them, it would give Celta the cash for Boufal & Hoedt).

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As a bit of a follow up – my previous post was focused mainly on our incoming transfers versus our outgoing transfers and showing we’ve had a net negative amount (i.e. we’ve spent more than we’ve received on players).

 

After a bit more research though this does not necessarily reflect the overall profitability of the club. In fact taking a look at previous accounts and reporting from the guardian about yearly club profits you can see that between the 2013-14 seasons and 2016-17 seasons we consistently made a healthy profit with figures of +£29m, +£15m, +£6m and +£42m following an -£7 million loss in the 2012-13 season (all figures pre-tax, last years accounts won’t be made available until March this year).

 

https://beta.companieshouse.gov.uk/company/00053301/filing-history

https://www.theguardian.com/football/2018/jun/06/premier-league-finances-club-guide-2016-17

https://www.theguardian.com/football/2017/jun/01/premier-league-finances-club-by-club

https://www.theguardian.com/football/2016/may/25/premier-league-finances-club-by-club-breakdown-david-conn

https://www.theguardian.com/football/2014/may/01/premier-league-accounts-club-by-club-david-conn

 

This would suggest that the club does have some money but that it is not being put back into the playing squad. The clubs mantra that any money from player sales going back into the squad would still technically be true with the caveat that income/profits from other sources is not going back into the squad.

 

I suppose the big question then is how this profit is being used and is it to the betterment of the club? At a guess some of it has gone into trying to improving our commercial revenue streams (which if profits are rising would indicate it is working) but you’d like to think if push came to shove that some of this could be used on the squad if we were in danger of relegation.

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If course it doesn't, people always forget that. And wages. And running costs of the club. And tax. Etc.

 

The thing is wages, agent fees and loyalty bonuses are highly likely to correlate directly with the transfer activity of the club. Since our transfer activity is entirely unremarkable compared with our league peers (total amount spent, record signing value etc), I see no reason to assume that these ancillary costs are vastly out of proportion with the rest of the league. In other words, they're pretty much irrelevant when asking the question of why we appear skint in contrast to the clubs around us.

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