The Saintsweb guide to transfer strategy

[Ex Lion Tamer]

• Get all your signings done weeks before the end of the window. Pay whatever the selling club is asking for to make this happen. Equally, sell players for whatever a buying club's initial offer is in case they don't come back with a better one.
• Prioritise players who used to play for the club. Ideally they will be over the age of 33.
• Aim for Scandinavian players as we've had some good ones in the past.
• Avoid South American players as we've had some bad ones in the past.
• Full backs must not be smaller than 6ft.
• Make sure any centre backs and defensive midfielders have a track record of shouting a lot.
• Make 6+ signings in total even if that means having to go for cheaper, average players.
• Spend more than the club can afford.

Anything else?

[Paulwantsapint81]

As soon as a possible incoming is discussed - Someone has to say waste of money not good enough while someone else says club lack ambition & should have spent more 

 

as soon as possible outgoing is discussed - someone has to say they were never good enough

[Suhari]

In any window never, ever, sign less players than Norwich or Fulham.

[SaintBitterne]

Right off or declare the player as the second coming within a Twitter rumour appearing.

[Weston Super Saint]

If we are selling a player, even thinking about accepting an offer for half the value will trigger a meltdown.

If we are buying a player, if the selling club don't accept our offer for half their valuation a meltdown will be triggered.

[Maya's Dad]

whenever another club makes a signing, post how the club have missed out and have no idea what they are doing. especially when they are 30m+ or its villa/ brighton

[Billy the Kidd]

How about ‘what a load of old pony’ and ‘it is Ralph’s fault’ even before the season starts?

[The Cat]

As soon as a player is rumoured make up a song for them which includes a line about hating Pompey.

If the signing is a centre back there must be a post reminiscing about the times we signed Van Dijk and Alderweireld.

Anyone under 23 should be described as "young, hungry and guaranteed to improve."

Something about Les Reed or Ross Wilson screwing us over.

A short YouTube clip followed by posts where people who have never heard of the player judge his whole career off the back of a 3 minute highlight reel with a terrible Euro dance backing track made by a 14 year old who has been banned from his Xbox and has nothing better to do.

 

[Turkish]

9 hours ago, Ex Lion Tamer said:

• Get all your signings done weeks before the end of the window. Pay whatever the selling club is asking for to make this happen. Equally, sell players for whatever a buying club's initial offer is in case they don't come back with a better one.
• Prioritise players who used to play for the club. Ideally they will be over the age of 33.
• Aim for Scandinavian players as we've had some good ones in the past.
• Avoid South American players as we've had some bad ones in the past.
• Full backs must not be smaller than 6ft.
• Make sure any centre backs and defensive midfielders have a track record of shouting a lot.
• Make 6+ signings in total even if that means having to go for cheaper, average players.
• Spend more than the club can afford.

Anything else?

you’ve cover a lot of it but missed 

 

Get depressed because we didn’t sign a whole list of players no one has heard of because they’re good on football manager or fifa/they went to another premier league club/you saw their name on some geeky scouting report or chart.

judge a player purely on their statistics

describe every young player and young and hungry so guaranteed to improve 

When we sell a player for a massive fee based on current prices bemoan years later how we we sold them too cheaply

 

 

 

Edited 23 July, 2021 by Turkish

[Matthew Le God]

- Say a player is 'highly rated' but don't say who they are highly rated by exactly

[Mr Saints]

Get linked with a centre midfielder and moan that we should be targeting a centre back, as if the club is unable to track more than one player at one time.

[Sunglasses Ron]

Don't sign anyone from a relegated club, they are born losers and their looserishness will spread like wildfire resulting in Saints spiraling into oblivion.

[Badger]

23 minutes ago, The Cat said:

 

A short YouTube clip followed by posts where people who have never heard of the player judge his whole career off the back of a 3 minute highlight reel with a terrible Euro dance backing track made by a 14 year old who has been banned from his Xbox and has nothing better to do.

 

I'd agree with you generally although I think the youtube clip of Carillo was fairly damning and supported the view we were signing a donkey.

[Badger]

You forgot the important "Skacel factor" when waiting on negotiations to be complete enabling some comedian to ask the inevitable question.

[Wurzel]

A) 25 man PL squad rules don't apply to us. We should buy enough players from other clubs (whether they are available or not)  to have minimum 3 for every position on the pitch. And all of them already PL quality.

B) In addition to A we should also have a ready made squad coming through from the Academy who can fit in seamlessly at any time.

C) Irrespective of B we should never sell an Academy product because, like, what's the point

D) Irrespective of C we should get rid of any Academy product deemed not quite a world beater and follow A

E) We should never pay our own players more than necessary and/or give them a long contract to keep them

F) Irrespective of E when we lose a player to another club who offer them  larger pay and/or a longer contract it's our fault for not offering better.

G) All incoming transfers and players wages should be paid for out of the owners personal funds regardless of any FFP rules and/or whether those funds even exist.

H) We must sell anyone deemed a scapegoat irrespective of whether anyone wanys to buy them

I) If all or any of A-H are followed, we should have done it earlier.

 

 

Edited 23 July, 2021 by Wurzel

[Toussaint]

Anything other than a move to Bayern, Barca, Real Madrid, PSG, MAN City etc etc is a sideways move and what's the point?

[eurosaint]

9 hours ago, SaintBitterne said:

Right off or declare the player as the second coming within a Twitter rumour appearing.

Ensure that you use an incorrect word in order that some smartarse can pick you up on it 😜

 

[Badger]

Any ratings on the 'tottyscope' ie how does their Doris rate, and can anyone uncover instagram photos of her with jugs on display ?

This will add or detract from the approval rating of potential signing.

[Ted Bates Statue]

I'm fond the once-ubiquitous catchphrase "Could he do a job for us?" which I recall applied to any player coming to the end of his contract when we were in the lower leagues. Probably the Paul Allen thread too. Apparently it even made it into an FBI glossary, impressive considering I don't believe anyone else used it outside the online Saints community.

[SuperSAINT]

Sign players with nice hair.

[Badger]

5 minutes ago, SuperSAINT said:

Sign players with nice hair.

Or a ready made song.

in the case of Stuart Armstrong he clearly ticked both boxes.

[Tamesaint]

Never sign players who your daughter is going to want to marry.

[TWar]

The manager is in charge of incomings, outgoings, all scouting, all negotiation, all contract extensions, making the tea for the players, the lot.

"Why doesn't Ralph simply sell a few players to get the people he wants, lazy is what it is, get on the phone to Norwich you mug"

[Lord Duckhunter]

Blame Les Reed or Puel for the lack of money, absolve Ralph of any blame. 

[SKD]

1 hour ago, Toussaint said:

Anything other than a move to Bayern, Barca, Real Madrid, PSG, MAN City etc etc is a sideways move and what's the point?

In which case, if a top team is interest, they’d only sit on the bench anyway. 

[TWar]

7 minutes ago, Lord Duckhunter said:

Blame Les Reed or Puel for the lack of money, absolve Ralph of any blame. 

The lack of money is definitely Ralphs fault, why doesn't he sell his car or remortgage his house or something? Complete lack of commitment.

Edited 23 July, 2021 by TWar

[Sunglasses Ron]

We need to collate this, put it in a leather-bound hardback, and submit to Martin Semmens and co. so they can turn our fortunes around big time.

The official Saints Transfer Playbook!

Edited 23 July, 2021 by Sunglasses Ron

[suewhistle]

2 hours ago, eurosaint said:

Ensure that you use an incorrect word in order that some smartarse can pick you up on it 😜

 

Yeah.

 

Quote

In any window never, ever, sign less players than Norwich or Fulham.

It's " fewer" FFS.

;-)

 

[Minsk]

Before signing any players waste a significant chunk of available funds in sacking/paying off the manager and all coaches. Any managerial/coaching replacements must have never been sacked by any other club ever as well as being currently employed at another club, meaning we will have to spend more of the transfer funds in compensation.

[SKD]

4 hours ago, TWar said:

The lack of money is definitely Ralphs fault, why doesn't he sell his car or remortgage his house or something? Complete lack of commitment.

Whilst maybe he can influence budget for incomings. Loaning out our back up RB when we had no one to replace him, was 100% Ralph’s fault though and it bite us on the arse, hard. 

[Bolokov]

Faaaaaaaaaaarrt

[Chapel End]

Our strategy is not worth bothering with unless it has been ratified by the president of self importance and head of belittling.......Turkish 

[Turkish]

4 minutes ago, Chapel End said:

Our strategy is not worth bothering with unless it has been ratified by the president of self importance and head of belittling.......Turkish 

LOL, mentioning me again, 

[TWar]

1 hour ago, SKD said:

Whilst maybe he can influence budget for incomings. Loaning out our back up RB when we had no one to replace him, was 100% Ralph’s fault though and it bite us on the arse, hard. 

Our back up RB was dreadful. I don't see how you can complain about losing a player who couldn't even get into an average Birmingham side. To say it bit us on the arse you'd need to say he would have been better than what we had and I don't think thats a fair assumption.

Edited 23 July, 2021 by TWar

[S-Clarke]

2 hours ago, SKD said:

Whilst maybe he can influence budget for incomings. Loaning out our back up RB when we had no one to replace him, was 100% Ralph’s fault though and it bite us on the arse, hard. 

There were moves to bring in that cover at full back when we let Valery go, but we couldn't move forward with that until we had a loan fee/% of wages off the bill from the Valery move. That's what I heard anyway. So we had to sanction the depature first, then move forward on our moves, which then didn't come to fruition. Always a risk.

Similar happened with KWP, we had to shift on Cedric first...before we had the funds to bring him in on a loan.

It's all very frustrating and you cannot run a PL club in this way. Miracle we're still here. I think Ralph, under the circumstances he's in, has been excellent and the only bit of stability we have. Some fans seem keen to throw the only positive thing about us in the bin and I don't understand that.

Edited 23 July, 2021 by S-Clarke

[Toussaint]

Fun thread just beginning to deteriorate into a squabble. Ho hum 

[Chocolate Box]

1 hour ago, Toussaint said:

Fun thread just beginning to deteriorate into a squabble. Ho hum 

Twas ever thus............

[Crab Lungs]

The players you really want should be bid for starting at an insultingly low offer.. and when you get told to sod off, go up in increments of 1p until they move to another club.

[Crab Lungs]

Load whichever relevant football manager in the series is the latest with a small database and filter all players interested in a transfer, giving you about 30 well known duds to choose from. Do not use scouting, at all. Do not watch any players. Choose from that list.

[Turkish]

Laud saints for the way we go about out business privately, despite it being all over the media we’ve had a ridiculously low bid rejected but this is just us not paying over the odds.  Lambast any other club who has low offers appear in the media for our players as being disruptive scum club trying to unsettle our players 

[SKD]

14 hours ago, TWar said:

Our back up RB was dreadful. I don't see how you can complain about losing a player who couldn't even get into an average Birmingham side. To say it bit us on the arse you'd need to say he would have been better than what we had and I don't think thats a fair assumption.

I agree, Valery isn’t great. However, he’s much better than Bederak or Stephens at RB. 

Valery doesn’t suit a back 4, defensively he’s not strong enough, however he’s competent enough as cover, as a wing back in a 5. God forbid we have to change formation, what’s the worse that could happen? I mean, we lost nearly every game from January anyway.

To leave yourself as no back up Right Back is absolutely ludicrous and poor judgement from the manager. 

[Ex Lion Tamer]

10 minutes ago, SKD said:

I agree, Valery isn’t great. However, he’s much better than Bederak or Stephens at RB. 

Valery doesn’t suit a back 4, defensively he’s not strong enough, however he’s competent enough as cover, as a wing back in a 5. God forbid we have to change formation, what’s the worse that could happen? I mean, we lost nearly every game from January anyway.

To leave yourself as no back up Right Back is absolutely ludicrous and poor judgement from the manager. 

In our first bad spell under Ralph, we played wing backs and we only managed to turn things around by switching to 4222. Going back to a failed formation would have been a disaster

[TWar]

24 minutes ago, SKD said:

I agree, Valery isn’t great. However, he’s much better than Bederak or Stephens at RB. 

Valery doesn’t suit a back 4, defensively he’s not strong enough, however he’s competent enough as cover, as a wing back in a 5. God forbid we have to change formation, what’s the worse that could happen? I mean, we lost nearly every game from January anyway.

To leave yourself as no back up Right Back is absolutely ludicrous and poor judgement from the manager. 

I disagree, I think Stephens and Bednarek were both better at rb than Valery, as was JWP with Romeu and Diallo in the middle. We didn't get to see the latter due to more unforseen injuries. 

Also bertrand is horrible as a wingback as he can't attack anymore. Furthermore, if we play 3atb Stephens has to start anyway and he's dreadful at cb too so I think 3atb would be a disaster. We would be losing an attacker, playing Bertrand where he does not excel, completely change our shape and how we play, and starting Stephens at cb, just to facilitate Valery. I'd rather we just put Stephens or Bednarek at RB tbh.

Also when Valery left Ralph was pretty sure he'd be replaced, he said as much in the press, the club let him down by failing to do so. Unless you are a fool like Duckhunter and think it was his job to scout and buy another fullback. 

Edited 24 July, 2021 by TWar

[le_tiss]

21 hours ago, suewhistle said:

Yeah.

 

It's " fewer" FFS.

😉

 

 

 

 

 

[Mystic Force]

Sell a player, wait to the following season to replace them and discover that player inflation means that for the amount of money you sold one player you can now only obtain a player with 50% of the ability of the last one, but at the same cost. Then repeat over several seasons.

[Tamesaint]

Moan every 30 minutes on every thread possible about getting £30m for our wantaway striker citing "lack of ambition" whenever you can.