Aaron Ramsdale

[Midfield_General]

2 hours ago, austsaint said:

Wasn’t that Dalek?    Alpines forecasts were a lot gloomier than that.

Yep, that was Dalek. 

Stated season after season that Saints long-term vision was to be a yo-yo club and that a 17th place finish in the PL was our ultimate ambition. 

Got roundly slated for it, but now we hear from those purporting to be ITK that that’s exactly how the club sees itself and that our strategy as soon as we got promoted was to get relegated again so we could have another year in the Championship with all our brilliant Prem quality players and then ‘come back stronger’. 

So it seems he was right all along! Who knew. 

#JusticeForDalek 

[austsaint]

29 minutes ago, Midfield_General said:

Yep, that was Dalek. 

Stated season after season that Saints long-term vision was to be a yo-yo club and that a 17th place finish in the PL was our ultimate ambition. 

Got roundly slated for it, but now we hear from those purporting to be ITK that that’s exactly how the club sees itself and that our strategy as soon as we got promoted was to get relegated again so we could have another year in the Championship with all our brilliant Prem quality players and then ‘come back stronger’. 

So it seems he was right all along! Who knew. 

#JusticeForDalek 

Yes, he was a “visionary”, our Dalek.  I hope he is still with us.   His cautious pessimism acted as a bit of a handbrake, even in those progressive days of Poch and Ronald.

[Turkish]

7 hours ago, CB Fry said:

"It was my son" was based on an England tournament campaign where he spent the entire thing saying his usual hate-the-overpaid-lazy etc etc England team, didn't want them to win a game, typical let's lose every gane and start again bollocks only to suddenly post a clutch of weirdly joyous, super excited celebratory posts when they won a match. But his son done it not him.......

Also he wrote off an entire Ashes based on the day one morning session (of course we went on to win that Ashes)

Was the only poster on here who hated the Koeman years because we didn't make the Champions League so we failed and didn't build on etc etc etc. Moaned like fuck pretty much every week of our best seasons in living memory

Also was partial to a Snickers or six.

 

 

 

Forever in our hearts x x x

That was it, good memory, very funny. 
 

his we are run like a crappy b&b should be up there in golden threads too

 

[Holmes_and_Watson]

6 hours ago, austsaint said:

Yes, he was a “visionary”, our Dalek.  I hope he is still with us.   His cautious pessimism acted as a bit of a handbrake, even in those progressive days of Poch and Ronald.

In fairness to Dalek, I do remember my brain cell finding it difficult to adjust from strugglers to Cortese's drive for CL football and the higher table enjoyment of Poch and Ron. Lots of nose Leeds at that unfamiliar altitude.

And I'm just about old enough to remember the Lawrie Mac days. 

 

[Saint Scott]

 

[for_heaven's_Saint]

Private jet to Newcastle is ridiculous. Not as if there’s a massive rush. 

[Miltonaggro]

16 minutes ago, Saint Scott said:

 

Just checked and the jet is recently purchased, registered to a Mr J Stephens out of Eastleigh airport. 

[OldNick]

13 minutes ago, for_heaven's_Saint said:

Private jet to Newcastle is ridiculous. Not as if there’s a massive rush. 

If you are Ramsdale it would be lol. The thoght of another season with us will send shivers down his spine. Alfie House may well have been correct when he said something on the lines of that he is not happy here

[Turkish]

13 minutes ago, Miltonaggro said:

Just checked and the jet is recently purchased, registered to a Mr J Stephens out of Eastleigh airport. 

Great guy to have around the airport 

[Miltonaggro]

39 minutes ago, Turkish said:

Great guy to have around the airport 

Apparently he's the Captain. 

[Gloucester Saint]

7 minutes ago, Miltonaggro said:

Apparently he's the Captain. 

Given the record of both those players in terms of going down it was a miracle the plane landed safely!

[Chez]

48 minutes ago, Turkish said:

Great guy to have around the airport 

would explain the rise in lost baggage.

[sockeye]

54 minutes ago, OldNick said:

If you are Ramsdale it would be lol. The thoght of another season with us will send shivers down his spine. Alfie House may well have been correct when he said something on the lines of that he is not happy here

I expect Ramsdale doesn’t want to appear like a dick but believes himself to be far above our level. Was probably disappointed he ended up here in the first place

[Miltonaggro]

1 hour ago, sockeye said:

I expect Ramsdale doesn’t want to appear like a dick but believes himself to be far above our level. Was probably disappointed he ended up here in the first place

Maybe.  I like the bloke and in an interview said his boyhood hero was Jaaskelainen who played 500 games for Bolton - above all else Ramsdale wants to play every week I feel, but doesn't look prepared to give us a season in the Championship.  Also think he was sold Saints by his bestie Brooks when we had momentum during the play offs.  Shame, as he felt like the first old school proper Saints signing in years.  

[Matthew Le God]

1 hour ago, sockeye said:

I expect Ramsdale doesn’t want to appear like a dick but believes himself to be far above our level. Was probably disappointed he ended up here in the first place

He'd be right! He is far above the level of the rest of our squad, bar Fernandes. 

[SaintsLoyal]

Great deal for Ramsdale as we needed the full £20M to spend not a poxy loan fee.

[pimpin4rizeal]

On 28/07/2025 at 22:14, Chez said:

I'm cooling the Pop Fizz in readiness. 

Is it not false economics? We save on his wages, but have to pay Baz's and or someone else's instead. We gain £5m, but won't his value probably go down by a similar amount? If we have a suitor, is now not the time to exploit them?

I'm usually the first on here to say we have to be realistic and balance the books, and if this is the best deal available and we accept it, we obviously needed to, but I certainly won't be happy and describe it as a "good deal". Allowing your best player to leave on loan sucks. What other club does that?

 

You’ve got a point here though why are we allowing our best player to go on loan ? We seem to prioritise what the player wants over what’s actually good for the team ..  fair enough if they meet our asking price.. but why let it happen for a poxy loan fee and saving some wages ?

[CB Fry]

11 hours ago, Fabrice29 said:

Obviously first choice you think? Let’s revisit this because I think if Pope stays fit he’ll be the one playing the big games by the end of the season if there is any.

Revisit what you like, couldn't give a fuck if he plays or not. 

The point is he isn't joining "to sit on the bench". He is not signing knowing he won't play and not caring. He will be expecting to be first choice. And I think he will be 

[Lighthouse]

44 minutes ago, pimpin4rizeal said:

You’ve got a point here though why are we allowing our best player to go on loan ? We seem to prioritise what the player wants over what’s actually good for the team ..  fair enough if they meet our asking price.. but why let it happen for a poxy loan fee and saving some wages ?

What do you mean, why? That’s literally the reason, his wages are amongst the highest at the club and will severely restrict our capacity to recruit.

[James]

9 minutes ago, Lighthouse said:

What do you mean, why? That’s literally the reason, his wages are amongst the highest at the club and will severely restrict our capacity to recruit.

I would forego some outfield recruitment if it meant keeping Ramsdale and not having Baz in goal. 

[pimpin4rizeal]

2 hours ago, Lighthouse said:

What do you mean, why? That’s literally the reason, his wages are amongst the highest at the club and will severely restrict our capacity to recruit.

But at the same time we’ve gone from having the best keeper in the league to the worst one .. at least if we sold instead of loaned we would have some decent money to get a replacement .. 

I suppose as long as we do we get a replacement at least we have some time now .. but frankly if we loan him out with the view of  having bazunu as our number this is just absolutely shocking 

[Lighthouse]

You can’t just ignore finances because you want to. We have a bloated squad with some very high earners in it, some of them are going to have to go and the likes of Ramsdale and Fernandes will be more likely to attract suitors than ABK or Aribo.

Whether we bring another keeper or not, and it looks like we’re certainly in the market, a player like Ramsdale was always likely to leave. We may well have had a gentleman’s agreement when he signed that we’d look for a deal elsewhere if we did go down, I can’t see him wanting to stay in the Championship.

[Saint Fan CaM]

I don’t view the loan deal as a great win for the club (how does that help us get a decent replacement?) and I certainly don’t relish the idea of the worst GK in English football being our no.1 this season. At the moment, with much of the deadwood still here and losing our best players, it’s easy to imagine another very underwhelming season ahead of us, even if we are in the Championship.

[Captain Jack]

Feels like the club have caved in again. Absolute bargain for newcastle. If their champions league campaign fails then they have the option to offload him back to us at which time his value will probably have dropped. Another asset that could have provided funds for a rebuild has been lost it feels

[hypochondriac]

10 minutes ago, Captain Jack said:

Asolute bargain for newcastle. If their champions league campaign fails then they have the option to offload him back to us at which time his value will probably have dropped. Another asset that could have provided funds for a rebuild has been lost it feels

We've raised over 50 million so far. We're hardly skint and we're rich for this league at least. 

[tdmickey3]

3 hours ago, hypochondriac said:

We've raised over 50 million so far. We're hardly skint and we're rich for this league at least. 

So lets spend some of our riches then, it we dont we will be also rans

[hypochondriac]

17 minutes ago, tdmickey3 said:

So lets spend some of our riches then, it we dont we will be also rans

We obviously are going to. 

[Saint86]

3 minutes ago, hypochondriac said:

We obviously are going to. 

I don't think it's obvious at all at the moment, although obviously we all expect that we will do.

[tdmickey3]

11 minutes ago, hypochondriac said:

We obviously are going to. 

Is it?

[hypochondriac]

11 minutes ago, Saint86 said:

I don't think it's obvious at all at the moment, although obviously we all expect that we will do.

Has there ever been a window where we brought a load of money in and then didn't spend a reasonable percentage of it on replacements? No one seriously thinks if Fernandes goes we won't spend decent money on a replacement do they? We spent last time in the championship and we were in a more unhealthy state financially. Why would we not? 

[hypochondriac]

6 minutes ago, tdmickey3 said:

Is it?

What evidence are you using to suggest we won't? 

[tdmickey3]

Just now, hypochondriac said:

What evidence are you using to suggest we won't? 

I don't have any but there is no current evidence, just historical purchases and that is not "evidence" that we will this time is it.

Time will tell i guess

[pimpin4rizeal]

12 hours ago, Lighthouse said:

You can’t just ignore finances because you want to. We have a bloated squad with some very high earners in it, some of them are going to have to go and the likes of Ramsdale and Fernandes will be more likely to attract suitors than ABK or Aribo.

Whether we bring another keeper or not, and it looks like we’re certainly in the market, a player like Ramsdale was always likely to leave. We may well have had a gentleman’s agreement when he signed that we’d look for a deal elsewhere if we did go down, I can’t see him wanting to stay in the Championship.

Will you be saying that If we loan dibling and fernandez out too?. Holding out for our price is the only way we get to have a chance of keeping our best players . If we start allowing it on loan instead we might as well pack up .

im trying to think of the last time we actually put up a bit of resiistance and kept someone who wanted out your probably going back to van dijk and schneiderlin

Edited 10 hours ago by pimpin4rizeal

[hypochondriac]

2 minutes ago, tdmickey3 said:

I don't have any but there is no current evidence, just historical purchases and that is not "evidence" that we will this time is it.

Time will tell i guess

Well we have previously, the owner and the club have said we will bring players in, Still has said we will and we will want promotion so it would make no sense not to. Given that there's no evidence at all that we are looking to do a complete change of approach and not spend any money replacing our best players, I'd suggest anyone worrying about it is slightly absurd. 

[tdmickey3]

Just now, hypochondriac said:

Well we have previously, the owner and the club have said we will bring players in, Still has said we will and we will want promotion so it would make no sense not to. Given that there's no evidence at all that we are looking to do a complete change of approach and not spend any money replacing our best players, I'd suggest anyone worrying about it is slightly absurd. 

Lets wait and see before calling people absurd.

[hypochondriac]

Just now, tdmickey3 said:

Lets wait and see before calling people absurd.

It's comptely absurd to fret about the prospect of us not spending any money based on nothing at all other than voices in your head. 

[coalman]

5 minutes ago, hypochondriac said:

Well we have previously, the owner and the club have said we will bring players in, Still has said we will and we will want promotion so it would make no sense not to. Given that there's no evidence at all that we are looking to do a complete change of approach and not spend any money replacing our best players, I'd suggest anyone worrying about it is slightly absurd. 

While Sport Republic haven't been shy about opening up the purse strings they haven't been the best at recruitment. Right now we're holding onto the hope that Spors is the man but he was recruited by the people whose track record is so terrible. We're also carrying the burden of that record. Last summer we signed a lot of players who didn't even make the bench or were immediately loaned out.

I think we will spend some of that. From the very limited viewing I've had Downs looks really good (that first time finish in stride was something else) and Quarshie has a lot of potential so maybe Spors is the man. Though, he also extended Stephens for 3 years so 🤷‍♂️

The longer we leave our recruitment the more disruption there will be to the team and the slower start we're likelier to make. Again this is suboptimal but sadly part of parcel of being a relegated team with a bloated squad on the books. It will be a real test of Will Still's tactical nous and man management for the first couple of months.

[SaintBobby]

Does anyone have a rough guess at the scale of sales we'd need to be remotely financially sustainable? I always assumed that we'd need to net about £70m or so just to counter the dramatic fall in revenue following relegation. I appreciate it's a multi-dimensional picture - wages are a feature, not just transfer fees. But my rough guess was that we'd need to make a profit of about £70m in this transfer window just to balance the books  - without any reinvestment.

[Matthew Le God]

2 minutes ago, SaintBobby said:

Does anyone have a rough guess at the scale of sales we'd need to be remotely financially sustainable? I always assumed that we'd need to net about £70m or so just to counter the dramatic fall in revenue following relegation. I appreciate it's a multi-dimensional picture - wages are a feature, not just transfer fees. But my rough guess was that we'd need to make a profit of about £70m in this transfer window just to balance the books  - without any reinvestment.

What are you basing the £70m on?

[SaintBobby]

6 minutes ago, Matthew Le God said:

What are you basing the £70m on?

Very rough and ready. They say that winning the championship playoff is worth £120m or some such like. So if it's worth that much to go up, presumably it costs that much to get relegated (offset by parachute payments).

[Matthew Le God]

1 minute ago, SaintBobby said:

Very rough and ready. They say that winning the championship playoff is worth £120m or some such like. So if it's worth that much to go up, presumably it costs that much to get relegated (offset by parachute payments).

The maths does not work like that at all.

As well as parachute payments, Saints have large relegation wage reduction clauses in player contracts. 

Player sales are also not all upfront payments. We are still bringing in and spending money on past transfers. Any other players we sell or buy this summer will also be paid for other multiple years. 

[SaintBobby]

1 minute ago, Matthew Le God said:

The maths does not work like that at all.

As well as parachute payments, Saints have large relegation wage reduction clauses in player contracts. 

Player sales are also not all upfront payments. We are still bringing in and spending money on past transfers. Any other players we sell or buy this summer will also be paid for other multiple years. 

The maths do work like that if the £120m figure is true - presumably there are bonuses to be paid if you get promoted etc.

You go up, you spend a lot of money. You go down, you need to save a lot of money. So the savings you need to make obviously aren't as high as £120m. But they aren't zero either. Pick the midway point if you like - say £60m?

[tdmickey3]

39 minutes ago, hypochondriac said:

It's comptely absurd to fret about the prospect of us not spending any money based on nothing at all other than voices in your head. 

No one is fretting, just not as convinced as you about it, nothing absurd about that so stop lecturing

 

[Chez]

11 minutes ago, SaintBobby said:

Does anyone have a rough guess at the scale of sales we'd need to be remotely financially sustainable? I always assumed that we'd need to net about £70m or so just to counter the dramatic fall in revenue following relegation. I appreciate it's a multi-dimensional picture - wages are a feature, not just transfer fees. But my rough guess was that we'd need to make a profit of about £70m in this transfer window just to balance the books  - without any reinvestment.

We lost £35m, before player trading, in the year we were in the championship. £25m was lost in the season prior (in the PL) before player trading. So if you want to break even (which isn't necessarily required) you'd need to make a net profit of £35m or so, based on last time.

Its worth noting that we have a sizeable debt that at some point needs paying down too. 

It's not easy to compare seasons, but the drop in wages (due to relegation clauses) from PL to Championship last time helped overcome the big loss of TV/PL revenue.

Obviously, after the first two years, the parachute payments fall to about £8m, so you then need to find further savings in the realms of £35m. After a couple of season in the championship, the income from player sales tends to fall dramatically, so overcoming operational losses through player trading becomes pretty tough.

 

 

[hypochondriac]

1 minute ago, tdmickey3 said:

No one is fretting, just not as convinced as you about it, nothing absurd about that so stop lecturing

 

Let's revisit this when we spend good money replacing Fernandes. 

[tdmickey3]

1 minute ago, hypochondriac said:

Let's revisit this when we spend good money replacing Fernandes. 

No need for revisit, lets just hope you are right and then everyone is happy

[Chez]

4 hours ago, hypochondriac said:

We've raised over 50 million so far. We're hardly skint and we're rich for this league at least. 

Transfermarkt has us bringing in £32m so far, not including Ramsdale. Mind you it has us spending just £10m on Downs and Quarshie, so maybe it undercooks the fees a fraction?

[hypochondriac]

2 minutes ago, tdmickey3 said:

No need for revisit, lets just hope you are right and then everyone is happy

All previous historical evidence, the appointment of Spors, statements from still and solak and evidence from all clubs in a similar position to ourselves in the championship suggests I will be. Zero evidence to suggest I'm wrong.

[hypochondriac]

2 minutes ago, Chez said:

Transfermarkt has us bringing in £32m so far, not including Ramsdale. Mind you it has us spending just £10m on Downs and Quarshie, so maybe it undercooks the fees a fraction?

Has it I clouded Amo Ameyew fee and the small amount we got for the youth player? Bednarek? Also Ramsdale obviously. 

[SaintBobby]

10 minutes ago, Chez said:

We lost £35m, before player trading, in the year we were in the championship. £25m was lost in the season prior (in the PL) before player trading. So if you want to break even (which isn't necessarily required) you'd need to make a net profit of £35m or so, based on last time.

Its worth noting that we have a sizeable debt that at some point needs paying down too. 

It's not easy to compare seasons, but the drop in wages (due to relegation clauses) from PL to Championship last time helped overcome the big loss of TV/PL revenue.

Obviously, after the first two years, the parachute payments fall to about £8m, so you then need to find further savings in the realms of £35m. After a couple of season in the championship, the income from player sales tends to fall dramatically, so overcoming operational losses through player trading becomes pretty tough.

 

 

That seems pretty close to pushing the envelope on PSR rules if we don't get close to balancing the books this year.