Summer Transfer Window 2026

[Turkish]

Is it time for an open letter to the echo yet? 

[CSA96]

7 minutes ago, Turkish said:

Is it time for an open letter to the echo yet? 

[Lee On Solent Saint]

12 minutes ago, CSA96 said:

I hope those two have some kind of image rights for that photo. The amount of times it gets posted here.

[Gloucester Saint]

Just now, Lee On Solent Saint said:

I hope those two have some kind of image rights for that photo. The amount of times it gets posted here.

Kirk would never need to grace Granada TV’s studios ever again.

[Suhari]

Did we have similar sentiment on last summers transfer thread, at this time of the window?

I suspect so...

[CB Fry]

23 minutes ago, Turkish said:

Is it time for an open letter to the echo yet? 

"The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing"

Rise up FFS

[hypochondriac]

1 minute ago, Suhari said:

Did we have similar sentiment on last summers transfer thread, at this time of the window?

I suspect so...

We did indeed which is why everyone should be markedly more calm. Yes it's shit to lose your best players abd at this stage it will probably mean we drop points when we shouldn't have due to the upheaval but Spors has a strong track record of buying the right players and im hoping for a couple of surprises too. Nothing we can do about it anyway so no point in shouting at the club about a crap situation.

[UpweySaint]

52 minutes ago, tdmickey3 said:

The price should reflect how important to the selling club but i guess we are happy with Stephens and Wood  

Do you honestly believe THB won’t be replaced? 

[Marsdinho]

David Zima at Slavia Prague, get it done Johannes

[Saint Mikey]

Even if we were promoted last year, THB would have gone to Villa. He would have wanted the move and we would have wanted the sale given he has 2 years left on his deal. Just have to hope we get in a decent replacement.

[tdmickey3]

1 minute ago, UpweySaint said:

Do you honestly believe THB won’t be replaced? 

No idea, but we need to replace him but not with players of Stephens poor standard, it must be far better

[Turkish]

3 minutes ago, CB Fry said:

"The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing"

Rise up FFS

I’m busy furiously typing away a strongly worded email about the ASSET STRIPPING and LIES going on inside the walls of St Mary’s. I’ll share it with the echo and on here when done.

The duty of every fan is to protect their club from its owners 

[Osvaldorama]

The worrying part is that our centre back recruitment has largely been poor for years now. 
 

I accept that we can’t stand in his way if Villa are really in for him, but I just hope our recruitment is up to scratch

[sfc4prem]

8 minutes ago, Marsdinho said:

David Zima at Slavia Prague, get it done Johannes

Is Zima actually in the frame, though?

[hypochondriac]

9 minutes ago, tdmickey3 said:

No idea, but we need to replace him but not with players of Stephens poor standard, it must be far better

Don't be silly.

[Football Special]

2 hours ago, Midfield_General said:

If true, that's at least £5m less than I thought we'd hold out for.

I'm guessing that THB has made it very clear he wants to go, and this late in the window there's not enough time left to play hardball. Only hope would be a competitor coming in and offering more, but that seems unlikely given the speed this is moving.

But a base fee of ~£21/22m + add-ons really does seem low for a 24 year-old who has played for England and still has two years left. 

 

That's a rubbish deal,  hardly any more than we paid for him 

[Challenger]

2 hours ago, James said:

If THB is basically out the door then I suspect our interest in Anel was genuine which does raise the slightly worrying/annoying spectre that he just picked Burnley over us and we are now having to negotiate for a new target which will delay things. 

That's how this outfit roll, if they're not on the back foot, they're on their arse.

[tdmickey3]

2 minutes ago, hypochondriac said:

Don't be silly.

Why is it silly mate, I have no idea what they will do but if/when they do it needs to be a lot better than Stephens

[Give it to Ron]

11 minutes ago, Turkish said:

I’m busy furiously typing away a strongly worded email about the ASSET STRIPPING and LIES going on inside the walls of St Mary’s. I’ll share it with the echo and on here when done.

The duty of every fan is to protect their club from its owners 

Including the new club our owner is buying?

[hypochondriac]

1 minute ago, tdmickey3 said:

Why is it silly mate, I have no idea what they will do but if/when they do it needs to be a lot better than Stephens

There's no historic evidence or precedent to suggest that we wouldn't replace THB. You're not stupid you know he will be replaced.

[Cuddles]

£25m is mental, what is going on? Is this purely and simply because we're in the Championship?

[LiberalCommunist]

For me, this feels different to last summer. THB is more critical, and the fees being touted are not as tempting by any stretch. And the fact its been left so late just feels nasty. Hell, if he kicked up a stink six weeks ago we could have just had it as part of a ongoing fucking punishment!

If he goes now, we should get 30M, nothing less. 

[Chez]

12 minutes ago, Marsdinho said:

David Zima at Slavia Prague, get it done Johannes

They have Champions League football again. Is he moving to a championship side?

[Ted Bates Statue]

40 minutes ago, CSA96 said:

Saw this yesterday and immediately thought we have a rival to the Crumps' compo face pictures.

I hope this isn't considered too far off-topic, bearing in mind the amount of shit we've had to deal with this decade

[hypochondriac]

1 minute ago, LiberalCommunist said:

For me, this feels different to last summer. THB is more critical, and the fees being touted are not as tempting by any stretch. And the fact its been left so late just feels nasty. Hell, if he kicked up a stink six weeks ago we could have just had it as part of a ongoing fucking punishment!

If he goes now, we should get 30M, nothing less. 

It will look like a picnic compared to next year if we don't go up.

[hypochondriac]

I think the hope makes it worse. Some of the best times supporting saints were the few years we were absolute crap bumbling around near the bottom of the championship with stern John's last gasp goals saving us from relegation and then the year we went down going to forest and having a party despite already being relegated at that point. For me the frustration this and the last window stems from the concern that we may be wasting the tiny window we have where we have a distinct advantage over most other clubs in this division with the parachute payments. 

[Paul_B]

2 hours ago, trousers said:

 

 

We may not have got Anel the other day, but we're definitely getting bummed now.

[Chez]

Henrik Falchener might be an option at CB. Seems to spend more time on his arse than Lyanco in this highlights video and some wont be keen on a CBs that wear their socks around their ankles, but he made the Norway world cup squad. Decent worm too...

 

 

[Greenridge]

43 minutes ago, Suhari said:

Did we have similar sentiment on last summers transfer thread, at this time of the window?

I suspect so...

With 10 or so days to go we’re not yet at the 11th hour but it’s probably about 8:30pm

[CSA96]

12 minutes ago, Chez said:

Henrik Falchener might be an option at CB. Seems to spend more time on his arse than Lyanco in this highlights video and some wont be keen on a CBs that wear their socks around their ankles, but he made the Norway world cup squad. Decent worm too...

 

 

Wrexham had €9.5m knocked back a couple of weeks ago according to David Ornstein

[Saint86]

3 hours ago, Turkish said:

On a seperate note to saints 

saviniho underwhelming at Man City who signed him for £30m going to Spurs for nearly 3 times that. Ridiculous 

Isn't it just fiddling the sale so that they pay less sell on for Marmoush?

[Saint86]

3 hours ago, Miltonaggro said:

I was struck in the first Russell Martin game at Sheff Weds how much Ward-Prowse bossed and marshalled the midfield. Had he stayed that season we would have been a good shout for the autos. 

As it is, it’s a number of years older and various loans which must have knocked his confidence. But, he is only the same age as Larin (nothing like the Walcott, Lallana, Romeu pension plan) and has never relied on physicality or pace. I think that a return would suit him and us. 

JWP also isn't carrying any baggage related to injuires. He's remained largely very fit and untroubled - so you would think he can go on for a fair while. If ever we were going to bring a player back to end his career at saints, JWP would seem the best option.

[Saint86]

3 hours ago, hypochondriac said:

How much would we owe Man City if it were 25? 

Circa £1M-1.25M (assuming 20-25% of profit)... Which would be paid in installments and subject to any sell on clauses. So we'd pocket nearly all of it at least, although i doubt we'll be free to reinvest more than 75%.

[Mk1J]

Not sure West Ham will be selling JWP to us, unless they just don’t consider us a rival. 

[tdmickey3]

47 minutes ago, hypochondriac said:

There's no historic evidence or precedent to suggest that we wouldn't replace THB. You're not stupid you know he will be replaced.

Nothing is guaranteed in football..... Remember this is a club that thought Bazunu was good enough for the us in the PL

Lets hope you turn out to be right

[hypochondriac]

2 minutes ago, tdmickey3 said:

Nothing is guaranteed in football..... Remember this is a club that thought Bazunu was good enough for the us in the PL

Lets hope you turn out to be right

There's no guarantee that if I throw an apple in the air in my kitchen that it will fall to the ground but given that that has happened every other time you'd be a bit of a fool if you said you weren't sure that it would happen the next time.

[tdmickey3]

1 minute ago, hypochondriac said:

There's no guarantee that if I throw an apple in the air in my kitchen that it will fall to the ground but given that that has happened every other time you'd be a bit of a fool if you said you weren't sure that it would happen the next time.

You are waffling some nonsense aren't you 🙄

Gravity guarantees the apple will fall but not sure it works in football transfers  🤣

[Wade Garrett]

3 hours ago, Lighthouse said:

We can if they’re worth a lot of money, which is needed to balance the books.

Would go completely against Solak's words though.

[hypochondriac]

7 minutes ago, tdmickey3 said:

You are waffling some nonsense aren't you 🙄

Gravity guarantees the apple will fall but not sure it works in football transfers  🤣

Maybe we will see a sudden gravity shift. After all nothing is guaranteed. You're the one talking bollocks mate. Why you've decided you have no idea if we will replace our centre back and best player I don't know. Can you name any time in recent history where we have failed to replace a player? Do you ignore the quotes from the club that sales will be replaced? Just a ridiculous thing to say. Watch when we do replace him you'll be saying something like "I never said he wouldn't be replaced I just said I didn't know if we would or not." I said you weren't stupid earlier but I'm beginning to have doubts. 

[Scoobysaint]

In May and June, we thought there could be a massive fall out from Spygate. Would the players want to stay? Would they seek legal action to cancel contracts and such like. Many couldn’t envisage keeping much of this squad together. 

Then we get the positive news that Peretz and Larin were signing, Bree a new contract, all the team were still together, gonna stick it up ‘em. I think we all got so carried away with this “us against the world” attitude many people forgot that THB and Shea Charles had only two years left on their contracts. Both have been offered Premier League football and it’s not a surprise if they are both to leave. The key now is what we do to replace. For every Peretz there is a Bazunu and for every Larin, a Downs. 
It’s not time to press the panic button just yet. 

Edited 9 hours ago by Scoobysaint

[Lighthouse]

31 minutes ago, Wade Garrett said:

Would go completely against Solak's words though.

I think you may have taken his interview a little bit too literally. He was hardly going to come out and say, "yeah we’ll probably have to sell two of our better players to balance out the wages vs. Income from not getting promoted." That unfortunately is the reality of the situation.

[hypochondriac]

12 minutes ago, Lighthouse said:

I think you may have taken his interview a little bit too literally. He was hardly going to come out and say, "yeah we’ll probably have to sell two of our better players to balance out the wages vs. Income from not getting promoted." That unfortunately is the reality of the situation.

TBF he could have said something like "it is likely we will have to sell some players but we will do all we can to replace them with the best quality possible." I know that arguably he said a version of that but it was a fair bit more than that in my opinion.

[Saint86]

20 minutes ago, Lighthouse said:

I think you may have taken his interview a little bit too literally. He was hardly going to come out and say, "yeah we’ll probably have to sell two of our better players to balance out the wages vs. Income from not getting promoted." That unfortunately is the reality of the situation.

I would say this summer has gone pretty much as expected given his quotes tbh. That will change if the signings are poor though.

[trousers]

I can see why people are saying that Dragan's words were "vague" and/or "open to interpretation" but, in my opinion, there's no way, *if* we end the window with a weaker team (on paper), that that outcome could be spun to retrofit his words, even by the forum's most esteemed contrarians... 

(And, for the avoidance of doubt, I'm not saying we *will* end the window with a weaker team than last season, just saying hypothetically *if* we do...)

Edited 8 hours ago by trousers

[Cuddles]

2 minutes ago, Saint86 said:

I would say this summer has gone pretty much as expected given his quotes tbh. That will change if the signings are poor though.

It's this, IMO. Obviously it would have been far better for someone to come in with a viable offer for THB at a much earlier stage, but...food chain.

Let's hope we are able to find another shithouse leader at CB who can play decent through balls and score a few too.

[Chez]

 

2 minutes ago, hypochondriac said:

TBF he could have said something like "it is likely we will have to sell some players but we will do all we can to replace them with the best quality possible." I know that arguably he said a version of that but it was a fair bit more than that in my opinion.

From a negotiating point of view, wasn't his general "we ain't selling mate unless the money is too good to be true" line the best option?

We bought Larin, Peretz and Dobbin. It looks like the club tried to resign Stewart too. So, when he said they were going to "try and make the side as strong as it was last season", he clearly had those player investments in mind.

Since then Charles has left and we have not found his replacement, we lost a game and we've turned down an approach for THB. Again, I think Solak suggested the players with two years left on contracts could well depart at the right price.  

If you feel Solak has pulled the wool over your eyes, fair enough, but personally I think his words tend to match the proceeding actions of the club. 

[revolution saint]

As much fun as it is to talk about the semantics of various things various people have said, I'm hopeful we can start getting some decent links for potential new signings.  Way more fun.

[hypochondriac]

3 minutes ago, Chez said:

 

From a negotiating point of view, wasn't his general "we ain't selling mate unless the money is too good to be true" line the best option?

We bought Larin, Peretz and Dobbin. It looks like the club tried to resign Stewart too. So, when he said they were going to "try and make the side as strong as it was last season", he clearly had those player investments in mind.

Since then Charles has left and we have not found his replacement, we lost a game and we've turned down an approach for THB. Again, I think Solak suggested the players with two years left on contracts could well depart at the right price.  

If you feel Solak has pulled the wool over your eyes, fair enough, but personally I think his words tend to match the proceeding actions of the club. 

I agree nothing wrong with that line. The stuff about being as good or better than last year I feel was an unwise thing to say. The reality is we are unlikely to be as good or better and it raised the hopes of fans in my view unnecessarily. Absolutely right to keep cards close to your chest and to be bullish to a degree but in my view you can do both. 

[SaintsLoyal]

Villa have no intention of signing THB and will Saints show some backbone and ban the athletic from St Marys.

[Give it to Ron]

1 minute ago, SaintsLoyal said:

Villa have no intention of signing THB and will Saints show some backbone and ban the athletic from St Marys.

Well they also allegedly looking at Tomori for £15m so who knows