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Is the Saints transfer policy working?

Discussion in 'Southampton' started by CBK, Feb 1, 2017.

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Is Saints transfer Policy working?

  1. Yes - Club plans well and brings in good players

    12 vote(s)
    15.8%
  2. No - Club is reactive & this season has done poorly in the window

    24 vote(s)
    31.6%
  3. Somewhere in the middle

    40 vote(s)
    52.6%
  1. Le Tissier's Laces

    Le Tissier's Laces Well-Known Member

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    I do agree that to progress rather than stand still, we need a more proactive summer (for what it's worth). If we don't then I will also be critical of the board's policy - particularly if we sell VVD. I still feel like there's extenuating circumstances for the moment though, and this is a 'transitional' year.
     
    #101
  2. fatletiss

    fatletiss Well-Known Member

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    I didn't mean to imply you did, I just was trying to find an anology.

    Any other comments on the rest of my post spaced? I hope we do have a good summer but do you agree that we've had only one bad summer with hindsight because apart from this season the rest turned out good?
     
    #102
  3. latviandream

    latviandream Well-Known Member

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    I'm calm and patient. The current crop at least has potential that some previous years wouldn't. It's not about 'not got the results overall' as if we've just been a little bit unlucky. Our GD has gone -11, +8, +21, +18 the previous 4 seasons and is currently -5 through 23 games. We've taken a big step back. We have the potential to get back to +18/21 at some point in 2-3 seasons if everything goes well but let's not pretend it'll happen overnight as if all is well.
     
    #103
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  4. Schad

    Schad Well-Known Member

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    Partially, it's because that strikes me as an even more concerning possibility: that, given a couple years to plan and six months to execute, we couldn't find a good CB available for purchase. That we tried to go the (cheaper, if temporarily) loan route, struck out and ended up with egg on our face seems more hopeful, heh.
     
    #104
  5. fatletiss

    fatletiss Well-Known Member

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    Yes, maybe.
     
    #105
  6. ......loading......

    ......loading...... 25 undefeated

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    To an extent, I agree. However, i have always felt our policy was a gamble, while you see it as a safe fonancial option. To an extent you were right, but I think past tense is the key to that clause.

    Let me offer an analogy of my own.

    You lie down to make love to your wife. You think you are doing great, pulling off those old moves with all the vigour of your teenage self, but she pulls a face and you, quite literally, grind to a halt.

    "It's not working for me," she says.

    "But these are my best moves. I have had years of success with these." You look pained, even a little hurt.

    "Yes, that's the problem," she sighs, and rolls over.
     
    #106
  7. Le Tissier's Laces

    Le Tissier's Laces Well-Known Member

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    But in reality, that part is not generally possible in January. Look at who has moved, and what they cost (if they are a 1st team player) this month.

    Sakho/Tasci are not either of those, and nor are the majority of signings this month (including Gabbaidini, who we more than likely paid a "January Premium" on). The reality is that those who are playing right now don't move and have no hope of doing so in January (unless you kick off, circa Payet/Fonte).

    Our options thing month, realistically, were probably those two, which we failed on for different reasons.

    I expect a very different picture to emerge in this summer, and if that doesn't happen, then yes, the board approach needs questioning.
     
    #107
  8. fatletiss

    fatletiss Well-Known Member

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    I'm not pretending all Is well, I'm just able to wait and see without pointing out every failure at every turn, which is what feels like is happening (not by you).
     
    #108
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  9. ......loading......

    ......loading...... 25 undefeated

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    Please excuse my awful iPad typing. I am like a gazelle typing on ice.

    Or something.
     
    #109
  10. Schad

    Schad Well-Known Member

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    Worth noting that a lot of people said exactly this when expressing disappointment in the fact that we didn't pursue a CB in the summer. We fall into the pattern every year; we don't get X in the summer, but it's okay...we can always go back in during the winter. We don't get X in the winter, but it's okay...prices are too high and good players too scarce, we can always go back in during the summer.
     
    #110

  11. Le Tissier's Laces

    Le Tissier's Laces Well-Known Member

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    PS - for what it's worth, and call it gut feel/opinon, whatever - I've never for a second felt like Sakho wanted to play for us - I think he wanted a bagful of money and then to move in the summer for more.

    He may, who knows, have made the difference between 12th and 14th, depending on circumstance, and then joined whoever.

    I dunno, I'd rather finish 14th than 12th, and have a united, relatively evenly paid squad, than someone who buggers us about.
     
    #111
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  12. fatletiss

    fatletiss Well-Known Member

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    Surely you were impressed I could do that and post in here though :)

    I get your point and to continue it, I would hope that now she has advised me (and I've seen - you assumed I hadn't seen) that performance isn't quite what it was, that there is an opportunity to allow me to try to improve and she sees that it is only recently that the old methods haven't worked so well. She was delighted less than a year ago when the earthen was moving every week with those old moves. It would be a little unfair if she suddenly forgot that very recently she liked the results of the old methods....
     
    #112
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  13. ......loading......

    ......loading...... 25 undefeated

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    See, I knew we were in agreement.

    It just took your wife to bring us together! :D
     
    #113
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  14. Le Tissier's Laces

    Le Tissier's Laces Well-Known Member

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    Please don't get me wrong, I do hear you on this. It could have been a better scenario for sure, I just don't see it as a catastrophe and i understand how we are at this point looking at the reality of it all. That's my perspective. We're going to be fine this season and we have a cup final to look forward to. We've probably, from a transfer front, got it a wee bit wrong. But that's not a tendency, if anything it's an abberation, and I can live with that personally.
     
    #114
  15. fatletiss

    fatletiss Well-Known Member

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    Good discussion tonight chaps, but I've got to go as up early to get tocollect people at the airport :emoticon-0148-yes:

    Night all.

    Ps. Spaced Saint my Mrs isn't happy with you. She didn't appreciate me giving her a nudge, waking her just to check that the "old moves" Still have got it... :emoticon-0138-think
     
    #115
  16. ......loading......

    ......loading...... 25 undefeated

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    Haha! Fair enough. Please note that there is no space in spacedsaint unless I skip lunch.
     
    #116
  17. Schad

    Schad Well-Known Member

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    That's the difference, I think. The warning signs have been there for a couple years, IMO...entering the season with a couple positions inadequately filled, leaving January without making substantive additions when they could perhaps have been really handy (say, when chasing CL). This just turned it into a warning klaxon, because we came up short after explicitly stating that we'd be getting in a good replacement, and we're now staring at a Yoshida/Stephens partnership in a cup final.

    As it stands, we have a bunch of needs in the squad. Chances are, we will not fill all of them in the summer, not with more than warm bodies at least. And my concern is that this tendency, which I believe is almost exclusively motivated by financial aims, will reach a situation where relegation is a realistic possibility, and we suddenly find ourselves with a bunch of different needs that all have to be addressed (and no desirable and dispensable assets to partially offset the cost, if that's their wont). Because that's when the truly bad decisions are made, and how teams end up in a cycle of bad spending to stay just above the drop zone, until they eventually fail.
     
    #117
  18. Missing Lambo

    Missing Lambo Well-Known Member

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    My problem with all this discussion is the belief that there are a host of top proven or obviously potential Premier League standard players currently playing who are telling their agents that if Southampton call this would be their life's dream.

    Our 'Arry, when he was at Spurs, reckoned he'd get, say, Spanish players waxing lyrical about the great Tottingham, and how they loved Jimmy Greaves and so wanted to play for Spurs. 'Arry's response, he said, was always "Don't give me that bollocks, son. The reason you want to play for Spurs is because I'm going to pay you 80 grand a week".

    Sadio Mane, Dejan Lovren, Victor Wanyama et al didn't sign for us because they grew up dreaming of playing at St Mary's, they did so because a) we were going to pay them more and b) it put them in the shop window for a transfer to a club that would pay them even more. Note Manolo's comments on joining. He's already dreaming of playing in Manchester or London, on that you can be sure. Don't get me wrong. This isn't terrible. If he has ambition, including cementing his place in the Italian team, he'll play his heart out for us and maybe become a folk hero.

    If I ran a highly successful business that needed, say, a Sales Manager and I decided that that young whippersnapper FLT was my man I'd be after him. But if I was willing only to pay £200 grand and he wanted £450 I'd look elsewhere (sorry FLT, I mean annual, and realise that these figures are derisory in your case) . I'd even take the risk of not appointing and/or look to promote within if I couldn't find someone who fitted my profile. Would my recruitment policy be flawed?

    I'm sure Les will have sat in his office on Tuesday night and thought "bugger". H&S experts will have been sent to the homes of Jack Stephens and Maya Yoshida to check for possible hazards. Of course neither the board, including Les, nor Claude will be happy going into the last part of the season with poor cover for the CB position and all of us will be hoping that Virgil will become available soon (26 Feb would be good). But to allocate blame for a situation that a one eyed moron could see is not ideal is risible.
     
    #118
  19. ihatemyselfandwanttodie

    ihatemyselfandwanttodie Well-Known Member

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    I think it is obvious the club tried and failed to bring someone in.

    I dont have any issue with that amd I'm sure deep down, we know stuff like this happens.

    After reading this thread from start to finish the bit I am sure we could all agree on is the fact we sold Fonte.

    If he was causing an enormous rift in the dressing room and had to be cut out of the team, then you don't have much choice.

    But I'm not sure it got to that point, and we could have kept him until we got his replacement, in which case as in our failure to do so, we wouldn't be short in CB position.

    Perhaps we wouldn't have got as many millions for Jose on the summer, and that was a factor also.

    So, to summarise this, the failure of the Board was to let a player leave without having him replaced prior to his departure, rather than not trying to replace him or just having bad luck. Luck wasn't bad, it was the planning and order of events...
     
    #119
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  20. Archers Road

    Archers Road Urban Spaceman

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    Fuxake. Terrible analogy mate. Truly ****ing embarrassing <laugh>
     
    #120

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