Article: We cannot do it alone. Football Southampton

what about the recent crop? best, sparv, lallana, bale, walcott, chamberlain, cranie, mills, mills, mcgoldrick (), surman, jones, dyer... the list goes on, we have young ex academy players scattered all over the football league and premier league and abroad!

 

I'm not sure regret is the word I would use. Sort of implies that things could have been different, which I don't believe is the case. The ones with regrets are surely the United's and Arsenal's, who didn't buy him ahead of Spurs.

Maybe disappointed is a better word, or something of that ilk.

 

You've let yourself down so badly by including Best in that list!

 

did'nt know groningen and Linfield were premier league clubs!

 

Get ready for the wums to infest this thread...

 

There's also Wayne Bridge at Man City.

 

To be honest he is right in one way although to lay the blame totally on all Premier clubs is not that accurate. The one club that is constantly on our tail is Arsenal. Tottenham got Bale because we got relegated. However it took them even two or three seasons before they realised what a talent they had. We have had bad management in that Lowe promised loads when he took over mainly about investment. No one can deny that we punched well above our weight for years in the top flight. Developing players like Chivers, Channon, Shearer, the Wallaces. Just to name a few. Although at the time we may have pretended to not be a selling club, with the exception of Micky channon, most went for record fees to bolster our bank balances. As for our latest Academy products Chamberlain was harassed by the media from an early age, just as our latest young player who hasn't even broken onto the bench yet let alone played in the first team. The fact about a lot of our Academy players actually playing in the premier is an exaggeration it is true, however there is still a lot of our ex players playing regularly paricularly Stoke for instance. Not all have come through the academy. Currently maybe 8/9 or so ex academy playing in the premier maybe, 10/12 playing in the Championship that springs to mind. I am sure someone knows each and every one so I could be underestimating rather than exaggerating, but hey who's counting.

 

Please don't start counting Beddy or this will turn into another mathematics thread...you know the one where two years old post to put you right

 

I have no problem with any of the sales to PL sides prior to 2010. These were all a necessary evil as the club was finacially in the mire. I am not impressed that Arsenal are able to approach a 17 year old academy graduate after 23 games, because he looks half decent. We got a good deal I know, but the fundamental moral here is wrong. It was the same for Crystal Palace and the young midfielder (Bostock ??) a couple of years back. They trained and developed him and brought him throught their ranks, only for Spurs to talk him into signing a pro-contract with them. Palace got something like £400k. It is wrong. If the Gooners or Spurs (both allegedly interested) come in for Luke Shaw then once again that is wrong.

I believe that a player coming through an academy, should only be able to sign pro-forms for that club and that he can not be approached for 2-3 years. Why do I think this? Well, firstly it would mean that smaller clubs don't lose future stars on the cheap, and secondly it would make the top clubs work harder at finding their stars.

I even read a rumour that Arsenal are tracking a Watford youngster who used to be in the Arsenal academy; that would be crazy as Watford have obviously developed him better than Arsenal originally had.

 

by the time luke shaw/corby moore and the like get into our first team, we will be in the premier league by then. no worries

 

How did you feel for Palace when Spurs nicked Bostock from them?

 

I think you would be better off staying at your place of worship Saint Goodness, St.Mary's Church..............

 

Oh yeah Barnard is as good or better as Bale .

 

Our chairman didn't want to sell alex oxo but the boy wanted to leave and we weren't gonna force him into staying here.We got a good deal really.

 

Not good with the sense of humour thing then.

 

Ha hA Ha... love it. Firstly how can you have a go at the OP for not answering questions when you want to avoid things yourself.

Secondly, what happened with Bostock if you didn't nick him? And please don't say he decided not to sign a pro contract at Palace and coincidently bumped into a spurs scout the following day. £440k from a tribunal was wrong.

 

You're allowed to speak to players not on a proffessional contract, although Palace could have got him to sign on a pre-contract, which would've meant we had to agree a fee with them for him rather than a panel deciding the compensation. It was Simon Jordan's fault anyway, he wanted £5mill upfront and a ridiculous string of add ons, we offered around £2mill so it ended up going to tribunual and they decided the fee of around 500k rising to 1mill depending on progress. That was a record fee at the time.

We didn't break any rules, we didn't nick him, Crystal Palace can have no complaints with us

 

Proper clubs? Proper clubs! What on earth is a proper club?

Are you just trying to wind us up, or are simply very arrogant and/or deluded?

 

Ask me all you like, you've just proved the point made by the OP with your attitude and refusal to see that Spurs did wrong by Palace... "not at our club attitude".

Well done fella, good to almost have a discussion.

 

ask Simon Jordan... you know very well that that deal was wrong for Palace and mirrors some of the things the OP is talking about.