Article: We cannot do it alone. Football Southampton

Well clearly I don't know that the deal was wrong. Any evidence?

Simon Jordan was a well known pain in the arse and caused Palace more problems than he was worth.

 

look guys, I'm going to jog on, becasue you know that we are talking about the ethics and morality of Prem league clubs tempting young talent away from clubs in less of a financial position to do anything about it. No "rules" were broken, but some underhand tempting had taken place.


Enjoy your season and good luck.

 

It was his Dad who was the problem, he told Palace he was staying whilst offering his kid out to the Premier League's biggest clubs.

The antics of both Bostock and his Dad since have shown the fee we paid to be if anything, excessive.

The abillity for bigger clubs to poach young talents before they turn proffessional is a problem, I agree. It's the rules at fault though, not the clubs. If Southampton were interested in signing a player from a team going bust, would you expect them to pay the normal market value or would you expect them to use the other club's situation to drive the price down?

 

It's unfortunate for Southampton, but it's the way that the rules are currently being used.
They should be tightened up so that clubs with less financial clout can't be exploited so badly, but I don't think that you've done too badly on that front, overall.

 

As I said earlier;

To be fair, we have made a lot of money from the sale of our youth players - that money may not have taken the club forward at times (some was used to pay off debts etc) but we have made millions out of the academy let's face it.

Because of our financial situation now, the £15 million from Chamberlain's sale will be re-invested back into the club, I have no doubt about it and we're just as stong without him - so are we really loosing out?

I don't think we are, and also, in terms in progress on the pitch, the club have never been left in the lurch without the likes of Bale, Walcott etc either.

 

I'll jog back in now

You are correct and on another thread on our board I have said it is the rules to blame. I believe that a player should only be able to sign professional terms for the club he has come through the system with and that a 2-3 year contract must be honoured at that club. It does go for us too, we signed a 17 year old from Plymouth for a rumoured £125k at the end of last season.

The FA or Prem league won't change the rules because they are scared of the big clubs.

 

One could argue that the freedom of movement rules help the smaller clubs to bring in money when a prodigy goes to a bigger club. However, I think that's short termism, and further reinforces the grip the bigger clubs have over their positions. It's hard enough in the football league for the smaller and struggling clubs to be ambitious, without potential star players making for the exits whenever a cheque book is waved in their direction. I'm not talking about Saints here, who are now able to compete again, but clubs like Exeter City, Brentford, Bristol Rovers, etc... These are clubs who have never been anywhere near the top division, either in living memory, or at all. I would like to think that if I was a supporter of such a club that I might get to see some real success in my lifetime. But clubs of this size and stature are condemned to mediocrity by rules, of this nature, that help to keep the strong at the top and the weak at the bottom. It shouldn't be.

 

Tough to enforce though, Ensil.
European employment law and all that.

 

This is a huge problem in English football and one that will never be properly addressed.

 

Not to get too deep, but kind of mirrors global economics! Who wants to give away power if they can help it?

 

If players are on a professional contract, then I don't see what the issue is. Just like any other player, if a team makes a bid and it gets accepted by the club whom the player is under contract of, then I don't see why age is an issue, whether they're 17 or 27, the Chairman who receives the bid is fully entitled to say no regardless of whether the player wants to leave or not - Chelsea supposedly offered a huge amount of money (reportedly £40m) for Modric, Levy said Modric weren't for sale even though Modric openly admitted he wanted the move but he's under contract to us and in fairness since the window has shut, you'd never have thought he was a player demanding to leave and in my eyes is an example to any other player who don't get their wish to move on. Charlie Adam (as much as I hate the pr*ck) was the same, he wanted out of Blackpool yet no one can deny he never gave 100% in the games he played for them.

For the teams who are in financial trouble and a bid that in fairness isn't matching the typical price of a certain calibre of player is made, the bidding club can't be blamed for being out of order or accused of poaching/ nicking players, at the end of the day football is a business like it or not and a club won't offer £10m when there's a chance of a £5m bid being accepted (theoretically speaking).

Now in regards to the Bostock situation, I can honestly say that we shouldn't have been allowed to get him for a nominal fee via the tribunal, players on a youth contract should NOT be allowed to leave their current club unless they're released or offered around. Saying that, Bostock has done f*ck all since joining us after all the hype and so called potential, so to be honest looking at it now, Palace are the ones laughing at the moment.

 

My word you are impatient. I have other things to do in my life than sit at a computer all day just on the off chance you might ask a question.

I will try but I haven't gone through every teams squad and I will remind you that I said Premier League and Championship.

A fellow lister has already given an answer but missed out Moss who plays for Swansea so that makes 8 PL clubs of which 3 have 2 ex saints academy players.

Off the top of my head in the Championship Forest have MacGoldrick, Coventry have Cranie, Reading have Joseph Mills, Doncaster have Gillet, Middlesborough have Scott McDonald, Leicester have Matthew Mills and Blackpool have Phillips.

That makes 15 of the 43 PL/Championship clubs (excluding Saints of course) which is over a third and is pretty good going I reckon.

I am sure there are more but I have no intention of trawling through all of the squads.

 

Ledley King
Peter Crouch
Luke Young
Stephen Kelly
Steven Caulker
Jake Livermore
Andros Townsend
Tommy Carroll

That's a short list of Spurs Academy graduates to feature in the Premier League or Europa League this season, with several others in the Championship or League One on loan from us, or because they didn't make it in the top flight.

As for the usual, highly innaccurate claims of being "parasitical", how does that work in the cold light of day? Gareth Bale played 40 games for Southampton, which is a remarkably high number considering he was a Premiership-quality player at a League One club at the time.

Of the various youngsters we've signed, we sdidn't spirit them away from their academies before they'd even played a game like some clubs do, they had turned out for their clubs, often making a decent number of appearances.

 

Not in all cases, but quite often the selling club gets a good deal. I wish Chamberlain was still playing for us, but in the Championship would we pay 12-15 million for a player? No. So we could put the money to good use, especially if we get promoted.

 

bale played for us while we were in the championship, he was part of the play-off team

 

we didnt have to buy him. his contract was coming to an end with plymouth, we offered to pay that money instead of getting him on a free so the money for him could be used to keep them afloat. we did our bit

 

Thanks for the honesty and agreement on the Bostock situation. I do realise that he has done nothing, however it is relevant as at the time he was the new sliced bread.

As for the first part of your quote, I think that is either a little naive, or a little selective. For every Charlie Adam and Moderic, there are 10 Tevez. It is more often than not that the player will hold out for his move.... dare I mention a young Bulgarian called Berbatov??

 

Well if all other clubs went out scouting, chances are they'd find atleast some if not all of the players the saints get, And to be honest if united or Arsenal came in for a young player they'd get 99.9% of them over the saints, which means less good players for you, less money for you, and eventually no club for you.

Atleast this way you get the good players, you get them for a while, get them help your club progress etc, then get a ****load of cash for them.

 

wont be happening now we're on the up and we have a Super Academy