Liverpool took three of key Southampton players in the summer, they went for the fourth, but not successful. No one gives Southampton any chance of staying up, but the way the are they are playing I cannot see them going down. They got good money from their sales, I am not sure they have re-invested half the proceeds of their sales yet. Southampton 2nd in the table and Liverpool in the bottom half of the table. Good business !
Southampton will end up about 10th. which is great for them.... t the start of august had sneiderlin got his way it coudl have all imploded. I am glad for them as i can forgive a few irate fans. HOWEVER. Lfc's position will not be determined by siging southampton players. lambert was a plan b abase don suarez and sturridge to cover cups. Lallana is an issue but a smaller one and lovern is a lump. Now that aside LFC's position is going to be determined by selling square for 75mil and buiying badontelly,. this is a rank decision by the look of things and has eliminate all penetration and speed of attack. LFc to finish 7th by current form... which indicates a return to where we were at prior to one good season. we are competing with utd, spurs and everton for 4th to 7th.
Not really interested in what is happening at Saints. It's just far far too early in the season to start making predictions. None of the sides in the top half have yet found what they would like to be their true form (unfortunately including United).
Lovren is the only one we should have signed. I've no doubt Lallana will improve- but for the price we could have done better. (Reus's buy-out clause). Lambert wasn't expensive- but not really who we needed.
Little premature there mollusk. Let's see what he's like when the season has developed a little or on a cold rainy night in Burnley.
Heh, I quoted you wrong, I meant to say that Tadic was superior to Lallana - for one thing he can complete a full match; Lallana was regularly subbed before the end of a match even when he was match fit here at Saints. On Lambert v Pelle, Pelle's younger, faster and not just an impact Sub as Lambert would have been, even here. You could have had him for £8mn - admittedly more than the £4mn you paid for Lambert. There's no doubt we got the better overall deal though; in simple numbers paid a total of ~£18mn, you paid ~£30mn for very similar style\quality players. As for Lovren(~£20mn) vs Gardos(£6mn) and Alderweireld (loan with option to buy for £6.3mn), well for a start, we got two for less than you paid for one. I'll let you decide who you think got the better deal here but there's a reason Lovren's former partner at CB (Jose Fonte) was made our captain after Lallana left and has been the one steady constant when we've played both of the two new CBs. Indeed, he's been a steady constant since he joined us in League 1. What? Rogers thought he paid £20mn for leadership in the back line? Sorry, wrong defender you bought there then.
meh..... you are forgetting something here.... you took a PUNT on pelle and tadic... you did you could be sitting here like newcastle crying in your tea cup. you really didn't know how they would react to the prem... and remember you lot have them 5 games.. in 6 months they could be sitting on your bench like say papis cisse was at newkie.. they are great examples the point is lovern proved himself at you lot... playing agressively from the back. now as a proven player he's done the job but we'll see if he's good enough to play top 4 won't wee. alderweireld was looked at by 5/6 clubs before athletico bought him. theres a reason he's with you on loan. he's limited. but i think he's decent but not top 4. best of luck there but if you can't digest there a difference between a punt on a player like origi for <10 mil or can for 9.5mil and punting on your best player... who you'll never ever admit were your best players.
Tend to agree with you here mito. Great when untried players come in and do well in the PL but like you say it's always a punt, some pay off some don't, too many examples to pick just one. It could also be said though that it's a punt a player doing well in one PL team will replicate it at another, but as every new signing is a punt anyway let's just say the bigger risk is the untried player. We are also looking at the balance of British > foreign players which is a reason [if we are looking for one and we probably are] that Lambert and Lallana made sense.
£20m for Lovren could be seen as expensive; however, he is a good signing. Other than West Ham- he's been good at the back. Two Lovrens and Reina of 4 years ago back and we would be as impenetrable as a Nun in a tungsten steel chastity belt.
Koeman had signed Pelle before, so knows him and his abilities well - that's wasn't a punt, Tadic whilst not having been previously signed by Koeman was also well known to him, however. Again, not a punt. Koeman himself was the best signing we made in the summer - arguably, he *was* a punt. Yeah, about Lovren when we bought him Lyon fans were telling us how bad he was and were mostly glad to get rid. He was good for us because he was partnered with a proven leader. Rodgers, apparently bought Lovren for his leadership* but now apparently the man himself has admitted he's finding it hard to lead: "“It is not so easy to lead all the time. I was used to other players leading before" (http://www.thenational.ae/sport/cha...art-says-with-time-and-the-games-it-will-come ) - so yes, you paid too much for a player that admits himself he's not that good at doing what he was bought to do (lead your defence). On the other hand, we still have the slightly less technically able, but far better leader Fonte, who's proven he can bring out the best in players he plays beside in three different english leagues now. If anyone can bring out the best in both Alderweireld and Gardos, it's Fonte - the man made Hooiveld look semi-capable in the Premiership** for a while!! If you really think you got a good deal on Lovren, you're nuts - he's not a bad defender, he's very good with the right partner but he just isn't a leader and that's apparently why he was bought. Who do you really think got the best deal in terms of centre-backs this summer? *http://www.liverpoolecho.co.uk/spor...ndan-rodgers-dejan-lovrens-leadership-7517134 http://www.theguardian.com/football/2014/jul/28/brendan-rodgers-liverpool-dejan-lovren-leadership **I love the bloke & apparently he was popular in the dressing room too, but he's a championship standard player. No, we're not.
Your fellow fans were saying quite the opposite in the summer when we were linked to him... they were rather irate at us for taking him.