Nice little rant there undone by this line about Toby.. What we did with Toby was just the same as you have been describing other clubs as doing. We sourced a decent player cut-price.
I don't think Saints, or many other clubs for that matter, have gone to the same club and taken three or four of their 'best' players in one hit. We might raid a few club's but it's usually one at a time over a longer period of time. I can't believe what Liverpool did last season and I fear that it will happen again this season, not just Clyne and Morgan either. I have a lot of empathy with the original poster, after all how often can you watch an exciting, 'challenging' team, get ripped apart by other clubs season after season and not get a bit jaded and cynical? Personally speaking I no longer believe one word any players say about any club, or the managers come to that and I have a horrible feeling if we do get torn to bits as a squad at the end of this season our 'replace them with just as good players' belief may not work as well again. Perhaps this is a bit woe-is-me and I know it is a fact in the modern world, let alone football world, but it has definitely made me fall out of love with football to quite a degree. For instance I no longer watch anywhere near as much football on TV as I used to - even when I have nothing to else to watch or do. I've never been like that.
The trouble is a lot of players just say what they think you would want to hear rather than what is really in their mind. That unfortunately is life.....and life is what you make it!
Do Celtic have a right to be pissed off with us? After all Hooiveld, Boruc, Wanyama have popped down here in recent seasons. Who will be complaining this summer if we buy Clasie, Vilhena, Kongolo etc? Basically it's all come and go. Yes Chelsea buy-to-loan far more than should be acceptable, but of course that benefits the teams that those players are loaned out to. Just as Saints have benefited from A.Madrid for loaning Toby us (nobody's complaining about this - strange that). I agree Liverpool were outrageous last season, but that's only because they wanted to improve. There was no agenda against us. Regarding players like Bony, he would be playing more if they were still in the competitions they should be in Can't blame him or the board for that. Only Pellegrini.
And Danny Fox was Celtic. EDIT: No he wasn't. My mistake EDIT EDIT: He was Burnley, along with Jay Rod and Cork.
Didn't we poach Feyenoord's manager last summer, then come back for their top striker? Their fan's must have loved that, about as much as we love Spurs for luring Pochettino then being continually linked with Rodriguez and Schneiderlin.
Interesting point actually because so far the story with Toby is similar to Lovren; a player not fancied by his club and who has played well at Saints. Well, we know how its turning out for Lovren so lets hope Toby sees sense and stays with us (if allowed).
All very good points and I agree with them to a point but....all the players we 'poached' were playing in different leagues [including the manager] and mostly I think the fans would say you can't blame them. In our case clubs keep saying, 'they're doing a great job....what can we do - oh I know just poach their players and staff', including Wenger making jokes about having half the England team in his squad - most of which came from Saints and he had no hand whatsoever in developing them although you'd have thought he had the way he is fawned over.
I just don't think it is deliberate. The fact is that we are a team playing well and showing our players in a good light. We are also a team that doesn't have the clout of a United, City, Chelsea etc, so our players can be lured away. It is harder to lure a player from United to City for example without talking seriously stupid money. On the other hand, we are in the EPL and are seen as a team on the up, so we can tempt players from other leagues as we give them a path to the PL. it is just the way it is....not a thought out plan by other teams at all.
Or is it simply teams see players that have proved themselves in the Prem a better option then buying abroad? Arsenal buy English youngsters as they need the home grown quoter. Why not buy the best English youngsters? Which atm we seem to produce over and over. I see it as simply as this: Biggest teams in the World. Big teams in the various top leagues. Medium teams in the various top leagues. Small teams in the various top leagues. You can use the same thing as you go down the leagues (apart from the world teams obviously). I see us as a medium size team, so we take players from the smaller teams from our division and below. But the big teams in the league and others and the world's biggest teams take from us.
It is just the way football is. Mane is another example, he went on strike at Salzburg in the summer after our initial offer was rejected, do you really think if a bigger team came in in he would stick around? We basically are a good way into England and the PL for promising players abroad. They know they would be able to play regularly here putting themselves in the spotlight if they can play well enough for a top team to become interested. I remember when Wanyama signed and Arsenal were supposedly after him and there was a quote from Wenger about Saints paying too much for an unproven player. Teams like Arsenal/City/Chelsea etc have the financial clout to let the smaller teams take the risk then pay more at a later date if they prove to be a hit, as far more often than not, a player coming in from abroad doesn't live up to the hype.
We all feel the frustration that teams will 'steal' our players; perverse as it seems, l the pleasure that we have proven we are better than our so called contemporaries. Long term, yes it will hurt us, possibly, bit the tacit acknowledgement that we are better than all the others, is something l will cherish.
Yeah, the effect of home-grown quota can't really be overstated, either. Not all the players we have sold/will sell are English (though it bears a reminder that Morgan qualifies), but those with the home-grown designation are more likely to result in teams meeting whatever inflated price tags we append. We're never going to have a problem filling the quota (not only do we have a lot of English players, seemingly half our squad is under 21), so it creates a bit of market asymmetry...a quality that really doesn't matter much to us is highly important to the buyers, so it makes it that much easier to reach an acceptable sale price. Peruse the squad lists to see it in all its glory. Spurs have 4 over-21s who qualify as homegrown, with four roster spaces left open to fill the gap...they're right up against the quota, and consequently any players brought in need to be either English or under 21, or they need to sell/drop from the squad a foreign-trained player for any additional such player they add. City has 6 home-grown players in a squad of 23, and are likewise up against it...their eyebrow-raising addition of Richard Wright a couple years back, a career low-leagues backup keeper, owed to the fact that they couldn't afford to have a non-homegrown third keeper on the roster. They're also potentially looking at the loss of Lampard and Milner, at which point they'll be in rather desperate need of a couple Englishmen, price be damned. It's really no wonder why those two sides are expected to battle it out for a striker coming off a major knee injury and an eighteen-month layoff, then...perversely, in the case of City, it almost doesn't matter if he's anything more than a bit player, because they're effectively comparing his production to what would likely otherwise be an empty roster spot.
And todays Saints Supermarket story is......Mane to Arsenal...Ta Da! Who will it be tomorrow? If JWP gets into the England squad, I guess it will be him
