Never mind Poch, Paul Williams etc. I've never forgiven you lot for Tommy bloody Forecast To think that a sell on clause was taken out too!
£2m and Forecast for a 25% sell-on clause on Gareth Bale and clauses worth an addtional £5m, wasn't it? He's currently without a club, having been released by Chelmsford City, a sixth-tier side.
****ing hell, I didn't know the sell on clause was as high as 25% ! To think at one point in our history Saints were nearly as badly run as Liverpool !
Something like that, thought it was 15% though. And yeah he was utter ****e (as you've just proven), didn't make a single appearance! Never mind though, we were on the bones of our arse so needed it
Yeah, you survived and you've made it back and into Europe. The predators will be circling in the summer again though, I fear.
Van Dijk unfortunately looks the next to be out the door. He was absolutely outstanding for us last year and has continued his form into this season. Ominously there are quite a few 'top' PL teams who dearly need a top CB like him and I was very surprised to see during the summer that he wasn't linked with a move despite the likes of Koulibaly and Bonucci being quoted as 50 million plus. Chelsea have bought Luiz and are apparently monitoring Burnley's Keane and Boro's Gibson, while I understand that they are under pressure to field at least one english player this decade, Van Dijk is streets ahead of both of these.
Agree that Virgil is streets ahead of the two mentioned. Would quite like Keane as a Fonte successor though.
Probably. We seem very good at dealing with it though and our set up must be one of the best in the country. Some think now that we've got all our main players (bar Romeu) on long term deals we should find it easier to hold on to them. I'm not convinced myself, can certainly see Virgil going sadly.
So Piskie, let's get this straight. Your name is piskie, your avatar is of some sort of caricature which certainly isn't arsenal related yet your caption refers to Spurs. You realise the face you show this forum bears reference to spurs and not Arsenal, the club you claim to support. Why is it you choose to embed Spurs within the character you outwardly show on this forum and not Arsenal ? Could it possibly be because they are a club that you are well and truly obsessed with ?
Clearly the caption is a tongue in cheek reference to Spurs, but that seems to have orbited straight over your head. A fan of what team in particular do you think would make such a tongue in cheek reference to Spurs ?
If you do well and get back into Europe, then you'll probably keep most of your best players. The problem might actually be if you do too well or any of your individual players excel. Keeping a team that does well is possible. Keeping a player that does amazingly well is much harder. Back to Bale again, I guess.
I've been thinking to myself recently who should replace Fonte when his time with us comes to an end, which will unfortunately be quite soon it seems. I agree that Keane is a good shout and he has all the attributes needed to prosper at a club like Saints, if he has any sense he'll chose us over Chelsea if it came to it. I'd like to see us have a go for Shawcross on the off chance he'd see us as an upgrade. It will probably be some unknown unearthed from a smaller European league and I'm fine with that, look where that policy has got us 1
Yep, will be very hard to qualify by league position again though. I'd quite like a cup run. Pretty much We'll keep plodding along as we always do though, leaving everyone wondering how we do it
So, what defines you on this site is a reference to Spurs, particularly in the absence of any evidence you are an Arsenal supporter So, are spurs more important to you than Arsenal, as your 'forum face' would have us believe ?
No, it's kind of a balance. Having very good players that aren't ridiculously headline grabbing helps. Alderweireld's going under the radar at the moment and didn't make this list, for example. A striker playing as well as he has would make much bigger waves. Van Dijk's doing well and I know that other clubs are looking at him, but he's not a media darling. Clubs like Real and Barca aren't thinking that they can write off his transfer fee in shirt sales and advertising, if they were interested. A young, explosive player is much harder to keep than an older, more solid one.
Good points regarding Toby and Van Dijk. For me Toby is easily the best cb in the league and Van Dijk would get in all but a couple teams too. A good example of the non media darling thing is our first Summer exodus when we sold 5 players but kept arguably our best in Morgan
Seeing as you were banned from the Arsenal board, it might be a mistake that you'd fall into. The tongue in cheek reference to Spurs, would for most, point them to me being an Arsenal fan, but you have to make allowances for some people I suppose
