Two questions; - Is he is a human being? - Does he have a pair of legs? If the answer is 'yes' to at least one of the above, then I'm happy enough.
I suspect that whoever we sign some Saints fans will find a negative with it. It won't that hard for a new player to be an upgrade on Pierre based on last season. You might want to repaint the sponsor on your subbuteo Danny, Black...
I do find the seemingly negative comments along the line of "never heard of him" etc. a bit strange. If you know about a player and have an opinion on him, such as my views on Tom Davies, then I think fair enough - you are entitled to your opinion. But not being happy with a signing because you don't know who he is seems strange to me - he could be awful or incredible, without watching him play, you have no idea!
I'm not being negative. I'm just wondering how much people have seen of him to form a positive opinion. I'm saying I don't have a clue not that he's rubbish.
That's fair enough mate, I always keep an open mind on new signings but as you say he is an unknown quantity right now.
Exactly my position. I'm not against signing someone I know very little about (Bednarek is a good example), but I'm dubious about how many Saints fans have a keen interest in Ligue 1/Toulouse/Ivory Coast in order to know this player and be excited about him. Most of the fans I'm talking about are on Twitter by the way, so does anyone on here actually follow Ligue 1 and know much about him? Fans of other clubs seem to think he's great and are disappointed they're not in for him, but until yesterday I'd never heard of him and I suspect most Saints fans hadn't either. Hard to share enthusiasm in comparison to the links for Loftus-Cheek.
For me he falls into that category of having heard of him, knowing he is highly rated and often linked to top clubs, but never having actually watched him play. So he is by no means a nobody, but I dont really have an opinion on how good he actually is. Could go either way really - Boufal fits the above description pretty much 100% and that hasnt worked out.
I watch Tifo Football videos on YouTube, and he’s a bit of a meme on there for how much they rate him. They are very stats orientated, and although it’s not nearly as good as watching every game of his career (Whosscored list Mustafi as a top Premier League centre-back), it can give a decent indication of what sort of player he is. I don’t think it’s necessarily weird for fans to be optimistic about signing a young player with a good reputation for a good price. It also doesn’t mean that those who are excited by the signing think he’s definitely gonna be a success.
There's so much info available in players these days. Once a player is linked with a club (arsenal and spurs in this fella's case) 'scouting reports' spring-up. https://www.footballcritic.com/features/ibrahim-sangare-for-c10mc-what-are-teams-waiting-forc/591
I'm always a bit excited by the prospect of a new player coming in but then i'm generally an optimistic Saints fan and hope for the best. I'd like to think we are signing a potential Morgan rather than an Anthony Pulis!
Done deal apparently - Hopefully Saints clarify whether it is an option or obligation to buy (hoping for the latter!)
The high wages of a player who will never play for Saints again off of the books is good news Jasp, the truth is we lost Hoedt as any use to the squad a long time ago. I'm excited by the prospect of new blood being injected into squad in the coming days/weeks.