I think he'll stay, as his chances of 1st team football are far greater at Saints than they are at other clubs. Also, he will grow as Saints do, and it may come to the point where there will be little need to move to achieve personal success.
Good point, but Butland is a goalkeeper, and traditionally, keepers don't cost as much as out-field players.
Of course £6m seems mental for Butland - but that's because we don't know much about him. I'm sure our scouting network have done their research and deem him to have enough potential to make it a worth-while investment.
I don't think £6m sounds mental at all! £6m up front lump sum, maybe, but in installments typical for a kid, not mental. Nor am I saying £4m is an acceptable offer for Shaw - I'm simply saying I have no idea how to make a judgement on whether he is or isn't.
People are saying that they'll need to offer much more than £4m because Cortese is Cortese. He's likely still upset that he couldn't extract more than £15m for a League One teenager who was angling for the move.
OK. If you're going to give a silly example like that, I'll write Christian Ronaldo - £80M. You see, Buffon cost less.
He won't stay if he's going to be as good as some say. He's just seen a team mate head of to Arsenal, receive loads of plaudits, play for England at a major tournament, and has just been linked to a move to the club he supports... He won't stay forever mate.
The article seems pretty certain it's going to happen. "Will be back-up to Cole and Bertand." Stuff like that really pisses me off. If true, hopefully Cortese will stick to his word and not let the youth talent go like he promised.
No i'm not saying he'll stay forever, but there is a good chance he'll stay this year atleast. Chamberlain was an established member of our team and still initially struggled to get in the arsenal side. I feel it would be much easier to break into our side than anyone else's, and once he has played a few games, maybe get a big money move away.
The general football media community [conformity..?] suggests that an unglamorous team can never hold onto a set of really good players and therefore can never rise to becoming a glamorous team. During last season's Coventry game, Rob Bright was talking about our potentially great youngsters always going to top teams, to which the other commentator [Steve Wilson..?] suggested that Saints might hold onto them. I hate the attitude in this country, reflected in Bright's comments. It means that big clubs stay big and little clubs stay in their place. Presumably, there was the same objection to Manchester United before the Busby Babes, and they were just another club. I presume there was the objection to Liverpool before Bill Shankly made them what they were. There was a definite objection to Leeds Utd in the Revie days, because they'd done nothing before then. There was the same objection to Derby County, Nottm Forest, Aberdeen, etc.., and eventually they did go back to being also-ran clubs. These teams were not supposed to disturb the status quo. Well Liverpool, ManU, and perhaps Chelsea [Arsenal have always been there or thereabouts] did it so often, they became the standard that now needs to be shoved aside. And my opinion is, everything is up for grabs. If Saints want to be the best club in the UK, in Europe, even in the World, then that is entirely upto them, and nothing, save another club competing on the other side of the football pitch, should stand in their way. Certainly not the football establishment, media or pundits.
Typical journalism if you think about it. One paper writes a story so others follow suit... I reckon this is the scene: "We're running out of time and need to fill up a small article for the sports tomorrow! Any ideas?!?"! "What did we write ages ago but never stuck?" "Luke Shaw for £4m?" "I'll copy and paste that. Panic over! "
I don't think that it's entirely impossible for a team to hold on to players and work its way into position to threaten for CL, but it requires near-perfect decision-making by the management and an irrational sense of self-confidence around the team; without the former, one or two lost players will spoil the whole endeavor, without the latter, players' heads will be easily turned. We have the latter, at least for the moment, but a blip anywhere in the process could shatter the illusion. Newcastle is something of an interesting test case; they blew back into the Premiership, and on the back of a couple stellar acquisitions, nearly made CL after two years, and at least for the time being seem as if they might be able to keep the core of the squad together. But if they take even a small step back, it will be difficult to keep the vultures at bay.
