Sadly that's true. There was a point in January when I thought he'd actually come good. Didn't last. Didn't it also come out we signed him knowing he had a long-term injury issue? Just a dreadful bit of recruitment.
Wonder what we'd have done if we were still in with a shout of survival in January. I know the word was that we would have spent, but we hadn't got Spors through the door in time for that either, so would have probably been another car crash. One benefit of being so **** that we didn't have a chance of survival before January I suppose.
I mean I basically agree but Onuachu is slightly different for me. I can see how he could be used and score goals in the right system. Whether he'd ever be able to be a real success in the Premier League I'm not sure. Even then he's scored a few goals for us this season despite being in and out of the side and the team being crap. He's actually averaging a league goal every 250-ish minutes this season, which is decent.
I had a similar thought, Onuachu might only have 3 goals but for the amount of time he has played he is by far and away the most clinical player at the club, over a full season of starts he could get above 10 at least which is miles away from what anyone else is offering. Think he could do very well in the Championship, but can see him leaving.
Whereas Leicester very much still had a chance in January, and yet they too barely spent anything. Which says a lot about their financial position. As Laces has said before, I'd rather be a Saints fan heading into the Championship than a Leicester fan heading into the Championship.
I think there may be some teams in the Championship thinking that this is their year next year. Leicester have dodgy finances and all the teams get far less in parachute payments for only spending one year in the Prem this time out.
I suppose it depends on how safe us, Leicester and Ipswich want to play it. We'll all still be entitled to the year one (55%) and year two (45%) parachute payments (unless any of us get promoted in year one, in which case no year two parachute). The loss will be the year three parachute payment (20%) in the event that any of us fail to get promoted in those first two years. So potentially any of us might decide to keep back some of the money from the first two years, to cover that potential drop thereafter. But I personally doubt that as a strategy. It makes more sense to just focus on getting promoted again.
Wednesday 2nd April 2025 Southampton V Crystal Palace 1945 ko. Referee: Andy Madley. Assistants: Nick Hopton, Craig Taylor. Fourth official: Tim Robinson. VAR: Chris Kavanagh. Assistant VAR: Matthew Wilkes.
Oh yeah, forgot about him. Where he’s gone? Feels like he’s not been around to enjoy this season with us
