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Cuco Martina about to arrive...
at 20:02 6 Jul 2015

Not for long, I haven't got the time, I'm drawing a logo for you. It's just one huge round circle, white around the edges with red in the middle. Your apparent fave colours. The fact that it resembles a prolapsed arsehole is probably a mere coincidence.
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Cuco Martina about to arrive...
at 18:50 6 Jul 2015

You are right, which is why I'll hang fire because I could be pleasantly suprised. No reason to write the season off before we've even played a match!

If you were going to make a best guess on what the club wants to do. Morgan would go out, that money would just about cover Toby & Clasie and then they'd spend 10m on Praet

I think that would move us towards the top 10 on wages & would probably mean a net spend of about + 10m. Which will probably put us in the top 15 spenders.

Assuming the press are right about targets & that first choices are available. If they aren't I assume we'll spend a lot less.

The truth is, the squad is in a bit of a weird spot now, because it's filled with premiership quality players. But only a few "difference makers" that are good enough for a top six club. What we actually need to do, to break into the top bracket, is to sell the likes of Maya, Long, Pelle, Steven Davis & replace them with players in the 15m - 25m bracket. Intead we have to sell our players in that bracket and then shuffle the deck.

My point being, that although I get frustrated. I do recognise how difficult it is to push on. Because I don't think you can get more from this quality of player than we have already. Sure the attack can improve, but the defence can't play that well again next season, it was practically perfect except for in goal. But if I had a vote on it, we'd sell the bench and replace it with the best kids & 2-3 players better than what we have. Then roll the dice.

I wouldn't be signing this Martino lad, when we've got umpteen young defenders deperate for minutes. It's just 100% the wrong message and once again gives the lie than Ron cares about playing kids. He doesn't, he needs to stop giving the likes of Jason Mac, Turnball, Seager & Hesketh the expectation that they will play when in reality they'll be blocked by the quality of Durex, Gardos, Elia & Martina.

Basically at some point, people at our club are going to have to stop talking shite.
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saints threaten legal action
at 18:35 6 Jul 2015

For the same reason that Clyne & Cork weren't offered contracts, etc. etc. The club should have offered 10m cash on Jan 1st.

The player will end up going to Spurs for the same reason that Clyne went to Liverpool. Because he'll likely double his money.

It's had to claim that the club isn't involved in sustained propaganda campaigns, when they brief the press for months on end, that they are hoping or want Clyne to sign a new contract. I'd like a hot oil massage from Rita Ora, but while she's being offered better elsewhere she's hardly likely to take it!

Just like last summer, just like with Jack Cork, the club made no genuine attempt to keep Clyne. Because he couldn't, wouldn't & shouldn't sign a contract worth 45k a week. Offering him that deal, a year late, was purely for the sake of deniability.

The club is better run as a business without him, no question. But I'd prefer the toxic arrogance of Nico to the cloying bullshite of the Ralph administration. I don't know a club that works harder on PR than Saints at this point. Both Ralph & Nick have the same issue, because neither play with straight dice, if it ever goes wrong it'll go sour with the fans very quickly. It's a shame, purely from a personality stand-point that Leon Crouch isn't involved anymore. Always came across as an honest bloke & an actual fan.
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Cuco Martina about to arrive...
at 18:24 6 Jul 2015

I just wanted to see the club improve quality & not just numbers. We didn't improve quality last season and even with the best intentions, if we manage to start the season without a weakened first eleven, minus Morgan & Toby we'd have done brilliantly.

If Juanmi is the no .10 we were missing last season, we've paid 4m & he's actually a 10m player then great. But it's great for Kat & Ralph, not for the fans because to actually kick on we need to spend 15m on a player that's worth 25m.

I just want to start next season, with the club spending somewhere in the region of what we should be doing as financially speaking, the 8th biggest club in the league. Top 10 would be great. Top 12 I'd take now. Just some hard indication that the club are targeting sporting success & not just operational efficiency. They need to make a net spend of at least 20m + & wages to support it.
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Cuco Martina about to arrive...
at 17:46 6 Jul 2015

It's lucky we have a phillosophy where we develop the young player of the academy and don't just get squad depth by signing cut price nobodies from other countries!

As an indicator of how good this guy is, current Whoscored.com ratings from last season-

Florin Gardos: 6.83
Cuco Martina: 6.69

If we sign him, I'll back him as always. But at this point, I'm fully expecting us to start the season 20th in net spend & 16th in wages again. Can't help thinking that the club is operating without any safety net in these budgets, having to hugely overperform to even tread water.
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saints threaten legal action
at 17:37 6 Jul 2015

The Saints have paid a blinder line, is only valid if he turns up for training at Staplewood in the next week.

Otherwise it's a bizarre stretch, for non T.U.I posters, to suggest that Saints purposely held off agreeing a fee in the expectation that the selling club would be too stupid to provide competent administration.

Considering the money at stake, it seems like it's in Athleti's interest to sell the player to Spurs and to then argue & try to settle with us about the difference between the 6.8 million agreed fee and the fee paid by Spurs. Which should result in a couple of million back in our pocket. Hopefully it'll cover the Mayuka fee.

Unfortunately though, no Toby, which was the only thing that mattered. I don't know why we didn't offer the going rate for him in January. Well actually I do know. But let's wait and see how it pans out.
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hi jacked threads !
at 18:05 22 Jun 2015

First time I've checked in on this site for weeks & I come back to this thread, quelle suprise. Though I guess I should have been shocked because obviously, it was me that was trolling the board and the guy who a number of valued posters had complained about. So let's have it right, with a few home truths.

1. Nick is the worst writer of any football blogger I've ever read, without a question. He loves the club, his heart is in the right place & he's put in a huge amount of effort but his articles are absolute garbarge. They are often full of inaccuracies & the opinions are repetive and foolish. On the tenth mention of the Mayka transfer two years after the deal & the 5th article telling us how Saints MUST remember how we generally win away when playing on St. Swithun's day I had to stop. He's awful & the site is never going to get any bigger, because he has no talent. He deserves better, but he won't get it.

2. The employment of "Aids" as moderator shows everything you need to know about the actual desire to do anything remotely regarding moderation on this board. The guy is both witless & is never actually on the board. The policy towards moderating this board has been a combination of apathy and only occasionally making a token whinge when somebody at the network has complained.

3. The people who post on this board are almost to a man fookwits, who are only here because they can get away with this behaviour. The lack of any moderation and general apathy has meant that this place is a ghetto of middle aged, low-iq fantasists and wannabee hoolies. The reason why nobody new, below the age of forty or literate joins this group is because they read the board & find it as inviting as a seat next to John Westwood at Fratton Park.

If the network are serious about closing the board, then good riddance. It's been wonderful, ya'll. Love Bradley
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Transfer window
at 15:20 26 May 2015

LOL

The thread & the reply from Del was a flame, dear oh dear. This moderation is going to go well. ;)

Alright lads, I'll leave you to your board. Enjoy the summer!
[Post edited 26 May 2015 15:21]
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How many grounds have you been to following Saints?
at 14:26 26 May 2015

Thanking you squire, you've performed your role perfectly.
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Transfer window
at 14:25 26 May 2015

I've talked about this subject often and at length when they were brought up genuinely by people interested in debating the points. You missed them?
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How many grounds have you been to following Saints?
at 14:16 26 May 2015

See there you have the difference again.

What we were doing was talking about football. The relationship between budget & success, which is 88% correlation by the way the last time I saw a statistic.

What you are asking to do is to talk about posters, which isn't football at all is it? What if I say a low amount? Or the same as you? Or how about every league ground? All that does is give you another avenue to snipe about a person that should mean nothing to you. You'll just speculate about whether I'm telling the truth, who I am or whether I'm a real fan.

How is that talking about football Del?
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Transfer window
at 14:10 26 May 2015

Where was the insult?

You've come onto a thread, once again, looking to flame by purposely trying to ridicule & misinterpret what another poster has said.

Plenty of people have suggested that the top seven side, shouldn't be 20th on net spend & 16th on wages spent. It's an opinion that you should be able to not get upset about. Don't you think? Not the same as agreeing, but as an adult you should be able to respect a fellow fan's opinion, while stating your own. It really shouldn't be very difficult at all.
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Transfer window
at 14:04 26 May 2015

Oh dear, back to struggling with proportionality again. A little prone to overexageration even.

Just goes so show, that the subject of flaming comes up and the instant response is for the normal suspects to start flaming again. It's what these guys are here for.
[Post edited 26 May 2015 14:06]
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How many grounds have you been to following Saints?
at 14:02 26 May 2015

The more money a club spends, the worse they do it's an excellent point you've made several times now & I'm sure everybody agrees with you.

Hope the club spends less next season, so we can win the league.
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How many grounds have you been to following Saints?
at 13:46 26 May 2015

Nick said you can't talk about Doc & post personal information on the forum.

I've said that they should add to the ban, multi-posting and flaming.

How would that stop you from talking about anything you wanted to talk about?
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How many grounds have you been to following Saints?
at 13:18 26 May 2015

Firstly which version of "you" is supposed to have visited 72 grounds following Saints? Not Pompey Elvis I presume.

Secondly, it's a pretty simple point. A Saints forum is supposed to be a place to talk about Saints. You exclusively use it to talk about other posters. How much of a fan you are is completely irrelevant because it's supposed to be about the club & not the personalities of the posters involved. Nobody cares about who you are, what you do in real life, how many matches you've watched or anything else.

Issues come up about the club, have your two cents, debate the issues and then leave. Anybody that specifically comes onto an internet forum to attack other supporters of this club is a disgrace. It shouldn't happen. The Leslie account is 80% Doc and 20% bumping. That's when you aren't spending 6 months pretending to beleive that somebody isn't Doc, when you actually do think that he is DoC, only occassionally breaking this up to tell everybody how pathetic they are to give an opinion about Saints! Have a word with yourself, you need an intervention. How many years are you going to carry on doing this?
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No subject
at 10:52 26 May 2015

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Boruc among six released
at 10:48 26 May 2015

Dan Demkiv is the only real suprise for me. He had a decent record.
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2 consecutive seasons in the top 8
at 10:45 25 May 2015

What the club has done, is won the "best of the rest" title two years running. By spending less money than probably 8 or 9 of the other rivals for the spot.

In terms of our spot in the pecking order. We've gone up one place, because Everton collapsed from a 72 point season, to a 47 point season. Next year without Europa, they'll be looking to break our 60 pt total from this year.

I find it weird people are so celebratory about this year, because if it's been a triumph it's been a triumph in world class administration. I don't think we've made headway on the sporting objective, which was to break up the league's elite. Though we have done the very difficult job of maintaining where we were.

First half of the season was brilliant. The defensive unit has been as good as its possible to be. The second half of the season has been poor & the attack generally hasn't matched the clubs ambition. Last season we had about 6 top four quality players. This season it's about the same, but except Mane unbalanced at the back. If we start next year with 8, with two of them in forward roles, then we could have a chance.
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Crappest season ever
at 21:16 24 May 2015

I think I've watched every premier league game Saints have played in the past two seasons, I've only missed a couple of cup games.

I'd take the Bielsa/Barca style of play of last season, with a quality English spine and 8th place, than the Mourinho/George Graham style of this season with a 7th place finish.

I think we've got a manager that isn't capable of getting more from his players than he is, a board that won't pay to get him a better group & fans that will only admit all this in five years time. All of which is a more grim outlook than I had last spring.

Genuinely, the best way of us improving next season is for Ronald Koeman to start reacting to what is happening on the pitch. Like MoPo, he seems to be world class on the training pitch & useless on matchdays. I think he's influenced the game from the touchline once this season that I can remember and that's when he brought on Shane Long at home to the Foxes. Other than that, it seems as though he makes every call completely ignoring form. Pelle again today, was an absolute shambles. An embaressment to a Vanarama division side. Technique that a proffessional footballer should be ashamed of & managing to get caught offside so many times in a short space of time the commentary team thought it might be a record. What happens? He plays 90 minutes. Again! The team fails to score. Again! Ronald Koeman has to have something up his sleeve next year. If we don't keep Toby, we'll need to sort out the attack just to tread water. The frustration comes from seeing the same mistakes and the missed opportunties. Last season I felt that we were getting the best we could out of that group. Since the home game against Arsenal I don't think I've felt that this season at all.

For me, I'd say this was my fourth best Saints supporting year. After WGS, the Championship promotion year, last year & then this one.
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