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Ronald Koeman Happy With Saints Strength In Depth !
Friday, 12th Feb 2016 08:15

Saints manager Ronald Koeman is delighted with the strength of his squad and now believes it is the strongest since his arrival in the summer of 2014.

Speaking at the pres conference ahead of the trip to Swansea City, Ronald Koeman has spoken of how happy he is with the depth and quality of the Saints squad at present.

He told reporters at the press conference:

“Of course, you have during the season bad times and good times. I think now at the moment this is the strongest squad from the beginning when I came to Southampton, because we have really strong competition between the players.

“It’s not easy to make every week the best line-up, but that’s what you want. You need that competition. Still, we have some players out through injuries, but at the moment we have 22 really good players and that’s important to have and to finish strong how we like to finish the season.”

“Last season maybe sometimes it was easy to take the best 11, or even to take the best 18 in the squad.

“We had a lot of young, under-20 players making their debut for the first-team, but now it’s all about the players we have in the first-team selection and they give really good competition.

“What you like if somebody gets a good opportunity to play is that he shows his qualities and that’s what you like as a manager.”

Koeman is also pleased that he now has options to change the system that Saints play, either a 4-2-3-1 system or a 3-5-2.

“That’s all about the players, because if you have those kind of players you can play different systems, and that’s good, because that’s difficult for opponents,”

“You don’t know what you can expect, and that’s good for us, because we know how to play out of both systems. We have different types of strikers, different types of midfield players, we can play with three at the back or four at the back — that’s not a problem.”

Certainly Koeman has built a stronger oerall squad this season despite the loss of key players from last seasons squad in the summer of 2015, however their replacements have now started to adjust to life in the Premier League and as the Dutch manager confirmed he has not only added quality but depth and that could be vital in the final part of the season.

Last season Saints did not finish strongly due to a lack of options and depth available to Koeman but this will hopefully not be the case this season.

All Saints fans hope that Koeman will once again strengthen the squad further in the summer and that he will again improve on both last season and of course this.

Photo: Action Images



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SaintBrock added 16:16 - Feb 12
Ronald talks a very convincing analysis at the moment but he wasn't quite as confident of his explanations a few weeks ago when we were being given a kicking every week and his own reputation was on the line. Short memories are convenient but wisdom should teach him to take the longer view. It cannot be as simple as he makes it sound at the moment.

The only thing missing from our perfect team is M. Schneiderlin, just imagine a mid field quartet of Wanyama - Romeu - Clasie - Schneiderlin

Sigh!
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IWOZTHERE added 20:38 - Feb 12
Our supposed Schneiderlin replacement missed most of the first half of the season. RK had faith in him though and he now seems to be proving his worth. To be honest, I think the midfield was a confusing mess until recently with only Davis performing....Ironic when he's been out for most of this winning run? I don't know whether Clasie can provide the incisive long passes we need? Bit surprised we didn't go for Shelvey, despite the alleged 'baggage'.
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bstokesaint added 21:25 - Feb 12
I actually thought Ron has been pretty confident about his team and squad since the first day of the season. It's only the fans that have doubted him and our "second rate" "bargain basement" replacements. Some fans are far too quick to turn.

Mind you if Ron's that delighted he could sign a contract extension to show some intent. Would be sad to go back to square one if he does go at the end of his contract.
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SaintBrock added 09:55 - Feb 13
Agree with that completely, He's pretty evasive when questioned about his contract beyond stating what we know that his contract has one year to run.

My guess is that he will be inclined to stay for three more years as he has assembled his own team of young players and will want to see them come to fulfilment.

The delay in contact extension negotiations probably has more to do with transfer policy than money, if Reed cannot pursuade Mane & Wanyama to stay in the summer Ronald may decide that his future will be better served at a bigger club where his chosen players will be happy to stay, the club paying what is necessary to keep their stars.
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