Saints manager Ronald Koeman has denied that there is a rift with midfielder Dusan Tadic going into the game at St Mary's against Newcastle United.

Last weekend the Daily Mail seemed to be up to it's old tricks again as the chief muck stirrer when it comes to Southampton FC, claiming that Dusan Tadic was upset by his treatment by Ronald Koeman and would want to leave in the summer with the paper also claiming that James Ward Prowse and Sadio Mane had similar feelings towards the Dutch manager.

Tadic has since publicly claimed that he is happy at Saints but was coy about his long term future, this is perhaps only natural, Tadic has not played as much lately as he would perhaps have liked too and any footballer of the Serbian's quality who is not an automatic choice will not be happy.

Koeman confirmed this when he said.

"For every player if he doesn't start regularly it's difficult.

"You talk about what came out in the press, I spoke to Dusan and he was totally surprised."

"He's one of the players that if he has a problem he will talk to the manager. We have good contact."

"Even in the winter time when he wasn't playing all the time we spoke about his situation."

"There's no problem at the moment and for next season we will see what happens."

This is the problem Saints have at present, they have a good squad that is improving all the time and Tadic is not the only player in the squad who can't get in the side automatically, but who would get into at least half of the other teams in the Premier.

Koeman knows the dilemma he has.

"We have more players on the bench, more players who will not always start, and that's the competition you like to have,"

"But there's no problem, because if there was any problem he is one of the players who speaks to me and we have very good communication."

"The answer is always on the pitch and not outside."

"We have more competition in front now, Jay Rodriguez is back, Charlie Austin is here and Shane Long has developed fantastically this season in the last few months.

"So that makes it more difficult for everybody: Mane was on the bench, Austin was on the bench, Pelle was on the bench.

"That's part of football and part of being a team.

"Look to every Premier League team, every team has a good bench because it's all about competition, and everybody has that."

Dusan Tadic is still a vital part of Saints squad and has a big role to play in the final games of the season, he now needs to replicate his best form on a regular basis, if he does that then undoubtedly he is a player that Saints fans lve to see on the field.

Photo: Action Images

SaintBrock added 19:51 - Apr 8 I hope we don't lose him, even when not playing well he is very good value for money. His biggest trouble is he is not Christiano Ronaldo and rather than try to emulate all those oh-so-clever step-overs, if he stuck to his simpler game he can at times be phenomenal as against Sunderland last season.
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