According to the latest media stories Saints are not prepared to talk about Sadio Mane leaving the club unless any potential buyer is willing to stump up £40 million.

Liverpool seem to be the main admirers of Mane these days, the press spent a year claiming that Manchester United were on the verge, but there was little substance to that and now they have Jose Mourinho they are looking for better quality than Mane.

So the media have had to find a new club to link to Mane and that club is Liverpool and Jurgen Klopp.

Klopp will need to be careful should he decide that he wants to spend £40 million on Mane, he will be in danger of losing a hand if he waves that sort of money in Saints direction.

The fact is that Mane is not a £40 million striker and in fact for most of last season he barely looked the £10 million we paid for him.

He seems to go long periods without scoring, however one club he did seem to be able to do so against was Liverpool, after tapping in Gaston Ramirez header on the line to equalise in the dying seconds against the reds up at Anfield, he did not score another Premier League goal for over five months till we met Liverpool again in the return fixture and Mane scored twice as Saints made a stirring second half come back.

He did score in that five month period in the League cup though and you guessed it it was against Liverpool, with over a quarter of his goals in all competitions coming against them.

Perhaps that's why they are being touted as willing to meet the £40 million transfer fee and the £125k a week that the papers say he will demand in wages.

The fact of the matter is that if Mane could repeat the form he has showed at the end of both his seasons at St Mary's then he would indeed be worth £40 million, but the fact is in both of those seasons he went through periods where he could not hit the rear end of a cow with a banjo.

Still Liverpool will probably feel that they can harness that potential and that when they play him alongside their other big attacking signings Mario Balotelli and Christian Benteke he will find his consistency.

Of course we would prefer Mane to stay at St Mary's, but as we have recently found out with Ronald Koeman, every man has his price and we as a club have to consider where that line is with each and every member of the squad.

We will know what a player is worth to us and when that price has been greatly exceeded know when to sell, I would say that Mane's worth is well less than the £40 million we are asking, this is a price designed to scare off possible suitors, but if someone gets near it then we will snatch it off them.

Photo: Action Images

BUCK added 10:01 - Jun 19 Mane ain't going anywhere this summer
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1970 added 10:03 - Jun 19 Why would anyone go to Liverhampton except money and a guaranteed England career oh yeh you also get to stare at the biggest trophy room in world football and pretend they will win one again, in the current climate of financially madness even Bum-muth could afford 40 million, we know Mane is a game changer and like him or not he would be in all of our starting line ups so he has to be worth 60 mill, I would of thought he is destined for great things but that doesn't consist of going to Liverhampton coyr

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bstokesaint added 10:15 - Jun 19 I don't think it's easy to put a value on Mane. He's a potential game changer on his day. His electric pace often bails him out of a bad first touch and subsequently he's always going to win fouls in dangerous positions. We've all seen the best and worst of him, but I'd say for £40m we could find a more consistent threat, maybe even two. I'm liking the Saints' board stand on this. I'm fed up with other clubs thinking they can effectively steal our best players for the price they want to pay and not what we think they're worth.

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perazi added 11:19 - Jun 19 Nick, a lot of what you write is interesting and makes sense but your articles undervaluing the class and unique skills of Mane border on the farcical. With the inflationary effect of TV money and the shortage of attacking players with the qualities Mane has, the Club should be doing everything in its power to keep him. If he is determined to go he is worth every penny of 40 million. Stop bagging the best attacking player Saints have had for a generation.

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StRipper added 13:14 - Jun 19 I do agree with 1970 and perazi here. Look back over the season and Mane scores against the 'big clubs' consistently. Long generally only scores against the lower league sides. Check the stats for this season. Mane may have had a barren spell this season when we expected more, but that could be as much the fault of Koeman as Mane. Mane scored or assisted against Chelsea, Liverpool, Man City, Arsenal and United. He's our big game player, along with Pelle. There aren't many players out there like him who have an eye for goal, the threat he carries and composure to finish and I feel it's naive to think otherwise. For me, particularly in this money rich market, I would be gutted if we let him go for less than £50m,though if rather be stayed to get us in the Champs League and tear up our competition in the Europa League

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saintsnutcase added 14:31 - Jun 19 Nick - there is no way Saints could go out into today's market and replace Mane with a player of equal talent for less than £40 million. You could certainly find more consistent players at less than that, but Mane has exceptional talent that can change games at the highest level. And he will get more consistent over the next 3 years.
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SanMarco added 15:34 - Jun 19 I agree with parts of all of the above. I don't think it is 'farcical' to suggest that Mane has been hugely inconsistent but I also agree we have a unique talent who we shouldn't off-load to the first club who offers a medium price. He is not so central to the team that we shouldn't sell him for a ridiculously high sum but I would be extremely disappointed to seem him go for the sort of price that Nick evidently thinks he is worth.

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BoondockSaint added 04:04 - Jun 20 Agree with perazi and St. Ripper: He's the only player we have that other teams actually fear. Nick, I greatly appreciate all the work you do, but I can imagine you describing Matt as "a player who can be replaced, after all, he can score goals, but only if his head is in the game, he doesn't put in enough work on the training pitch, and can't even make the England squad."

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