Saints are standing firm with their want a way central defender now known as Vulgar Van Dijk to many supporters and are prepared to take drastic action if necessary.

Whilst Southampton Football club and indeed it's supporters are well aware of the pecking order in football as mentioned by former Liverpool player Jamie Carragher earlier in the week and can understand just why Van Dijk would want to go to Liverpool both in terms of opportunity on the pitch and financial reward off it, they are totally shocked and gobsmacked by what has gone on over the last few months.

Of course talks go on behind club's backs, that is the way of football these days with agents doing the talking, although it is technically against the rules, clubs accept this as it sorts out who is and who is available and willing to move and saves a lot of time.

But this is seen as being only preliminary contact, once a players status has been established then there are the official ways that need to be adhered too and that means a buying club putting in a bid and asking to speak to the player.

Although this is mainly cosmetic, it is the done thing and in most cases transfer enquiries are conducted in a civil and businesslike fashion.

But the Van Dijk case is different, it is everything that is wrong with football these days, it is a tale of a players head being turned by signing to an agent known for his pushy ways and for getting his clients big money albeit not at the club that offers the best in terms of career development.

It is a tale of a football club once known for its integrity and class reducing itself to clandestine meetings and breaking rule after rule as if such things do not apply to them.

Finally it is a tale of another footbal club who has had enough of being treated as if they are merely peasants there only to do as their so called masters and betters decree.

If Liverpool had gone about this in the right manner then Vulgar Van Dijk would have been their player by now, some Saints fans don't like to hear it, but we have a strategy and that strategy is to buy low and sell high and develop the squad.

Ironically this strategy was much admired by Liverpool's owners Fenway Sports Group, who adapted it in Baseball and their team the Boston RedSox won their first World Series in decades because of it.

Sadly for Liverpool fans it is not one that FSG apply to their team, it is buy high and then buy high again when it doesn't work out.

Chances are that if Liverpool had put in a high bid then perhaps Saints might have thought it in their best interests to sell and reinvest, perhaps not though given that Liverpool appear to have been rebuffed months ago and felt they had to use underhand tactics.

But if they thought that bullying would force Saints to sell then they have had a shock, three years ago that was the case with Saints a club in turmoil internally after the Cortese years and needing to raise funds due to budgets not being adhered too in the case of the training ground and poor transfer decisions ie Ramirez, Osvaldo, Mayuka & Vegard Forren , just these four seeing over £36 million wasted in transfer fees in the final 16 months of Cortese's reign.

That meant when Liverpool came calling back in the summer of 2014, they found a club with it's board finding it's feet, its budget in tatters and a playing squad on weak contracts, Saints were ripe for the picking.

But now things are different, the likes of Van Dijk are on solid long term contracts, the finaces are secure, we are in charge of who we sell and when we sell them, yes it is part of our strategy to sell when the price goes above their valuation, but we are well aware of what that valuation is now and what it could be in the future.

So Saints attitude now is of hard ball, they have played Van Dijk with kid gloves, put an arm round him, given him time to think, but been kind and firm.

That hasn't worked and now as Liverpool and Van Dijk are finding out it is Saints who hold all the cards.

The media are waking up to that fact Saints are not rolling over, after months of being briefed that Van Dijk's move to Anfield is close they have realised that it actually isn't and that the likelihood is that he will not be a Liverpool player come September.

They are starting to use phrases like "Saints willing to let Van Dijk Rot in the stands" and this seems to be the stance that Saints are taking.

They don't need the money at the moment, they seem ready to freeze the player out and let him sit it out till the January transfer window and then having made a point consider offers then, this is not a course they want to follow, but is one they are prepared to take rather than back down to Liverpool.

Indeed it seems that any offer from Liverpool will be turned down due to their despicable behaviour and lets get this right, we are not complaining about the pecking order or why Liverpool would be better than Saints etc, this is all about the way that Liverpool have approached trying to sign Van Dijk, completely underhand and illegally.

Indeed Liverpool admitted as much and apologised earlier in the summer and claimed they would no longer persue the player, that is why they now cannot bid, they will be liable to sanctions if they did, that is why Van Dijk has been used by Liverpool to force it through, we literally have to go to them and ask them to take him !

We are not going to do that, there are only three options now, the first is Van Dijk grows up comes back into the squad and puts in a shift for the first half of the season, if he does that, the likelihood is that Saints having saved face would consider offers in January or at the end of the season.

The second is that Chelsea or another club make an acceptable offer, we might at that point accept it, although it would need to be soon so we could reinvest, it should be pointed out that a Liverpool offer would be turned down out of hand unless it is totally way above his valuation.

Finally it is the stalemate scenario and Saints are ready to go down that road and isolate Van Dijk from their squad and let him rot in the stands, he would be required to train alone, play for the academy team perhaps and perform all the duties required of him under his contract.

But he would be missing out on bonus's for not playing for the team, he could be fined should he fail to fulfill all his contractual obligations and more to the point it would effectively write off this season, he would not be great for Liverpool or any club in the fact that he would not have trained properly for a year or for that matter taken part in a competitive game, Van Dijk has more to lose than Saints.

Those Saints fans who claimed that we are a selling club who roll over and sell as soon as we get an offer have been missing the point over the last three years, they conveniently forget that we refused to sell Schneiderlin, Wanyama and Fonte, we stand firm when it suits us, they wn't forget what has happened with Van Dijk and hopefully they will see the way football is these days, it is full of pampered players with inflated egos who think that the game is there only for their own personal gain and club's like Saints only matter till a bigger offer comes along.

Photo: Action Images

SaintNick added 14:15 - Aug 9 Boondock, we never complained about Lallana and Lovren because liverpool put bids on the table. Selling players high and low is about deveoping a squad not a team, having a squad usually helps you win more games than just having a team This is all about how Van Dijk has been tapped up and Liverpool's strategy not Saints
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birminghamsaint added 14:27 - Aug 9 after the grovelling Liverpool apology and their 'legends' stating that everybody taps up players, I would have thought there would be a whole host of journalists trying to find evidence that Southampton FC do not do business in the correct manner. Has anybody seen any articles along those lines?
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PETEA71 added 15:15 - Aug 9 Excellent point Birminghamsaint. For too long naive people have been taken in by Scousers false charm a wit.
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forest_saint added 17:08 - Aug 9 Yet another one of your Fairy tales Nick?
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mattthelegend added 17:13 - Aug 9 Jamie Redknapp needs to sort out is own life, before claiming to be some authority on other people's. The bloke is an absolute tool like PETEA71 said. Why the media give him the air time is beyond me and another example of all that is wrong with game now.
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BoondockSaint added 17:47 - Aug 9 Hi Nick Unless I was hallucinating, I thought Lallana and Lovern came back from the World Cup wanting to move to the Scouse, in fact, Lovern's "Head was already in LIverpool". And it was common knowledge that the Scouse players on the England team had been tapping them up, convincing them they shouldn't be wasting their talent at a small club. Weren't we all ranting about that then?

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Gents added 17:55 - Aug 9 Cannot understand why we haven't pushed the complaint with the Premier League if the case is as solid as we are being led to believe. VVD, his agent and LFC would all be liable to fines and in the agents case suspension, likewise LFC with regards to future transfer dealings
3

PETEA71 added 17:55 - Aug 9 Spot on matthelegend.... His specialist subject on Mastermind would be Stating the bleeding obvious!
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montecristo added 19:03 - Aug 9 There is little dignity to my mind in a sell to improve policy in football. And Im not convinced it works any way Saints have been firmly in the 6th to 8th bracket for some years now. All we ve been able to do is roughly maintain the clubs position. So why do it? And thats without discussing the disrespect being shown to the club by others who think all of our players are in the shop window. Not clever.

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Jesus_02 added 19:21 - Aug 9 StRipper If Mark Twain ran football clubs it would be a sensible comment, but as it is if Les & Co expect people to shell out £600 + every year to support a soccernomics PLC they could at least he should stand by the supporters and defend the clubs reputation. I would have a lot more respect for him if he publicly condemned the like of Redknap, Caragher, Adavocat, Steven Gerrard and every ex Liverpool player that has felt it necessary and justified to encourage a player to go on strike to allow their old club to get him on the cheap. The list goes on, and he just stands there watching us have the p1ss taken out of us. Is that the Southampton way now? Les isn't a saints fan, he doesn't have to put up with it, its just his job. @LoisDeem I agree, we have always been minows, under Cortese we shifted that perception, unfortunately we have reverted to type. Trying to shift it once more will be double hard. We cant do it every year. Every year it feels like a gamble. Our current approach is simply not sustainable and I fear for our future

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SaintBrock added 19:33 - Aug 9 In fairness, Ralph Kreuger is on the record as having said that we had to sell players during the past three summers just to help us progress as a club by buying promising talent relatively cheaply and then selling those players on after a couple of years at a profit. During the troubled years even earlier than this regime we were forced to sell players such as Walcott, Surman and Bale just to keep our club afloat with the cash generated. Thus we have been for a decade or so de facto a selling club - more strictly a trading club - so the epitaph accorded us by the hacks is quite reasonable. If now we have decided that we are no longer in need of selling our players than it will take more than a little time and a few words from the Chairman to change people's perceptions - including amongst our own fanbase. Time will be the arbiter and judge and so this whole vD situation is critical to the club's new stance and image. They dare not let vD leave now and if he doesn't't understand this then he (or his agent) is not quite as bright as he thinks he is.

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SaintBrock added 19:41 - Aug 9 Jesus 02, you could not be more wrong about this. By not commenting the club are refusing to legitimise any of the scuttle-buck floating about in the media which is exactly the right policy to adopt. Why get involved in a war of words which are not in the least helpful to the situation. The very last thing we need is for any club employee to go off message. The legal beegals have a very tight reign on this one and that's how they should keep it.

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pintsizedsaint added 20:00 - Aug 9 Scuttlebutt Saintbrock, its Scuttlebutt...! And I'm just joshing.
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aceofthebase added 20:05 - Aug 9 We should never have sold Chivers, that set the ball rolling.
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Gadge60 added 21:22 - Aug 9 We are not manc u. We don't have the shirt sales of chelski. Buying low and selling high is our bread and butter. Rather that than receivership and no more SFC. So for all you complainers out there this is a matter of economics and survival. Personally I see a football club that is SOLVENT, professionally run. The envy of most of the footballing world and is growing sustainably. We are better at signing talent than most other prem sides and have grown our fan base because we are the cool and exciting underdogs. It has never been a better time to be a Saints fan and I am relishing the new season. My only hope is that we sign another centre back to strengthen what is already a fantastic squad.

2

Gadge60 added 21:23 - Aug 9 We are not manc u. We don't have the shirt sales of chelski. Buying low and selling high is our bread and butter. Rather that than receivership and no more SFC. So for all you complainers out there this is a matter of economics and survival. Personally I see a football club that is SOLVENT, professionally run. The envy of most of the footballing world and is growing sustainably. We are better at signing talent than most other prem sides and have grown our fan base because we are the cool and exciting underdogs. It has never been a better time to be a Saints fan and I am relishing the new season. My only hope is that we sign another centre back to strengthen what is already a fantastic squad.

1

Gadge60 added 21:24 - Aug 9 We are not manc u. We don't have the shirt sales of chelski. Buying low and selling high is our bread and butter. Rather that than receivership and no more SFC. So for all you complainers out there this is a m eatter of economics and survival. Personally I see a football club that is SOLVENT, professionally run. The envy of most of the footballing world and is growing sustainably. We are better at signing talent than most other prem sides and have grown our fan base because we are the cool and exciting underdogs. It has never been a better time to be a Saints fan and I am relishing the new season. My only hope is that we sign another centre back to strengthen what is already a fantastic squad.

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Gadge60 added 21:25 - Aug 9 We are not manc u. We don't have the shirt sales of chelski. Buying low and selling high is our bread and butter. Rather that than receivership and no more SFC. So for all you complainers out there this is a m eatter of economics and survival. Personally I see a football club that is SOLVENT, professionally run. The envy of most of the footballing world and is growing sustainably. We are better at signing talent than most other prem sides and have grown our fan base because we are the cool and exciting underdogs. It has never been a better time to be a Saints fan and I am relishing the new season. My only hope is that we sign another centre back to strengthen what is already a fantastic squad.

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steve73 added 22:17 - Aug 9 Sometimes the silence from the club can be maddening but in this specific case I think it's the right decision. Any statement we could make would no doubt end up getting twisted and used against us. Better to let all the sh1t talkers get on with it while the calm heads get on with business as usual.
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bstokesaint added 22:50 - Aug 9 The best way to deal with idiots is to ignore them. All those associated with LFC and the media really aren't worthy of our time or attention.
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Jesus_02 added 01:34 - Aug 10 @SaintBrock.. OK lets just forget the 4 years under Cortese we didn't sell anyone, I mean who actually bothered going to matches then anyway?. You are quite right it will take far more that Les saying something to change peoples perception. I take it all back we have always been a selling club you are quite right, lets leave defending the club to Le Tiss. I guess he was a dreamer too. UTS ... but not too loudly.

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Consigliere added 09:27 - Aug 10 Gadge makes a very soon point (so sound its repeated three times!) Better to support a well-run and solvent club than one owned by a load of shysters and chancers
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