The ante has been upped and Southampton's poker face stance could be about to pay dividends as Chelsea are said to have tabled a £48 million pound offer for midfielder Romeo Lavia.

Liverpool have been playing cat and mouse with Saints over their attempted signing of Romeo Lavia, they started out ridiculously low and instead of acting like a big club, have pestered Saints by just upping the offer a couple of million each time they come back.

The media have said that the Merseyside club have been playing on the players desire to join Liverpool and force Southampton's hand as they tried and failed to do in their pursuit of Virgil Van Dijk in the summer of 2017.

Now it seems their stance could blow up in their face according to Talksport who claim that Chelsea have gazumped Liverpool by slapping £48 million on the table for Lavia.

Chelsea head of recruitment is no stranger to Lavia, he helped develop him at Manchester City and in his brief time at St Mary's last summer was instrumental in bringing Lavia to Southampton.

Chelsea are now in the game and with Shields close to Lavia, they no longer have the players ear as they did.

From a Southampton perspective, the fee is now approaching the starting price of £50 million, a price that Chelsea were said to have come in with a late offer with last season.

Liverpool fans seem to be confused as to their thoughts on the situation, social media posts veer from "We don't want him anyway" to " We want him but not at that price" to the extreme of "Why are Liverpool acting like a bunch of amateurs and not the World giant that we believe they are "

Saints fans are braced for Romeo Lavia to leave the club, but the side showed they could win without him at Sheffield Wednesday, so things move on, the best part of £50 million for Lavia, should be joined by £30 million plus for James Ward Prowse from West Ham and adding to that the £35 million for Tino Livramento.

Good players all three of them, but with around £115 million in the bank, Saints can build a promotion challenging squad.

Photo: Action Images

PatfromPoole added 00:03 - Aug 10 It seems that 20% of the Lavia fee goes to City, so that is (the best part of) £10 million off the kitty sadly…..
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Butty101 added 08:05 - Aug 10 More like saints end up with 24mil for tino, 30Mill for jwp and 40mill for Lavia. Approx 94mill
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underweststand added 08:24 - Aug 10 the more the merrier. For decades the big money clubs have paid out ridiculous fees for players who did nothing to improve their team whilst buying up Prem. talents for peanuts. and we haven't seen any concrete moves from Spurs or Man Utd ..YET. Yes Lavia is an exciting talent, and so it's good that we hold out for the best deal we can get.
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saintmark1976 added 08:25 - Aug 10 “ Saints can build a promotion challenging squad “. They certain can Nick but given the extent of Club’s debt disclosed in their last available accounts together with the vast amount spent attempting to avoid relegation last season the question now is will they ? I suspect that those fans who are now expecting a big spending spree are going to be very disappointed as the Club will see balancing the books as their main priority.

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SaintPaulVW added 09:51 - Aug 10 Don't we want £50 million because the MC buy back fee activated next season is £40 million but if sold prior to that they take 20% of any sell on fee instead. So unless we get £50 million this year better off keeping him and getting £40 million next year? If I was Lavia life under Poch might be better although Lpool have a definite starting spot for him. Still whatever just hope it all gets sorted ASAP. Love him to stay for another year but accept unlikely COYR

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Block8 added 10:00 - Aug 10 I would rather he stayed but if he is to go, out of the two clubs currently bidding, Chelsea would be my preference. Mainly because I really don't like Liverpool!
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underweststand added 14:24 - Aug 10 Oh what is wrong with these penny-pinching " so-called " big clubs? Is paying the extra 2 million for Lavia going to hurt someone's pride because they will have to pay " lowly Southampton" the entire sum that we have been demanding from Day 1. We are dealing with very wealthy clubs who have previously paid out almost twice this fee for players who subsequently haven't been worth their salt at the end of their first season, and are then likely loaned out to some inferior European club. Whichever of them who comes back with a bid of... 49 million will be the laughing stock of the footballing world over this extended comedy deal. Pay up and get the deal done !

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NYC_Saint added 14:57 - Aug 10 Saints should just have a "final and best" sealed auction - open it to any other rumored interested parties - and see what number comes out. This way they'll put their real valuation in if they're genuinely serious and we'll get the best price. Selling agent should max his commission that way too so he should be up for it...
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Frank_Xerox added 17:15 - Aug 10 NYC, I like your idea of pushing the deal along, but this is a player's registration that's up for sale, not a house. The player gets a say in where he'll go too. All the noise has been about how keen he is on Liverpool. If he doesn't want to go to Chelsea then we've got a tough decision to make, as he could go back to City for £40m next summer if they both want it to happen, so Liverpool might not need to be the highest bidder to win.

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underweststand added 07:13 - Aug 11 you have a good argument (Nick) in the article but perhaps the maths you quoted in the last paragraph might need a second look. The three deals you mentioned may / may not bring in over 100 mill. but several other factors must be taken into account. SR spent well over this amount in fees last year and only a few of those are anything to boast about. With the possible exception of Alvarez, most of the 60 million spent in January was wasted on the wrong buys and we will be lucky to recoup much of that if the "square pegs " move on to other clubs, and at least 30 million of the money spent in summer 2022 comes into the same category. One wonders how much of that 70 million that the club borrowed during the COVID period is still to be repaid ?..and the some of the profit from the Livramento (and the impending Lavia move) will go back to their original club(s). These (and probably one or two more sales) may go a long way towards " balancing the books" but i don't see us sitting with a fat bank balance, and the freedom to buy 20-30 million pound players. Thankfully, Championship teams can be promoted without massive expenditure. Burnley are pretty tight-fisted with their expenditure, and Luton are almost broke to start with. Hopefully, we may be good enough to get a good shot at promotion, but I don't see us "spending big" in this window in order to do it.

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