Its another day on the internet and already the Danny Ings rumours are leading the way for Saints related news, this morning it's the turn of the Tottenham Hotspur supporters to drum up the illusion that the Saints striker will be joining their club.
The latest rumours doing the rounds are saying that Saints are demanding £25 million for Danny Ings and nothing less, something that will not please Spurs supremo Daniel Levy who prefers only to do transfer business on his own terms.
This year though will be different if he comes in for Ings, Saints are resolute, they know every player in their squad has a price and that they would prefer to let Ings run down his contract than take a cheap offer.
The reason for this is mainly down to pure mathematics, a year ago with Pierre Emile Hojbjerg, the player was strangely very keen to join Spurs from January onwards for some reason, Levy had leaverage, he had the player in his bag and with a year left on Hojbjerg's contract was in the driving seat, at the end of the day Saints had to bite the bullet on the price.
They could not afford to let Hojbjerg run his contract down, they needed the money to buy new players.
But with Ings it is entirely different, firstly Ings is a game changer, he is worth 5 places to Saints, in an average season for him his goals will be the difference between fighting relegation and being safe in mid table, in a good season it will push us up 4 or 5 places into the middle of the table.
That means purely in prize money from the Premier League alone he is worth around £12 million to Saints.
So any offer Saints have just on that basis alone would have to be more than that figure, but Liverpool have a 20% sell on clause attached to the transfer deal that took him from Anfield to St Mary's, that means that even if Saints accepted £15 million, the price that Levy likes to pay for players from Saints, we would only end up with £12 million net after we paid Liverpool their cut.
That being the case then at that price we might just as well keep Ings for the final year of his contract and let him go for nothing, there is absolutely no difference financially to us at that level of transfer fee.
This will infuriate Levy who has a reputation in the game for never negotiating and relying on the players desire to join Tottenham to force the selling clubs hand in the past the likes of Hojbjerg strangely had that desire, Ings doesn't.
So the rumour mill is stating that Saints have set the price for Ings and that price is £25 million, where they got that figure i don't know, in a previous article on here I suggested that £25 million was the minimum figure that we would consider, but it was only a suggestion and no club selling a player ever sets a minimum fee that is actually realistic, it is all about negotiation, set the rate high and negotiate and as we know Levy hates to do that.
Even at £25 million after Liverpool's cut we would only be left with £20 million and that isn't much to replace a striker who could get you 12-15 goals a season.
But Saints are realistic and know Ings will go sometime, even if he sign's a new deal and stays for the 4 year term he has to go sometime, the Southampton way is and always has been about being able to move players on at the right time for the right fee and keep repeating the process, I don't know what some people get uptight about this, we have been doing it since Ted Bates built the foundations of the modern club in the 1950's.
So there will be a point in which Saints will consider that the money is right and the deal is right, we are linked with Adam Armstrong of Blackburn Rovers and they will weigh up if they are better taking the money and buying Armstrong and still have change left in the kitty than keeping Ings.
Southampton FC has always thrived on change, it might not always be as successful as we would like, but we have to keep moving forward it is the only way we can compete and this summer is no different.
But the real problem for Daniel Levy is the lack of desire for Ings to join his club, or indeed as they found with replacing Jose Mourinho, finding anyone of stature willing to go to White Hart Lane or the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium whatever it is called these days.
Building the ground has left Spurs in debt, massive debt that could only be serviced by the multi usage of the stadium, this is the second summer that they have not been able to bring in that revenue and with debt mounting and said to be around £1.2 million they are in trouble.
The whole football World knows this and it is now coming home to roost, forget the rumours of linking Harry Kane with Danny Ings, that won't happen Spurs don't have the money unless Kane goes, that is unless they take out more borrowing and they would find it hard to find someone to loan them money at the moment.
Their squad has massively underperformed and they have a raft of players who have grown old and are not the standard they used to be, two years ago Spurs were one of the Big Six, now that has become a Big Four, all those four clubs have debt, but it is serviceable, either thorough a World wide supporter base as in Liverpool & Manchester United or the owner as in Chelsea and Manchester City, Tottenham & for that matter Arsenal have neither and are dropping back into the Peloton in Tour de France terms.
So things are not going to go Levy's way this summer, it is unsure even if he can sell Harry Kane, Manchester City seem to see Kane as their fall back option if they don't get their preferred targets.
Kane like Ings wants to be playing Champions League football and ironically the very thing that see's him want to leave is the very thing that means Danny Ings does not want to go to Tottenham, both know that they don't have time on their side now in doing this.
Danny ings may leave St Mary's this summer, but it is just as likely he will stay, perhaps the ball lies in the court of Manchester City, just what they do will trigger movement in the transfer market, Ings will move to only 4 clubs in England, two of those his former club Liverpool and also Chelsea have shown no interest, that leaves only the Manchester pairing.
Ings is happy at Southampton, it is his home town club, he is living back in the area near his family, of course he wants to play at the highest level, but he knows that Spurs or West Ham might scrape the money together to pay him more than Saints can offer, but ultimately he is in the same boat as he is at St Mary's
As I said earlier I would prefer Ings to stay, but I am not afraid of change , throughout Saints history a star striker leaving has often been the catalyst for a replacement just as good to come in.
Think Kevin Davies leaving for Blackburn and James Beattie arriving or Rickie Lambert departing for Liverpool and Graziano Pelle being signed, change is sometimes needed even if it can't be seen at the time.