Even if Virgil Van Dijk does extend his Southampton career into this coming season Saints are still short of a genuine quality central defender.
The biggest surprise back in the January transfer window was that knowing the ongoing situation with Jose Fonte that Saints did not land a quality central defender to replace the Portugese International and we paid dearly when Virgil Van Dijk was ruled out for the rest of the season meaning we soldiered on with Yoshida and Jack Stephens in the centre of defence.
Now it cannot be denied that both gave the proverbial 110% in the games that they played, but the harsh reality was that as a partnership they weren't good enough and we initially leaked goals with rarely a game going by without a soft goal or two being conceded, as was the case at Wembley when first Jesse Lingard and then in the dying minutes Zlatan Ibrahimovic were left unmarked in the penalty area to pick their spots.
Ultimately the fact that we went into the final third of the season without a recognised first choice central defender cost us the cup final at Wembley and cost us any chance we had of pushing Everton a little bit harder
At the time when I suggested this I was accused of having something against both Yoshida and Stephens, far from it my views on them are purely down to what they do on the pitch.
As the season went on our defensive frailties improved, however much of that had to be down to the tactics being adapted to protect the defence at the expense of committing to attack.
With respect to Yoshida we know what we get with him, he is adequate back up, but he is not good enough for a regular Premier League place, Stephens improved as the season went on and showed promise, but truthfully is he another Virgil Van Dijk or even Jose Fonte, I am not so confident on that one and perhaps the proof is if we ask ourselves whether ither would get into another Premier League team ? the answer is almost certainly no !
Jan Bednarek has come in as our only signing so far, but he is untried at this level and needs to adapt to living in this country and to a far higher standard of football here than in Poland. He is one for the future, we cannot pin our hopes that he will turn out to be the find os the season just yet.
So all of this being the case the biggest surprise of this current transfer window is that given we have yet to replace Jose Fonte let alone the ongoing issues with Virgil Van Dijk that we have not signed a truly quality central defender.
It is not as if we have not had time to think and pinpoint our targets and then sign them, back in January Saints claim they did try to sign several central defenders of the required quality but could not land their preferred choices, this being the case Saints have been aware of the need to replace Fonte for at least 8 months yet we still have not done so with barely a fortnight to the start of the new season.
Given that even if Virgil Van Dijk does stay then we still need a quality central defender to not only play alongside him but to possibly replace him, if not now but in the future, this being the case it amazes me that we haven't already made this purchase especially since the Van Dijk situation is so unclear at present.
What would be unacceptable would be a repeat of the situation back in January where we let the player go without replacing him first.
I hope that Les Reed is already working feverishly and quietly and will surprise us with a signing, but my worry is that given the length of time that he has had to deal with this issue that we are not at this stage very near to bringing in someone.
Saints are continuosly being linked with midfielders and attackers, but we have plenty of options in this area, our weakness last season was in the centre of defence after Fonte left and Van Dijk was injured, in 15 Premier League games we conceded 22 goals thats 1.47 goals a game not the greatest ratio in the division , yes we tightened up in the final 6 only conceding 4 but that was at the expense of scoring goals and the reason why we only scored 2 goals ourselves in that final half dozen games.
So the most critical element at Southampton Football Club at present is not the Van Dijk issue it is the fact that we have not even dealt with the departure of Jose Fonte over 6 months on, if we haven't done that how can we deal with Van Dijk if he leaves.
Saints cannot be blamed should Virgil Van Dijk leave St Mary's what more can they do, but they can be blamed if they do not deal with the situation, it is never about what happened it is always about what you do next, we are still wating for them to do something about the departure of Jose Fonte !