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Fonte Set To Move To West Ham United
Friday, 20th Jan 2017 10:25

Jose Fonte is set to move to London and join West Ham United with rumours circulating that he will complete a medical and formalities today.

The Jose Fonte saga is set to reach its sad ending today with the Portugese defender joining West Ham almost exactly to the day seven years ago that he made his Saints debut in a 1-1 draw at Millwall in League One.

Back then we were in our lowest league position in half a century and Fonte played a major part in our rise back up through the leagues, one of his earliest games for Saints was at Wembley in the JPT final and it should have been a fitting twilight to his career that he returned to Wembley again in the League Cup, sadly Saints chances of doing that have diminished due to the situation that has arose since his return from the Euro Championships in the summer.

Something had changed in the player on his return, perhaps this was mainly due to the influence of his new agent Jorge Mendes, the super agent who also represents Jose Mourinho, immediately rumours appeared in the press about Fonte going to Old Trafford, make of that what you will, but it's fairly obvious that these were not started by Southampton Football Club.

Agents make the big part of their money from transferring their clients, the writing was on the wall once Fonte changed agents.

The saddest thing though is that Fonte was on his way into being a club legend, the word should not be bandied about lightly and in modern times it is used less and less with players moving clubs so often that nowadays they rarely stay at one club more than a couple of seasons.

But after 7 years, 260 league appearances and 288 in total with 15 goals, not to mention the success we have enjoyed during that time, on his retirement which we all assumed would be at St Mary's with a testimonial, Fonte should have been acclaimed as a club legend.

That will now not happen and he will leave with the Saints support having a bad taste in it's mouth about the whole situation.

Publicly he has not been too bad, there have been none of the public shows of desperation for a move that Dejan Lovren or Adam Lallana showed, but behind the scenes the story seems to be not so smooth.

Up until Xmas the club seemed to be handling Fonte with kid gloves, perhaps in the hope that he might decide to sign a new deal and stay, but after Fonte went public and told the media that the club hadn't offered him a new deal and in some respects almost accused them of lying things changed between player and club.

What angered Saints most wasn't his words but the timing of them, they came only a couple of days before the team were due to play Happoel Be'er Sheva in what was a do or die match, the club felt that this was deliberately timed to unsettle the squad and certainly there were those in the dressing room who felt that.

From that point on a line had been crossed and there was perhaps no return, there now seemed to clearly be a rift between not only Fonte and the club, but with the player and manager, Claude Puel did not seem to have faith in his Captain to do a professional job for Saints whilst speculation was rife and the window opened, however it should be noted that he had no such reservations back in August when Fonte although on the bench for the opening Premier League game was in the starting line up for the remaining two games until the transfer window shut.

Like any disagreement there are always two sides to a story and I have spoken to those who perhaps feel Fonte is not entirely to blame and those who think he is, in any situation there are as i say always two sides and usually the truth is somewhere in between.

I will say though that Jose Fonte was linked to Manchester United before he had even kicked a ball for Saints, this was the original cause of the rift and without the media leaks and subsequent speculation this story might have had a happier ending at least for Saints fans.

The reality though is that this could actually be a good deal for the club if they can replace Fonte with a quality defender, the transfer fee seems to be £8 million up front with a further £2 million in add ons based on appearances etc, that for a 33 year old is good money, but only as long as we get in a quality replacement.

From this point Saints seem to have a knack of finding quality in the centre of defence, so you would hope that this can continue.

But the saddest thing is that it is ending this way, Jose Fonte has been a brilliant servant to Southampton Football Club and in return we have turned him from a run of the mill player at Crystal Palace where at 26 he was steady but not exactly making headlines hence that we were able to get him for £800k, a bargain it now transpires and sell him for 10 times that.

This has been a mutually beneficial relationship,and although his name will not bring the vitriol that some of our ex players do to Saints fans lips, it has sullied his memory and he will not be as beloved as some of our legends.

Fonte should be considered one of those legends, certainly the track record and requirements are in place, but the last six months mean that it cannot be in the eyes of many.

Photo: Action Images



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sidsaint added 18:42 - Jan 20
Sad day for the club. Situation very badly handled. We were told by Les he would not be allowed to leave unless we had a replacement, and Les hinted very strongly in his statement that he expected him to stay. At the moment we have no replacement and we are talking about a great opportunity for Jack or Gardos, not what Saints fans want to hear. Whilst West Ham are close to us in the league now, when we meet them in a few weeks there might be a bigger gap!
3

Gizzle007 added 19:12 - Jan 20
He's gone now end off but I can say one thing for a fact a year ago roughly he was happy and doing his badges with Southampton and wanted to stay and teach the youth team something happened speaks for itself really, yeah a sidewardsstep but playing time and good luck to ya I wouldn't work either a un manageable boss and before anyone jumps on he got knocked in eufa should have played nearly every game he deserved it
4

SaintBrock added 20:07 - Jan 20
Fonte must be desperate to get away if he is prepared to go just about anywhere rather than wait for a top 3 side of a major league in Europe. I find this very disturbing as something really bad must be going on in the background for a guy like him to walk as soon as he can get out.
5

vanmans added 21:28 - Jan 20
2

dirk_doone added 23:27 - Jan 20
Van Dijk will be following his mate in the escape from Les Reed:

Virgil van Dijk ‏@VirgilvDijk now2 hours ago

Thank you champ for everything you have done for me and also for the club, was a pleasure to play with you! #saintslegend #champ #gutted
2

PezzaSaint added 08:00 - Jan 21
Extremely disappointed with the Fonte news. I'm not blaming Fonte, he wants a decent last payday, we would all be the same. The sad part is again how the footballing world will view SFC. For the moment I'm reading the Southampton Way = Asset stripping!
2

AmericanSaint added 09:32 - Jan 21
I have been mulling this over for a few days and while I am sad to see Jose go,it is football today. A few observations: I think Jose's agent takes a large part of the blame for this. He twisted his head after the Euros. I saw it immediately in Jose's play and I think a lot of people did too. Next, I think Jose takes some blame as I believe he was offered a new improved contract with an additional year. The reason I say this is that Les only talked about the contract situation after Jose tweeted about it. Les would be playing a dangerous game if he was lying and it was exposed. Lets say if Les wanted to destroy Jose's reputation (and sale value) Les could easily show the contract offered. Jose could do the same if he was telling the truth, but after the moment Les came out and said what he said Jose (and agent) were silent.

Next, Les and the Club take some blame too as they could have added more money to the contract offer. Now we know Jose left for the same money and stated he looks forward to winning trophies WHU, so the money cant be it. Also WHU will not win anything in the next 3 years, so Jose is just playing the "I love being here" media game.

So, final analysis is that there must have been an issue with the Puel too. All these things combined with Jose's ego, Agent's ego, Club's ego, coach;s ego equals a disastrous end to a saga that probably could have been avoided.

Well now we will see if the Club really does have a black box and what our transfer/replacement policy is. If we do nothing this period, then someone high up has made the decision to play with the youngsters and ride out the season as it is. We will then be in for a roller coaster ride and will probably end in the 10-12 positions.

Just my two cents worth.
2

vanmans added 10:13 - Jan 21
Koeman was right none of our academy players are any good. We need to buy good first team players now or we will get relegated.
2


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