Saints are set to try and tie up the signing of Manolo Gabbiadini today with a meeting scheduled between the representatives of all three parties.

Italian sports papers are reporting that Manolo Gabbiadini has turned down other clubs and is determined to sign for Southampton, however the stumbling block is still Napoli president Aurelio De Laurentiis, who although now a long way under his original demands of 25 million euros is still not sanctioning the deal till Saints meet his current terms.

The clubs are not too far apart on the actual initial fee, Saints are only 1 million euros short of the 18 million asking price , but it is the finer points of the contract that now need to be resolved so that the deal can be completed.

With that in mind all three parties, Saints, Napoli and the players agent will meet in Milan today to try and finally resolve the situation and let the player move to St Mary's.

If the deal can be reached then things will move fast with Gabbiadini prepared to travel straight to Southampton for a medical and the signing could be tied up by this evening.

The big question though is whether Saints will sell to fund the deal with West Brom rumoured to be about to launch a £15 million bid for Jay Rodriguez.

Personally I would be disappointed to see J Rod leave the club, he has shown that he still has an eye for goal and if playing regularly could well hit double figures in the Premier League this season, a total that would be decent given the game time in the Premier league that he has.

But Saints may feel that the problem up front is not quantity of strikers but the failure of them to score on a regular basis, I blame the constant rotation for that which has seen only Nathan Redmond played with any real regularity.

But the club who have been very patient with J Rod over the past three years since his initial injury may take the view that it is time to move him on and selling him to West Brom for £15 million represents a good deal for the given that they would still have Long, Redmond, Tadic, Sims, Boufal and new signing Gabbiadini in competition for the three attacking positions, not to mention Charlie Austin on his return late in the season.

Photo: Action Images

arthurfane added 10:15 - Jan 30 I would be incredibly worried for the financial health of the club if we feel we need to sell JRod to fund this. Everyone knows we need more firepower up front so why on earth would be sell one of our few strikers to fund the signing of another one? We're £30m odd in the black this season - I'd feel we're being fleeced by the owners if we really needed to sell to fund this signing. Would consider it a successful window if we can get Gabbiadini, Hassen and a good centre back over the line. Why are we leaving it so late though?

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ChannonFodder added 10:18 - Jan 30 Sounds promising on the Gabbiadini front, but FFS don't sell JRod. With Austin still out for another couple of months at least we're still woefully short of options upfront for most of the rest of the season. If Gabbiadini takes time to get up to speed with the English game, or if he or Long get injured, we're right back where we started. If West Brom are so keen on JRod, they can wait til summer and we can revisit it then. In the meantime we shouldn't be strengthening a team that - bizarrely, frustratingly - we are direct competition with for a top-10-or-better place at this time.

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SanMarco added 10:43 - Jan 30 If this happens it will confirm the fear that, notwithstanding the millions of tv and other revenue, we are going to only buy when we cover it with sales. Fonte had to go before a much needed CB came in and now it would seem the club's "patience" with JRod was just a fattening up exercise until, kerching, he reached the right price. We need EXTRA quality in these positions, not replacements. As ChannonFodder rightly says if WBA are keen they can wait. I don't usually like loans - as I feel the big clubs abuse the system to amass loads of players they dont need and then farm them out - but why not bring in some reasonable quality loans for the rest of the season in the key areas and then think again in the summer (when, if JRod has a storming finish to the season he will be worth 25m).

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SaintNick added 11:24 - Jan 30 Couple of points I dont think people have picked up on. 1. we are only about £11 million down on what we have received in during this summer and what we have paid out, most of that would be taken up by signing on fees and agents fees etc. 2, The owner is trying to make the club self sufficient she is not fleecing us. 3. As I said in the article even if we sold J Rod we would still have six options up front for 3 places, 7 when Austin is back, 8 would perhaps be too many, people complain about rotation and complain about money not being spent, but also complain that we would need to trim the squad both from a financial and tactical viewpoint. No club can afford to keep 8 forwards for 3 places, I take the oint about getting in better quality, but when you get that you have to move on players who wont get a game, we cant have it all ways, Sims apart all of the 8 players we would have are on substantial wages

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ChristchurchSaint added 11:34 - Jan 30 Sorry Nick, I agree with most of what you write, but must disagree on this one. JRod is a striker out and out, Tadic and Boufal are attacking midfielders. Redmond is also not an out and out striker either. To my way of thinking, we would have 3 senior strikers (Gabby, JRod and Long) and Sims, who, although I feel he has a bright future, he is not the finished article. We would only need one of the 3 seniors to pick up a serious injury and we would be back to square one again. If we need to offload, then surely wait until the summer and review it then.

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BathSaint added 11:42 - Jan 30 I have to strongly disagree with this, we have been short of strikers all season and it has cost us badly. Earlier in the season when rotation was being blamed for europa and league losses, it was really only the striker rotation that was hurting us, because Austin was the only solid finisher in the squad and we were very poor without him. Earlier in the season when our defence was really solid, we lost and drew so many games that we would have won if we had had real options up front. That includes europa league games, where playing Jrod at milan cost us 3 points and a qualifying spot for the knockout round. Its been clear this season the clubs decision to keep only one out and out striker in the summer (Austin) and pocket the Pelle money has cost us dearly. Long is a good player but he's only been a prolific goalscorer for one 6-month period in his entire premiership career, and that was the second half of last season. He was best for us out wide supporting Pelle. And Jrod hit his pre-injury form as a wide striker playing off Lambert. Neither are a solid option for leading the line, especially with the Jrod of old seemingly gone. If anything we have 5 players competing for the two "wide-striker" positions: Boufal, Tadic, Sims, Long and Jrod, and 1 competing for the central goalscoring main striker position, Austin, who is injured.

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Chesham_Saint added 12:02 - Jan 30 I would be VERY pissed off if the club did this.
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SonicBoom added 12:04 - Jan 30 I agree with Christchurch Saint. We are talking about goalscorers not just "forward" players. Our strikers would be Long, J Rod, Austin and Gabbiadini. The rest are attacking midfielders. I do agree that Puel has not helped any of the strikers with his obsessive tinkering though but still the goal return from Long and JR this season has been very disappointing. I would love JR to get back to his best and Id keep him ahead of Long but still we can't wait forever for him to start scoring regularly. Long was never a prolific scorer, last season was a high and this is a low. He is a great squad player and a very useful option but I'd always hope we had a better first choice than him. So for me, I'd get Gabbiadini if he is to be the choice, and let Long go now if needs be. I'd then reassess JR at the end of the season. If'he's improved he stays, but if not look for a replacement.

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dixiefrog added 12:14 - Jan 30 Good article Nick with a well balanced set of views and opinions. For me I can't see the club letting JRod or any of the present strikers leave to fund the Gabbiadini transfer, firstly they're currently cash rich and secondly they'd get slated by the fans who have been calling for more strikers all season. I don't believe that the club sets very much store in theJanuary window, preferring to do their major business during the summer. That said I still think a new striker, centre-back and goalkeeper could still arrive before the close of this window.

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highfield49 added 12:19 - Jan 30 This does sound as though the Napoli president is trying to call our bluff on this to get as much money as possible knowing that there is a cut off point where the deal cannot progress. I also suspect that our negotiating team know exactly how to play this game having experience with our recent ex players pouting and sulking till they get their way. Les Reed is hopefully coaching Gabbiadini in moody body language, intensive scanning of Southampton estate agents brochures, annoyingly humming "When the Saints" and persistent moaning about of how his family cat doesn't get on with the neighbour's dog in Naples. Hopefully sorted later today or walk away.

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saintmark1976 added 12:53 - Jan 30 Nick, have I missed something here and if so then please do not hesitate to put me right. It appears that you are saying that to fund the purchase of near enough any player we need to "balance the books" by selling first.On this basis even if we assume that over the last three seasons money in roughly equates to money out then what has happened to all of the T V/sponsorship/gate income? I struggle to think that it has all been spent on players wages and agents fees together with the day to day costs of running the club particularly given that relative to a lot of other clubs we are virtually debt free.

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helpineedsomebody added 13:34 - Jan 30 they haven't even touch this seasons money the new TV deal is worth 9billion pounds over 3 seasons so if saints finish in the top ten they should trouser just under 3oo million pounds millions for the few nothing for the fans
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saintsnutcase added 13:48 - Jan 30 Nick -- We only have one fit striker, Shane Long. The others are all injured, or are not true strikers in the first place!
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GeordieSaint added 13:58 - Jan 30 Saintmark player wages must have shot up this year. Assuming the new contract players (big boys alone) got a 20 000 pound a week raise (guessing I know) this is a huge amount of money. Van Dyke Forster Bertrand Davis Cedric Tadic Long Romeou 160 000 a week 8.32 million a year wage increase just on those players. Rough numbers I know but it is probably in the right ballpark.

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SaintBrock added 14:06 - Jan 30 The only place I've read any scuttlebuck about Rodriguez's leaving is on here. Right now he is recapturing some form and an eye for goal. He is the only viable natural striker option we have. Only a bloody fool would contemplate selling him......
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SanMarco added 14:49 - Jan 30 All this stuff about 'balancing the books' seems to ignore all non-transfer revenue. SaintMark1976 asks the same question as me: where does all the other money go?
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garethhartwell added 15:20 - Jan 30 Often these financial considerations are about wages not transfer fees. There are lots of constraints on wages (FFP etc).
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IanRC added 16:21 - Jan 30 SaintBrock I agree entirely, JRod has shown some very promising signs, hope he gets the chances Puel gives Redmond. To be honest Long too appears to be recapturing some form, if only Puel hadn't changed the whole side bar one on Saturday ......
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