Saints have yet to offer Jason Puncheon a new deal, is there a reason behind this stalling.
On the face of it it looks a no brainer that Saints should be offering Jason Puncheon a new deal and fast, one reason being that in the summer he can leave on a free transfer if they dont do so.
At the start of the season Puncheon's future at the club didnt look long term, his previous couple of seasons had mainly been spent playing for other clubs on loan and rumours of incoming talent in the transfer market seemed to indicate that another loan away from the club was imminent with at best a squad number at St Mary's and being a fringe member of the squad.
But a few good performances have changed all that for Puncheon and there are many Saints supporters wondering why Saints havent made their move and secured their man, after all Chairman Nicola Cortese is a man who doesnt like to let players contracts run down and see them move for nothing, then again Cortese is also a man who doesnt like to let people who have crossed swords with him get the upper hand, Puncheon of course was seen as petulant a couple of years ago when he threw his toys out of his pram after being dropped for Alex Oxlade Chamberlain, rumours of him refusing to play abounded and he was soon out on loan, perhaps now Cortese is flexing his muscles and showing Puncheon that if and when he is offered a contract it will be on the Chairman's terms and no one else's.
But it could also be something different, given the number of names that Saints were linked with in the last transfer window and the fee;s quoted, it could actually be that should they survive, Saints see that their needs in this area could be serviced by someone with a lot bigger pedigree than Puncheon, the aspirations of Nicola Cortese, whether they be realistic or folly and im not going to debate that here, clearly lie higher than players of the calibre than Puncheon, Cortese showed by sacking Nigel Adkins that if he considers that someone is not capable of taking it to a higher level then he is not afraid to get rid of that man and replace him with someone who is, it could be that Cortese wants a better player than Puncheon.
Puncheon himself has put in some decent performances this season, the Man City win last weekend included, but his big problem has been consistency, at home he has generally played well, but away from home less so and the City game overshadowed the fact that in the previous two games at man Utd and Wigan saw Puncheon hauled off at half time, for all his skill and talent, with Jason Puncheon there is still that question mark about his attitude, when things are going well he is great, but when they arent he is inneffective, some would call him a flat track bully.
So just why the player hasnt been offered a new contract is unclear, I would say that perhaps that reason lies partially a little bit in all of those reasons, that our Chairman is flexing his muscles and seeing whether Puncheon is a changed man or whether the moment he has sigend the contract and holds the upper hand again history will repeat itself, one thing that can be said about Nicola Cortese is that he doesnt get burned twice and that could be the reason that Jason Puncheon might well be playing his football away from St Mary's next season.