It cannot be argued that Virgil Van Dijk was crucial to Saints success over the past two years, but that was ruined when he showed his true colours and disgraced the name of his profession back in the summer.
Over the years football has had it's fair share of players who have blemished the name of the game, indeed Saints themselves have had a few we would care to forget for their behaviour and disregard not only for the club but their profession itself.
Now I am not one of these who demands that footballlers be squeaky clean role models and spend all their time doing charity work, but there is a certain standard required of players even in these times and that is to fulfill the terms and conditions of your contract.
The problem is that football in the past 25 years has started to breed a type of player who cares not for the football club he plays for, but only satisfying his own greed and lust for adoration, you only have to watch TV footage of todays Premier League player getting off a team bus, you rarely these days see friendly characters engaging with fans,you see spoilt brats with headphones on clutching washbags that they are staring at with enormous interest to avoid actually having to come into contact with those who make their lifestyles possible.
Virgil Van Dijk was the very image of this, if he did have to scribble the odd autograph, no interaction with the young starstruck fan who had asked for it, only a blank staring into space that made you think that in another life he could have been an extra in The Walking Dead.
Not to say that Van Dijk and his numerous colleagues at every other Premier League club are totally to blame for this, in truth they have been bred like dogs, they have been part of one massive puppy farm where they have not been taught to be kind and considerate, but arrogant and selfish, because only those with the most of these traits truly make it to the top, whilst many fall by the wayside and are metaphorically speaking put in a sack and thrown into the nearest river by clubs that have feted them for years until in their late teens they are of no more use.
But what makes Virgil Van Dijk stand out from 99% of his colleagues in football, is that he has failed to realise that he actually has a job to do and whilst he has a contract he has to fulfill it.
There are plenty of players that I dislike or did dislike a lot more than Van Dijk, but they do what they are paid to do and that is play football to the best of their ability for the club that pays them.
This is where Van Dijk fails as both a professional footballer or as a person with a shred of moral fibre in his body.
Ironically Jamie Vardy is probably the most odious man in the Premier League at the moment, ironic because he was the man who ran his studs down the back of Van Dijk's ankle and put him out of the game last season, Vardy is an easy man to hate, but not if you are a Leicester fan as despite being upset when refused a big move he got on with playing for his club and fulfilling his contract.
Six months ago I had nothing against Virgil Van Dijk, I saw him as potentially the best central defender in the Premier League, I knew his time at St Mary's would be relatively short lived from the moment he first pulled on a Saints shirt, all I expected was for him be part of our production line, play well earn a big money move and then we could repeat the process.
But that was not a part of Van Dijk's plan and his behaviour in the second half of this year has been disgraceful, I can understand why he would want to go, but he surely understands the way football works, he was happy to sign a big contract in the summer of 2016, he was happy to pick up those not insignificant wages for six months on the sidelines, so the vilest thing to do was to treat the club that had treated you so well with such contempt.
Van Dijk was not the only player to have the same frustrations about a move, indeed his longed for destination of Liverpool were fighting to keep Coutinho at the same time, the Brazilian as desperate to get out of Anfield last summer as Van Dijkwas to get into it, but compare the performances of both players over the course of this season and there is a big difference.
Indeed there are comparisons to be made at Saints, both Morgan Schneiderlin and Victor Wanyama did not get their moves when they demanded them, but made to stay they put in a decent shift in their last season, no one could accuse them of not trying, however then there is Jose Fonte, perhaps a man with cause to be moregrateful to Saints than anyone else, but once he sniffed the money he changed, with his career in tatters in the name of greed, his biggest headlines are now for his sniping at Southampton Football Club over the treatment of Virgil Van Dijk.
Now I don't blame Liverpool Football Club for signing Van Dijk or for that matter a number of our former players, after all this is football, this is the nature of things, the pecking order if you like, they are perfectly entitled to try and sign who they want, yes last summer they made big mistakes in the way they handled things and the way they behaved, but underneath all that why should they not chase Van Dijk or for that matter any other player, every club does it, even us when we are after a target.
But the worry for Liverpool fans is why Van Dijk has signed for them, he could have had the pick of any club, indeed if he had knuckled down this season for Saints he would have been coveted by the likes of Barcelona and Real Madrid, so why was he so desperate to go to Anfield ?
I like Jurgen Klopp and being of a certain age I was brought up with a Liverpool FC that did things the right way, I know things have changed, but I cannot fathom why Van Dijk was determined to go there.
Van Dijk said all the right things in his statement about both Saints and Liverpool, but the words seemed hollow when referring to both, from our perspective if he wanted to thank us all, then why didn't he do that with actions rather than words in his final months, if he had put in a shift these last three months then we would have waved him off with a little bit of respect at least.
In what he says about Liverpool. it could have been cribbed from Dejan Lovren's speech on arrival on Merseyside, it was so scripted it was cringeworthy, with respect to Liverpool fans and I count many as friends who understand the game and who don't buy this type of BS, these were not honest words and were spookily similar to the ones he uttered 18 months ago when signing a six year deal at St Mary's.
The only question is whether Van Dijk becomes a Liverpool legend or a Liverpool Lovren, if it is the former then will he behave in the same way if Barcelona and th like come a calling ? A leopard does not change his spots.
So good riddance to Virgil Van Dijk, we can do a lot more with £75 million than a 100% committed Virgil Van Dijk, we could do a lot more with even £7.5 million than the embarrassing disgrace of a professional footballer gave us in the last three months.
When Adam Lallana left he broke Saints fans hearts, Van Dijk means nothing like that to us, what he has done has made us a little bit more of our love for the game, not or club, but the way this is now a game of Virgil Van Dijk's and greed and no one of Matthew le Tissier and loyalty !