The Southampton Courier
Market4 Sep 2028
Ross Stewart wants to know where this is going
“I want to win things, and I would like to do it here.” Nothing has been demanded and nothing has been threatened — but a boardroom at Southampton hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Squad4 Sep 2028
Tempers go at Southampton
Yukinari Sugawara was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Squad4 Sep 2028
Oriol Romeu has improved at 36, which nobody expected
Careers are supposed to plateau and then decline, and the players who ignore that are always the ones who were listening on the training ground. 3 points of it, over months, at an age where the direction normally only goes one way.
Market4 Sep 2028
One of our own: Jason Hughes joins the Southampton first team
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Jason Hughes is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Market4 Sep 2028
Southampton promote Edward Hawkins from within
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Edward Hawkins has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
Market4 Sep 2028
Alexander Mitchell steps up from the Southampton academy
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Alexander Mitchell has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
Squad4 Sep 2028
Damion Downs falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Squad4 Sep 2028
Nathan Wood gets it from the manager
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
Player ratings4 Sep 2028
Nobody could get near Brennan Johnson
Successful dribbles: 13. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
In brief
- Match Southampton and Tottenham cancel each other out
- Player ratings The referee tires of Noah Sadiki
- Player ratings A defender's afternoon for Welington