Hi. Southampton fan here in peace. I've been lurking on your forum for a while now because my nephew plays in your U23s.
I thought our very own Saintsweb was an exclusive pit of misery and pessimism, given our form and general status over recent years. But it looks like you lot are just as resigned to having a poor season as we are.
I honestly have no idea how this season will pan out. We had a good calendar year in 2020, surprising many, but it all went horribly wrong in January when we suffered the worst run of injuries and refereeing injustices you could imagine. We never recovered from that and looked truly awful for the rest of the season.
We've obviously lost Ings, which is a blow because we relied on his goals, but we look to have signed a decent replacement in Adam Armstrong. Will be interesting to see how well he makes the step up to the PL.
Our biggest success this window is finally shifting some of the deadwood players that we signed for big money on long contracts who turned out to be crap (Hoedt, Lemina, Gunn) and have been stealing a living for the last few years. Looks like you are in a similar position with your squad. Getting shot of these players has finally freed up some space in our wage budget, and I don't think we've finished our transfer business yet, as we will undoubtedly sign a replacement for Vestergaard, who has gone to Leicester to sit on the bench.
As for tomorrow's game? Despite the general apathy on here I don't think you have anything to worry about. We haven't won at Goodison since 1997, we have only won our opening day game 6 times in the last 40 years, and we haven't even scored a goal on opening day since 2016. We always start the season really slowly, and looking at our tough early fixtures, we could be looking at game week 5 before we even get our first points.
Good luck for the season anyway. I must admit I never used to like Everton as you were always one of our bogey teams, but my wife and I watched a lot of your games during lockdown, due to the family connection, and I have a close friend who is a lifelong fan, so I've developed a bit of an affinity for you.