Saints Marching
Fansided

Southampton: The Saints mustn’t forget to sign a new forward

By Chris Hughes

SOUTHAMPTON, ENGLAND - DECEMBER 23: Charlie Austin of Southampton celebrates after scoring his sides first goal during the Premier League match between Southampton and Huddersfield Town at St Mary's Stadium on December 23, 2017 in Southampton, England. (Photo by Clive Rose/Getty Images)
SOUTHAMPTON, ENGLAND - DECEMBER 23: Charlie Austin of Southampton celebrates after scoring his sides first goal during the Premier League match between Southampton and Huddersfield Town at St Mary's Stadium on December 23, 2017 in Southampton, England. (Photo by Clive Rose/Getty Images) /
facebooktwitterreddit

As Southampton complete their fourth and close in on their fifth signing of the summer, they must do well to remember they still desperately need a new striker.

The Saints have today announced the signing of towering centre-back Jannik Vestergaard from Borussia Monchengladbach, whilst they are also reportedly in talks with Barcelona for their ball-playing centre-half Marlon Santos.

The Saints have already added fresh reinforcement elsewhere on the pitch, with Stuart Armstrong, Mohamed Elyounoussi and Angus Gunn the side’s other arrivals so far this summer.

However the club haven’t really been linked with many strikers at all, with Andrea Petagna the only consistent link and he doesn’t boast a particularly impressive goal record in Italy.

The Saints still desperately need to replace the target-man presence they lost with the sale of Graziano Pelle two years ago, with Guido Carrillo clearly not the man to fill that void, having now been loaned out to Leganes for the next season.

Next: Pre-season recap: Saints 3-2 Jiangsu Suning

BERGAMO, ITALY – MARCH 31: Andrea Petagna of Atalanta BC reacts during the serie A match between Atalanta BC and Udinese Calcio at Stadio Atleti Azzurri d’Italia on March 31, 2018 in Bergamo, Italy. (Photo by Dino Panato/Getty Images)
BERGAMO, ITALY – MARCH 31: Andrea Petagna of Atalanta BC reacts during the serie A match between Atalanta BC and Udinese Calcio at Stadio Atleti Azzurri d’Italia on March 31, 2018 in Bergamo, Italy. (Photo by Dino Panato/Getty Images) /

Southampton do admittedly have three forwards on their books already, although things aren’t as black and white as they may seem. Despite his quality, supporters sadly need to be braced for the possibility that Charlie Austin will be injured and unavailable for at least some portion of this campaign.

More from Saints Marching

Assuming he is out of the game for some period of time, the Saints are left with Manolo Gabbiadini and Shane Long – the former is not a natural #9, and works better when making intelligent runs off of a another striker, something which worked so well for him in his native Italy.

The Irishman meanwhile, despite his work ethic, has never truly been prolific. He can lead the line when the Saints are just trying to grind out a result but he’s never going to produce the goods on a regular basis.

When taking that into account, it’s hard to consider why the board wouldn’t be more desperate to sign a new striker – granted we are basing this off what rumours have surfaced but since the arrival of Elyounoussi there’s been little-to-no discussion about any other attacking reinforcement.

Spending a similar fee to what they’ve done for the other arrivals would make sense and Southampton could get a really nice, physical forward for that amount of outlay – in my summer wishlist are discussed Nils Petersen as a possibility whilst William Jose and Nicolai Jorgensen are other options.

The amount of business the Saints are doing is brilliant and we can’t take anything away from the club for finally pressing on after a month of precious little, however not signing another striker would be absolutely criminal. The board simply have to start prioritising signing another forward.