They are getting hot under the collar up on Tyneside, all over the fact that little Southampton FC refuse to lay down and have their tummy tickled by the richest club in the World.

According to The Northern Echo in the North East, Newcastle United are getting very irate about their negotiations with Southampton over the signing of Tino Livramento, they claim that talks are continuing but that Saints keep moving the financial goalposts.

They even see that Saints starting Livramento in their friendly at Reading on Saturday was part of the act, all aimed at trying to push up the price that the St James's Park club are willing to offer.

From a Newcastle fans perspective they seem to be frustrated that Southampton are not just lying down and doing the bidding, fansite geordiebootboys.com seem to be taking that viewpoint, although they do concede that their club "must believe that Livramento is a worthwhile investment – otherwise they would have walked away a long time ago."

From a Southampton perspective it is a lot different, a few weeks ago the news out of Tyneside was that Newcastle had set a transfer budget of £75 million and that being the case a top figure of £15 million was quoted as the most they could pay.

Yet here we are now and they have already spent around £100 million on just two players Sandro Tonali & Harvey Barnes, bringing in just £15 million for Chris Wood to balance the books .

Yet they are now upped their bid from the derisory £15 million, ironically the same price they paid last year for former Saints left back Matt Targett(no comparison here) to £30 million.

So given they are the richest club in the world and we are now a poor Championship club, how dare we hold out for more money, indeed how dare we hold out for more for a player who like us they clearly think is a great talent.

Saints need to sell this summer and yes they do need to sell players in certain positions fast in order to bring in money to pay for them, but that does not mean that we should allow ourselves to be held to be pushed into a cheap sale.

Tino Livramento is under contract for another 3 years, for a year during his first two years at the club he was injured and we paid his wages, whilst i am not naive enough to think that a proffessional footballer thinks that means he owes the club anything, it does mean that the lets say £2 million we paid him in wages reduces down our potential profit.

So if Newcastle played silly buggers with us by offering stupendously low money for him a few weeks ago, excuse me for not shedding a tear now for their frustration about Southampton doing the same now by asking for more.

A month ago Newcastle offered a low figure not in the real belief they would get him that low, but to unsettle the player, to make him want to go to St James's Park and why wouldn't he, they are the richest club in the World, but also to try and make out they weren't really that bothered, the aim to be to get an unsettled player to force his current club to sell him at less than the going rate.

This isn't a Newcastle thing, its a football thing, it is just that some don't get as upset about it as others when they don't get their own way and have to pay the going rate.

Southampton FC have been lambasted by their fans over the last few years for selling players, truth is non were dragged away by wild horses, screaming to stay, now things are different, the club will not be held to ransom to sell a player under his market value, they are quite happy for him to stay at St Mary's another year, if he does then perhaps the £30 million that Newcastle are offering now will seem a snip.

Photo: Action Images

WestSussexSaint added 15:02 - Jul 24 The factor in our favour is that Tino still has 3 years left on his Saints contract. In addition, I expect Tino, along with most of the squad, had relegation clauses in their contract to take a substantial wage cut after last season. So in the financial front the club do not need to sell him cheaply. The only unknown is what the player himself feels towards the move. I agree there is no sentiment in the game so forget the whole “Tino owes us” for last season narrative, but emotions are a big factor in how a player will perform. There is little point in forcing him to stay if his heart is elsewhere and he ends up not performing to the levels we want or expect. Those in the club will know him better than anyone so will be able to judge if this is an issue. Personally I hope he stays at least one season but I think we are well equipped if we have to sell but just hope we get the market value.

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SanMarco added 15:23 - Jul 24 Why would the footballing wing of Saudi Arabia behave anymore honourably than the country itself. Lucky we are not from Yemen - they would be bombing us to smithereens. The funny thing about Livramento is that in a sense we won't really miss him because he hasn't been around for so long. I expect he will go and for Nick's sake let's hope its for at least 30m - the tummy tickling will come back to bite him if the fee is 20m !!

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kenchilds70 added 15:53 - Jul 24 Typical nouveau riche club. Tell then he' 90 million quid and go back to their "singing hinnies".
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Monksway added 16:04 - Jul 24 I'm sure they have worked out a minimum and maximum price for each player. We won't need to accept the minimum until the transfer window ends and we are still trying to offload to meet the shortfall. I think it's reasonable bet that a fit TIno will be worth £40 million in a year's time. He'll also play regularly if he stays which is why he came to us from Chelsea in the first place.

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Bowlercow added 17:00 - Jul 24 I hope no one is prepared to pay our minimum price for Tino and that he stays with us for at least oneore season We would still get £30m for him next year, Who knows by then we may have outlawed middle east investment because they are funding terror groups
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Monksway added 18:05 - Jul 24 I also suspect that the original plan was to sell KWP and keep TIno. It could be that if the Barcode Saudis bid £40 million for TIno the plan will be reversed and KWP will be offered a sweetener to give us another year. They both seem really good professionals and aren't part of the sulky brigade.
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Cjay80 added 18:17 - Jul 24 Don't Chelsea have a £40m buy back clause they can activate next summer? I'm sure I heard that when we bought him. If that's the case why sell him for anything less now? Tell NCL to stump up some real money or jog on.
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TimSaint added 18:21 - Jul 24 I thought Chelsea were interested in taking him back to the Bridge, however perhaps this was just a tactic of theirs to drive the price up and the amount they would get from their (undoubted) sell-on clause.
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Colburn added 18:24 - Jul 24 San Marco I think you've missed the boat there.. You might find that Obama ordered the Yemen bombs and those assisting him in Saudi were kicked out a couple of years ago..by better people.. But that has zilch to do with Tino anyway.. As with every player, there is a price which a club will settle for if they think its the right deal for them, taking all current circumstances into the equation. That's football..

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Waylander added 18:45 - Jul 24 Its not just Chelsea having a buy back clause, they get a percentage of his fee if he joins another club and that percentage is on a sliding scale. They more he goes for the greater a cut they get.
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LondonSaint76 added 20:14 - Jul 24 Oh dear Nick, naughty Southampton won’t roll over like a good litttle club and have one of their best assets plundered for peanuts, how dare we even think of being so disobedient? Well done Saints, keeep it up, if needs be get Pickfords in to help you move the goalposts a bit further. The barcodes are supposedly putting in one final bid - if we reject that, I reckon they will hurl their toys so far out of the pram it will need a search party to find them… In our favour, Tino has three years left on his contract, also, it seems he wants regular football, I would venture to suggest not guaranteed up there this coming season. On the minus side, if his heart is really set on the move away then is there much point in keeping a demotivated player? Would it end up going in the same direction as VVD? Personally, I’d like to see Saints put wheels on them there goalposts, keep Tino if we can and play hardball with West Ham over JWP as well. Get decent money for Lavia, ABK and Sulemana and what we can for Adams and Tall Paul. Invest in a decent GK plus Stewart from Sunderland or Piroe from Swansea (or both!!) and let the rest sort itself out on deadline day as seems to be the custom these days.

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SanMarco added 15:37 - Jul 26 Hi Colburn - yes it did start that way. I think we have to agree to disagree after that!
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