All being well Morgan Schneiderlin will make his 200th appearance for Saints up at Anfield on Saturday.

When the teenage French Midfielder Morgan Schneiderlin arrived at St Mary's in the summer of 2008 still aged only 18 many eyes were rolled, especially as he cost £1.2 million at a time when Saints were heading for administration, returning Saints Chairman Rupert Lowe seemed to blow the entire transfer budget on Schneiderlin meaning that the team would have to rely mainly on a combination of free transfers and youngsters for what would be a tough season in the Championship.

Now 5 years on Morgan is still at St Mary's and he celebrated playing in three different divisions with the club by being voted its player of the year in its first season back in the Premier league, highlighting what good value for money he has turned out to be and indeed raising the question just what would he be worth now ? 10 ? 20 times his original value.

Over the past five years Morgan's appearances have been spread across 6 different competitions, league wise he has played in the Premier, the Championship & League 1, making 150 starts plus 26 as sub scoring 8 goals along the way.

In terms of cup competitions he has represented Saints in three of them, the FA Cup where has played 8(1) without a goal, an identical record in the league cup as well as 5(0) in the Johnstone's Paint Trophy.

Now he is set to make his 200th appearance overall for Saints up at Anfield, all being well though he should make that 200 in league appearances alone later in the season, although it would take a decent cup run as well as a few replays to enable him to hit the 250 mark overall before the end of the season.

His first goal for the club though was a long time in coming,, that came in his 79th game for the club, a 5-1 win at Bristol Rovers and a spectacular long range effort, it would then be another 43 games before he hit a second, that a late equaliser at Burnley, to make it 2 goals in his first 122 appearances, he would get one more goal that season as Saints stormed to the Premier League, however since then he has been prolific by his own standards, after only scoring 3 goals iin his first 4 seasons, he showed that he is truly Premier class by scoring 5 times in his debut season in the top flight, almost doubling his tally in the process.

There has bee much debate in the past when the question of just how many games should a player play for the club to be considered one of its true legends, whilst some like Kevin Keegan attain that status with far less than 200, I would say that any player who hits 200 for the club in the modern day should be worth a mention and that when you consider that in the Club's history only perhaps just over a couple of dozen players or so have managed 250 games it puts into perspective just how near Morgan is to truly be considered a club legend for his service.

So congratulations Morgan Schneiderlin assuming you hit the 200 on Saturday, lets hope you make it another 200 in the next 5 seasons.

Photo: Action Images

stmichael added 16:37 - Sep 19 Morgan, Adam, Ricky & Jose all started on Saturday and all were with us in the 3rd Division. Add KD to this list as he was on the bench Saturday. 5 players who are true club legends in my eyes. Nothing but respet for them all..
0

Southampton Polls