French club OGC Nice have confirmed on their official website that they have signed Mario Lemina from Saints, although there has been no official announcement from St Mary's yet.

Mario Lemina has left Southampton Football Club and joined OSG Nice in France for a reported fee of 5.5 million euros plus add ons, which equates to around £4.4 million.

Some would say this is a big loss on a player who signed in 2017 for £15 million.

But these days you usually judge a transfer fee by the number of years played, that would equate to £3 million for each year of his contract, given that he played two full seasons for us that means we have had £6 million worth from the deal so far, add on the £4.4 million we received from Nice and about £1.7 million loan fee from Galatasaray and in truth we are only about £3 million down on the deal.

But we can't dress it up too much, although Lemina undoubtedly had talent, his attitude stank and he played when he felt like it, against the lesser teams he looked World class, but when the chips were down he went awol.

All in all Saints wil be relieved to see the back of him and have got something back from the deal as well as getting his not insubstantial wages off the books which frees up some cash for other signings.

The good news is that it is one more expensive signing got off the books and as I said freeing up wages that can now be spent elsewhere, our transfer dealings have been hampered by deadwood in the squad meaning we don't have too much money to spend, slowly but surely that is changing.

When a player leaves Southampton FC I usually wish them good luck, for most such as Guido Carrillo their departure is business and there has been no question that they have given anything less than 100%, it just hasn't worked out.

But with Mario Lemina it somehow seems a little different, here was a player who seemed more interested in himself than applying his undoubted talent, he turned it on when he wanted to, at other times he didn't give a hoot.

So although I do not wish Lemina any ill will, I can't say i wish him good luck either.

Photo: Action Images

EvertonSaint added 11:45 - Jul 25 That’s nine taxis for departing players, but only two bringing in two “new” players. Ralph said he wanted a larger squad so hopefully with the departure of maybe two more players it will be a time to re-stock from the shelves.if you look at the total number of departures (which was needed) over the last two years then there has been one hell of a clear out. What we need now is a new owner who is prepared to invest in the quality players we desperately need. IN RALPH WE TRUST? I sincerely hope we do….

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