A few weeks ago some were suggesting that Saints players would be disgusted by the Spygate issues and would demand to leave, I suggested that they would be making their decisions on what would be best for them personally before any morals came into play and I am being proved right.

Dragan Solak recently highlighted the issues surrounding Ross Stewart’s contract, Saints had an option for the right to extend it for a year, this had to be exercised within 5 days of the final game of the season and this is were it got tricky.

The final game of the season was suddenly extended to the 2nd leg of the play offs and when that game was won, it would extend to the play off final, which as we all know was cancelled, meaning that the deadline had passed.

Now there is a legal issue as to whether Saints have the right to extend, something that Stewart’s agent is saying that they don’t and whilst they are not ruling out re signing for Southampton, they want to look for other options.

This is not the way I envisaged Southampton players putting their own agenda’s before morals, but it is just as relevant.

You would have hoped that Ross Stewart might have had some sort of loyalty to Southampton FC, after all we had paid him for doing virtually nothing in his first season and his second season was also very much injury hit and his contribution was very little.

Last season saw him finally get free of injuries and show what he can do and most would have hoped that he and Cyle Larin would again form a lethal partnership.

But of course most would also have hoped that Stewart would have had some morals and repaid the faith that Saints has shown in him with some loyalty, but it seems he and his agent’s don’t think that way.

I can understand why they would want to explore other options and this will end two ways, either he will get a better deal that is on the table for him at St Mary’s or he won’t and then we will see him scuttle back making noises about only wanting to delay signing because he wanted to concentrate on the World Cup with Scotland, a competition that he will hope will see him become hot property after.

Now I can understand all this, I am not whinging, but it highlights my original point of a few weeks ago, professional football players or at least the majority of them march to the sound of the biggest pay cheque at the highest level they can get and not to the beating of the drums on the club badge.

So I am disappointed in Ross Stewart but not surprised, it shows that who stays and goes this summer was never going to be about the morals of the Southampton players, it was always going to be about whether they got better offers and if they didn’t then they were going to stay.

As I also said back then we are not going to see anyone leave and sign for Lincoln City for £5 a week less just so they can keep the moral high ground.

I truly hope that this situation is resolved and that Ross Stewart is a Southampton player next season, I just wish that perhaps if it does happen that it would have been handled slightly differently.

Via Reuters