/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/30924345/481290389.0.jpg)
If you've been following today's rumours, you'll have noticed that every neutral's favourite mid-table club is having some financial difficulties at present. And since Southampton are packed full of young, supremely promising talent -- some of whom have been heavily linked to Chelsea in the past -- it's pretty easy to imagine the club hovering, vulture-like, above St. Mary's, just waiting to swoop.
But... don't get your hopes up about a fire sale or anything. And not just because the Saints are cute and that it would be kind of distasteful.
Of course it's a burden, but it's a burden that has to be covered and will be covered...
...The most important point is that we are in a position where we do not need to sell any player Mauricio [Pochettino] wants to keep.
-Southampton director Hans Hofstetter. Source: BBC.
In other words, there will be no panic selling. I'm sure that they'd sell the likes of Luke Shaw and James Ward-Prowse if an insanely high bid came in, but that's not the same as actively shopping them to cover financial difficulties. So no, we're not getting a bunch of shiny Southampton baubles on the cheap. Oh well -- I don't really think we need Shaw anyway.