Saints take on Brighton & Hove Albion at St Mary's in their only official open door friendly of the pre season, bit the excessive pricing structure means that there won't be a lot of Saints supporters present to welcome Will Still to St Mary's.

You would have thought that with season tickets sold out, a new highly rated young manager in place, that the game against Brighton would see brisk business at the turnstiles, but with half of the ground being closed for this game and a quick glance at the online ticket system showing less than 4,000 tickets being sold, Will Still will have to wait a week before being welcomed by Southampton fans.

The £15 pre game price didn't appeal to the Saints faithful, so I doubt that many will roll up on the day to pay £20 for those over 18 and £10 for those under that age, this is hardly a bargain day out for a family of 4 at £60.

I say this most years, but the ticket price for a pre season friendly should be a loss leader, get those to the game that don't usually get the chance, bring in the kids with their parents cheaply and make the money when they buy replica shirts, scarves and of course overpriced food & drink.

So when Saints run out at the strange time of 3.30pm this afternoon, it will not be to around 25,000 empty seats and not an expectant home support.

But part of the reason that the crowd will be so poor is that at this moment in time they will not be sure what they will be seeing, not the club's fault or Will Still's, but the fact that with only week before the season starts, we are not sure what the squad will look like against Brighton and certainly what it will look like in a months time when the transfer window closes.

Arron Ramsdale played last week against Espanyol, as I write this i'm not sure if he is already a Newcastle player for the coming season or not, Matteus Fernandes also played in Spain, will he play against Brighton and will he still be here come September and of course Tyler Dibling is the subject of interest from Everton.

So far Saints have not lost anyone in the transfer window that the fans would really be bothered about keeping, Kyle Walker Peters aside, but there could be as many as 6 more leave before the end of August, the fans want to see a team made up of those who will be playing for us past August, they want to welcome new signings not wave good bye to those leaving.

That is not in the hands of the the club, the players or Will Still but the bizarre transfer window dates, its time for a revamp, end the transfer window the day before the season starts.

So what side will Will Still play, injuries (Real or otherwise) restricted him last week at Espanyol, but he seemed to play a side made up mainly by those who will be staying, so he seems to be basing his planning on who he thinks could still be here after the end of the month.

So I would expect this to be the case against Brighton, the big question will be Tyler Dibling, after the rejected bid from Everton, we will find out if his heart is at St Mary's or his head has been turned and he sees his future elsewhere.

There will be a few comings and goings before the transfer window closes and this does not help our preparations or indeed our early games in the Championship.

I think for perhaps the first time we will get an inkling of who Will Still sees as his first choice players for the season, I think the main talking points will revolve around the defence, we have a strong midfield and forward line at Championship level, even if we lose a player or two, but at the back it's not so cut and dried, indeed I would go as fas to say that in the back four there is not one player who you would say is guaranteed to be first choice in any position, whether that is good or bad we will soon find out.

There are those that have performed well in pre season, Joshua Quarshie & Kayi Sanda, but can you throw two inexperienced youngsters in as a central defensive pairing in the Championship.

So from this respect it could be that Will Still will offer no answers in the game this afternoon.

This will be a good run out for Saints against a team that won at St Mary's in the Premier League 4-0 just 6 months ago, that was the last knockings of the past though and this is the start of hopefully a new era at Saints, one where we finally have the right structure in place to build the club to it's former glory, just a pity that there will be so few there today to see it.

All Photos Via Reuters

Boris1977 added 10:38 - Aug 2 Sports Republic tone deaf again. It would help Saints cause if the window closed as soon as the season started but the uncertainty of who will be at the club in a month's time means any amount of pre season friendlies are purely about fitness not strategy and player roles. Sports Republic remain in the dock and so far there isn't any compelling evidence that they are reformed characters.

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Bowlercow added 10:44 - Aug 2 I agree that the back 4 is difficult to predict.If he goes with 2 young centre backs in Quarshie with either Wood,Sanda or Edwards then the 2 full backs must be experienced Bree, Manning or Taylor for example. If he has Taylor and Stephens as centre backs he can afford to play Wellington and Sugawara as wing backs
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