Danny ings Southampton
RALPH Hasenhuttl insists Saints will look to replace Danny Ings in the transfer market, after the striker completed a £30million move to Aston Villa this evening. Ings’s surprise departure from Saints was confirmed shortly before the club faced Levante in a pre-season friendly at St Mary’s. Kyle Walker-Peters scored the only goal as Saints clinched a 1-0 win over the La Liga side, but all the talk post-match was dominated by the departure of Saints’ star striker.
Ralph Hasenhuttl said: “It was not a shock for me as we are always informed about what is going on behind the scenes. It was clear we had a player who didn’t want to sign for us anymore. I must say it is fantastic that we get a lot of money for him. He did a fantastic job for this club. He was an amazing goalscorer all this time when he was here. It is a pity that he leaves, but this is the business. I want to say thank you for the time he played for us. We can replace him with the money we have got.”
Discussing Saints’ future plans in the transfer market now Ings has left the club,
Ralph Hasenhuttl added: “We know that we need maybe two more players. So we must always look that we buy players a little bit cheaper and sell players a little bit more expensive. This is our business. This is how we are working here. It (Ings money) helps us massively, definitely. But we lose also a very important striker who has scored a lot of goals, so when we want to be as successful in the offensive as in the past, we must split the goals he scored on our shoulders among the players. Everybody needs three or four more goals and then we can maybe replace him. Hopefully we can get two or three more players in. I am sure we have to replace him, Danny Ings, this is no question. We must have a look what striker we need, definitely. We have a few alternatives in our rows. They can definitely score goals. We have Che, we have Nathan Tella, we have Longy and Theo Walcott can play up front, Reddy can play up front and Michael Obafemi. So we have a few alternatives. But we know that we need somebody else.”
