Southampton manager Ralph Hasenhuttl has said that although he’s not forcing centre-half Wesley Hoedt out of the club, the player himself ‘should think about it’ with the January transfer window open.
Having arrived at the club as Mark Hughes replacement, the Austrian has quickly got to work on assessing the squad and although the 24-year-old has made 13 appearances so far this season in the Premier League, the last we saw him was at the end of November as we fell to a 3-2 defeat to Fulham.
Hasenhuttl seems to have made his decision on the £15million capture from Lazio, and Sky Sports quote him as saying.
“Nearly every player has played a game until now but he didn’t. It’s difficult. I made a decision for Jannik Vestergaard, Jack Stephens at Derby. I think Jack will take the part of Maya Yoshida who is gone for one month. Yeah, it’s not the best for Wesley, that’s right. It’s the same for Gabbiadini or Steven Davis. The guys went away to find other solutions, it’s better for them. For Wesley it can be the same. We don’t send any player away but if he feels like he is not used like wants from us, he should think about it.”
The gaffer was of course speaking as he met the press as preparations continue for Leicester City this weekend, but it’s a pretty blunt set of words and they are certainly honest. Hoedt’s time with us has been mixed but he did have his moments where he impressed, but for a lot of fans those moments were too few and far between.
As we look to trim the group and Hasenhuttl makes his mark, it wouldn’t be a surprise at all to see him move swiftly on – the only question is how much of a loss to we make?
