Central defender Wesley Hoedt is report ably in discussions to join Belgium giants Anderlecht, but seemingly isn't willing to take a pay drop to do it.

REports in the media say that Wesley Hoedt is about to have a second season out on loan in Belgium, but this time it won't be Royal Antwerp but Anderlecht.

Once the top club in Belgium, Anderlecht finished 4 points and 10 places behind Antwerp when the league was suspended.

But despite the fact that Hoedt was vocal in the media about moving away from St Mary's permanently it seems that he is not willing to take a pay cut to actually do that and Saints at best will get his wages covered, but even that is unlikely.

That is still a problem for Saints, they have too many on big wages who prefer to go out on loan for a year and thus receive their full wages from Saints, than take a pay cut and sign for someone permanently.

So it looks like Saints will have to wait till next summer when several like Lemina and Hoedt will be in the final year of their contracts and then may be willing to take a drop in salary for the security of a long term contract elsewhere.

Then Saints will finally have the financial shackles thrown off and hopefully will also get some transfer money in to improve the squad.

Hoedt could have been a decent player for Saints, but from the very start Ralph Hasenhuttl seemed to take a dislike to the Dutch defender, the nearest he got to playing under the Austrian was two appearances on the bench as an unused sub before being shipped out on loan.

Hoedt appeared to be back in the fold last summer and spoke of re establishing himself in the team, but again he found himself given the cold shoulder from Ralph and he was vocal in the media seemingly burning his bridges at St Mary's whilst Hasenhuttl is in charge.

Photo: Action Images

perazi added 11:17 - Sep 6 "Hoedt could have been a decent player for Saints". In fact, he showed himself to be a clumsy, one footed player with limited ability and an ego far in excess of his ability.
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underweststand added 11:38 - Sep 6 Careful... perazi... you'll upset Nick ..and the truth might get back to other interested clubs. I also read another site that suggested that Anderlecht had " only made a phone call to enquire about his availability" .. the joy of reading the headline was rather short-lived.
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IWOZTHERE added 17:07 - Sep 6 I'm certainly not defending the gobshite.... But I don't think he was any worse than Vestergaard. How we could do with that £35m now?.....
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NewburySaint added 19:46 - Sep 6 I’ve always said Ralph’s a very good judge of a player and his character!!
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A1079 added 21:42 - Sep 6 How does anyone know whether Ralph took a dislike to Hoedt? May be he just decided that his attitude just did not warrant a place in the team. Hell we have made some very costly mistakes in the transfer market in recent years and all of them are hanging around us like huge weights preventing us from moving on.
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SaintPaulVW added 09:17 - Sep 7 When he played for us, he looked no better than any other CB. So I'm not too sure where this 'Golden Era' of his performances really comes from. Seemed shy of making headers, which is obviously only a slight issue in that position. If it has been correctly reported, calling Ralph 'the trainer' in several interviews shows very poor attitude. However, if you are on a guaranteed contract why cut your take home pay? Wes will be with us for at least another season.

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SaintBrock added 11:18 - Sep 7 I've never met anybody who would be willing to take a pay cut that was part of their contract. It's not fair to pillory the lad over his pay.
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SanMarco added 19:33 - Sep 7 I simply never felt he looked very good. Ralph obviously felt the same. I totally agree with IWOZTHERE re Vestergaard. We had a good run of signing excellent CBs and after that we had a run of signing not very good ones. Hopefully we are due for a good one (or three).
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kristianJ added 22:04 - Sep 7 A poor defender with an even worse attitude.
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