10 Southampton Foreign Import Strikers Who Were Major Flops

7. Romain Gasmi

Cost: Loan Games: 4 Goals: 0 In June 2008 Southampton, then in the Championship, acquired a highly regarded young French midfielder from RC Strasbourg: Morgan Schneiderlin. Over the next six years Schneiderlin would become integral to the Southampton team as they rebuilt and rose back up to the Premier League to the point where he was called up to play for France in this summer's World Cup and is very likely to move to a bigger club in the near future. As with Pahars and Bleidelis, short lived Saints manager Jan Poortvliet figured that if Strasbourg could provide one future star then they could provide another. Romain Gasmi was intended to give Saints' forward line what Schneiderlin did to the club's midfield and was signed on loan in September 2009 for the rest of the season. Southampton, suffering through the financial collapse that would eventually put the club into administration, were enduring some of the worst form of their history as the team slumped to the bottom of the Championship. Even so, Gasmi could not force his way into the team, making his ten minute debut as a substitute for David McGoldrick against Plymouth and making a couple more appearances off the bench over the next month. Saints were relegated and did not take up an option to purchase Gasmi, nor did Strasbourg hold onto him for long. He finally found his scoring boots in Thailand with Bangkok United.