Gaston Ramirez’s Saints career is over, bringing to an end an era of transfer flops which have cost the club in excess of £50m.

Ramirez, Dani Osvaldo and Emmanuel Mayuka all arrived in the space of a year when the club was under the leadership of former chairman Nicola Cortese.

Their fees and wages have topped the £50m mark, for the return of a combined total of just 12 goals.

Even now it is understood that Saints have not stopped paying Ramirez, who has joined Middlesbrough on loan for the remainder of the season with his St Mary’s contract ending in the summer.

It is an extraordinary amount of money for Saints to have spent on the trio.

Ramirez and Mayuka both arrived in August 2012.

The Uruguayan was the headline signing, a then club record at £12m and on wages of around £60,000 per week.

Ramirez did have an impact in his first season with the club, scoring five goals in 26 games.

However, his final record at Saints underlined how little influence he had after that as he leaves with a total of 28 starts and 27 sub appearances over four years and with eight goals scored.

He is estimated to have cost Saints around £21m in total, or about £8,000 for every minute played.

His move to Championship promotion hopefuls Boro has seen him agree to a cut in wages, as the Teessiders were reportedly only prepared to pay £20,000 a week of his salary. It is believed Saints are also contributing to get him off the books with Ronald Koeman insisting he has no future at the club.

Mayuka’s £3m move to Saints was a less costly, but more marked, failure.

His three year stay cost around £5m in total, and was rewarded with a solitary goal – and that in a 5-1 League Cup win at Barnsley. Mayuka made just one league start for Saints.

Osvaldo was the highest profile transfer catastrophe for Saints.

His brief and eventful stay at Saints cost a total of around £25m.

Osvaldo signed for an initial fee of £12.9m in August 2013, breaking the Saints transfer record.

His controversial stay came to an end when he headbutted Jose Fonte.

After several loan moves, Saints were eventually forced to pay Osvaldo a significant settlement to end his contract early and be shot of him.

He scored three Premier League goals for the club at a total cost of about £8m each.