I'm afraid we missed the boat on that one about 15 years ago. When the board decided to listen to the fans
Jenas commenting on how we always play safe, always take the easy option, always play at too slow a tempo. Lampard saying that when your manager starts waffling on about team spirit and character, you know you’re in trouble. We’ve not got an easy run-in and we’re going through the motions and just ambling through games. They’re not wrong.
I felt that Pellegrino deserved a chance to begin with but if you keep making the same mistakes every week and don't learn from them, it is extremely worrying. I find it hard to understand how he is unable to see that his tactics blatantly do not work and how the board has kept faith with him when nothing ever seems to be done to address the problems that we have every time we field a team. I don't mind him failing if he responds to adversity or that it becomes apparent that he is learning how to rectify his errors. If he responded to the problems he has created and decided to do something different , I think he would get more respect. As I said last week, there is little point anyone posting on the match day threads simply because everyone is posting the same comments week in, week out. This has been the case since about December when, with the greatest will in the world, the writing was on the wall that this bloke was inept. I am loathe to agree with Merrington but I feel he is spot on that the board have dug themselves in to a hole and we will not hear anything from them until May. Pellegrino should have been binned before Christmas but the problem is now shown to be far more serious as the board would appear to be incapable of reacting. There are big questions to ask as to how we have squandered some of the best football I have seen Saints play under Poch and Koeman with two managerial appointments which simply undid ten years worth of good work.
^^^This. I think more the second appointment, but I just feel that we are making good players look bad now. We need a manger to step up, show them who is boss and make leaders out of our players. Oh what I would do for a Lambert now to give us some hope. I just cannot see anyone grabbing the game by the scruff of the neck or scoring anymore. ...But as I said earlier, we are still where we need to be come the end of the last day of the season, so all is not lost, yet.
I've come to the conclusion that there must be a grand plan. And that grand plan is based around the movie that will be made of this season. The finale will be our FA Cup Final win coupled with the last second winner against Man City on the final day - cue pitch invasion, celebrations etc. That pitch invasion will not happen unless we are still in trouble going into the final day. Get our points too early and we'll be safe with no pitch invasion. It's all about the pitch invasion. That can be the only reason?
I think they listened more to the dressing room last summer. And in all honesty I think it was the right decision, had they appointed a vaguely capable manager as a replacement.
It's like I've said before, even though I thought Puel did a good job considering and definitely earned at least a chunk of this season, I'm still not convinced he was the right appointment at the time. I've seen a lot of older posters on here say how our past is littered with situations where the board failed to capitalise on a good situation and really push forward, and I can't help but feel that has happened again. Our position and status in that summer was higher than it had been for a generation and we really didn't take advantage. And in the time since it fits to look at that famous Morgan quote from 2014... 6/7 years of hard work all undone in 12-18 months. And it's why I still hold Les and the board as the main issue in the club and responsible for the position were in now.
Yeah, maybe. I think our real problems started the summer before that though. Wanyama, Pelle, Mane, Koeman, all out the door. Fonte angling for the exit. Any new manager would have struggled in those circumstances.
Seems like they knew what was going to happen and it did. Backwards, sideways, backwards, keep the ball. Great game plan. Leave all the best players on the bench. The board has deserted us. Any other premier club would have changed managers after Christmas. But hey we are in the quarter final of the cup. The most delusional part is someone predicted 3-0 to saints.
