Southampton Football Club can today confirm the departure of Chairman Ralph Krueger. Following recent talks with shareholders Mr Gao and Katharina Liebherr, it was agreed by all parties that Ralph’s contract would not be extended beyond its end date of June 30th. The shareholders and everyone involved with the club would like to put on record their thanks for Ralph's leadership, dedication and hard work over his six years with Southampton. At the end of the season the club will release more information about the future leadership structure. However, for now, all our efforts and focus are on a strong finish to the season and remaining within the Premier League. https://southamptonfc.com/news/2019...8EZlDaW37PQluyC14xiN0SpZrEQr05O4evSOWsYn_WqoY
Mixed feelings about this. I will miss him - he never really got into the football side of things, and don't think he's the root cause of our problems the last 18 months or so. Ties in with the 2-year thing mentioned when Mr Gao took over back in 2017. Think that this was always going to happen, regardless.
Genuinely have no idea what he did for us, so hard to tell if this will have an impact. Thank god we don’t have to listen to him talking anymore though
Few of us knew about all that he did or didn't do for the club, so won't rush to criticise. Only the owners really know. Think it's a case of going as far as he can go. We live in interesting times.
A decent bloke, but his psychobabble and nonsense waffle was beyond tiring by the end of the six years. That said, always behaved with integrity and was useful for steadying the ship post-Cortese and the exodus of players and management. All the best Ralph.
Wow, wasn’t expecting that! Throws up lots of questions, especially regarding who actually sacked Les.
Slightly worrying we are planning for the summer, but have no chairman or DOF? Hope mr Gao has something up his sleeve ...
Not surprised by this news, mildly surprised by the timing as I thought it would come in the off season, but I suppose it doesn't affect football operations. What will be interesting is to see what happens next. Not a fan of Ralphs long-winded jargon, but he seemed like a good guy so I wish him all the best for the future.
It’s hard to really assess his tenure as we don’t know all of the intricacies involved in decision making, but we can accept that the football got worse and we’ve had to endure two relegation fights with him at the helm. I do commend him, however, for his involvement in securing Hasenhüttl and giving us the chance to (maybe) enjoy premier league status for another year
Initially it was the commercial side of things which was underperforming. He did well there (eg Body Armour and Virgin being our best ever deals). Latterly it was raising our profile abroad which may not mean much to fans but long term will have great commercial benefits ( eg Baltimore Academy). The very side of him that some fans found tedious was a great asset dealing with likes of new owners. And let’s not forget it was him to pursuaded Ralph to join us (Ralph’s own words as I recall).
You'd kind of want it before the summer though, especially as Ralph H is already talking about summer targets. Who is he talking to? I wouldn't trust Wilson to get anything right as his record is patchy as ****.
This being announced on Bednarek’s birthday definitely isn’t a coincidence. There’s something going on behind the scenes.
Perhaps he's not as clueless and out of touch as many Saints fans believe then, he must've been angry with the way his trust that he put in the men that were running things were abusing it.
