Just having a flick through the Internet and saw something about Wigan going up in 2005 which as you know was the season we got relegated. Then it dawned on me that we have now been out of the top flight for 7 seasons. It didn't seem right, it seems too many, so I started to work out where we have finished each season, in what league and was a year out. By my reckoning it should be the end of the 2011 season now! Obviously my memory is a little weary or its because I am bored on a night-shift and my mind is a bit fried! So I used the OS to track back through the last seven seasons. It appears that I had missed out our first season in the Championship and thought we went into the play offs in our first season. We were in the Championship for 4 seasons?? I had a season ticket then as well! Whats the point of this you ask? Well that season we finished 12th in the league, 17 points off the play offs and 18 off relegation. Proper mid table averageness and I guess that's why I forgot it. The thing is Saints just don't do mid table mediocrity. The following season we were in the playoffs, then the season after that a relegation battle which we got out of, then it was relegation from The Championship. An overhaul of a big points deduction and an outsiders chance at a push for the playoff in League One, followed by last season's top 2 finish and on at last to the summit of the Championship now. All of these have been memorable and live long in the memory for the good, for the bad and I guess, that's what it is to support Saints. We never just sit in nomansland like a number of clubs through the leagues. Every season has us on the edge of our seats and we are fighting for something. Well every season apart from that one lost season........
I remember that season, think we had 7/8 draws in a row which was actually a league record (awful that this was the most excitement out of that season). For some reason, the game I remember out of that season most was winning 0-2 at the Withdean (don't ask me why, but when I think of that season, that's the only game I can really remember). Also was the year Walcott made his debut for Saints against Wolves in the first match, and the season a certain Mr Redknapp left us for the guys down the road... I didn't like our kit though.
Our first season in the championship......we off loaded shed loads of players and invested £900K on one.....Ricardo Fuller. Maybe our illustrious chairman at the time had no confidence in his manager?? But at no time did we look like we had any belief we could bounce back to the Prem.
I thought we'd made the play-offs in our first Championship year, so I lost the same season as Big Si.
the away kit (black with a red quarter) was my favorite ever away kit though! .... i think it was our playoff season actually....
That season was more off the field drama as much as anything. It just proves to me that Redknapp is nothing without money.
05-06: Midtable finish 06-07 Playoffs 07-08 Relegation Battle - Sheff Utd game! 08-09 Relegation 09-10 JPT win, League 1 top half finish 10-11 League 1 Promotion 11-12 ????????????????
Bale made his debut that season too, albeit right at the end of the season. At home to Millwall as I recall, who were 1-0 down in injury time and seconds away from relegation, so they send their keeper forward for a corner and we break to go 2-0 up. Fuller scored it, as I recall. Vaugely remember that Brighton victory. Didn't Blackstock score? The results which stick out most for me though were the dour 0-0 draw on the opening day at Wolves (it really was a case of case of "welcome to life outside of the PL"), the 4-3 home defeat to Leeds (when we were 3-0 up, and the little legend that is Marian Pahars made a rare appearance and scored a couple of goals), and the Xmas dicking that Watford gave us (3-0) to usher in the Burley era. Oh, and the 4-1 reverse victory against Wolves, when Claus finally scored (think that was that season any way)!
Yeah it was, that 0-0, our first game in the Championship was shocking, didn't Claus get sent off as well?
The play-off season was my son's first away trip (a then 5 year old). His first ever away game was the Wolves game .... 6 nil win and we hardly got a touch. I remember looking at my watch after about 15-20 minutes thinking "please Saints scramble a nil - nil out of this just so my boy doesn't hate the day out"; we then had three attacks towrads the end of the half, scored three and Bart saved a penalty.
think you'll find that the return fixture against wolves was an even more dour 0-0 than the opening day game
