Our Great Club!

I wanted to say that I have been a member on here and the old 606 since our previous Premier league stint. I don't post often but read daily.

We have been through many ups and downs and although tough at the time when you get relegated or lose a star player, we get through it and I wouldn't change any of it for the world. It keeps us grounded and makes things like the JPT win even sweeter.

Over the last 5 years we have had manager changes, sold 1 player who we the fans wanted to keep(maybe a few more will go before the start of the coming season) and had a change of chairman.

Something has remained constant through all of this....the Liebherr family.

Whether it was Markus or Katherina they have been in the background while the party has been getting bigger and better. Markus had the foresight to hire Cortese, he wasn't perfect by any means but got the ball rolling.

Katherina had the foresight to hire Krueger(let's not forget that he is an ice hockey coach, surely someone who doesn't know what they are doing or isn't interested in the club, hires a football guy!), he almost certainly isn't perfect either but he will keep that ball rolling and improve us even more in the next 5 years.

You can tell when you see Katherina's smile just what this means to her. She doesn't need the money from this club being a success and could easily settle for a team who stays in the league but just as I would for my late father I would keep his legacy going and think of the joy on his face wherever he is when we get into Europe, win a cup, win the league! Some things are worth more than money.

I don't understand the negativity from some posters towards Katherina, Ralph and Les. There are no facts that show anything they are doing is to the detriment of this great club yet there are facts to show they are passionate and interested in the club.

I would have liked Pochettino to stay as I think the stability is important but I'm not devestated he has gone, in fact I'm very excited. I an sure we will get a forward thinking manager who the players will respect.

Hopefully Lallana and Shaw among others will want to stay and if they don't we will not fail to bring in suitable replacements.

Ramirez hasn't exactly succeeded yet(i still believe he can) but we signed him as a newly promoted team with Adkins in charge, now we are a team who finished 8th with 3 England internationals. Regardless of who leaves we will sign other big name players who Mark Lawrenson will insist we have no hope of signing!

Now we all need to get behind the team, manager, chairman and owner and improve on last season. I for one fully believe we will.

 

Bravo!...Let's banish all our collective Saintly inferiority complexes. We are one of the most attractive propositions for a prospective Manager in the best domestic league in the world. I believe that we will get an exciting new Manager (and there are plenty of candidates out there) and that Poch will soon be a distant memory, I also believe that we will keep our first team squad pretty much intact and will add to it over the coming few months.

 

I watched pretty much every game last season and as the season went on I went from wow to hmm. More than anything I got sick to death of hearing and reading 'we deserved more from the game'. By the end of the season its all I could remember. Too much same. Same team, same tactics, same possession, same dearth of chances, same narrow win/loss margins same headlines - 'we deserved more'. We played some great games and I'm fully behind the squad of players we have but I don't feel like we've lost our greatest asset. Maybe we did deserve more as a club. We certainly deserved more commitment from our former manager. Maybe we will actually get more now Poch has moved on.

 

Welcome SaintinNZ. Whereabouts in the old hunting ground are you based..?

Oh, by the way, well said. I got a little sick of it too, at times.

 

Thanks for the welcome. I don't have much to post being so far removed here in Christchurch and Queenstown but grateful to read everyone else's thoughts and opinions. Thankfully we got a streaming service here last season so I got to see every game home and away for the first time in my 45 years! The last 5 years have been fantastic times to be a Saints fan. I still think huge praise and thanks are due to everyone who has played a part. Of these I believe Poch to be the smallest part. Of all the potential losses Lallana will be the biggest for me. Luke has amazing potential but I believe he can easily be replaced. he's still learning and taking from the club. Lallana on the other hand is a huge part of the clubs big beating heart and if he leaves it will leave a big space behind. Having seen the mercenary disloyal manner Poch has taken, I wonder how much influence he has had over the other players 'aspirations'. It wouldnt surprise me if Poch has convinced him he will be better off moving on. Another thing not to thank him for.

 

Good to have you on board.

 

Welcome !

 

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I watched pretty much every game last season and as the season went on I went from wow to hmm.

I think that is called a honeymoon period coming to an end. I thought you had a great season overall better than us under laudrup so i hope you don't choose him as your next manager as he will **** you up....

 

Most certainly welcome SaintinNZ........Glad to hear you are getting a decent stream to watch the games.
Agreed....... the king is dead........ long live the king. We move on and why not upwards.......

 

Yes, a great, well-reasoned post. I do not understand why there is so much negativity on these boards either. One or two posters even suggested that the club should be sold because Pochettino left! I fear nothing more than the club falling into the hands of ownership like the rest of the Premier League clubs! Careful what you wish for!
Some of the negativity comes from a misunderstanding about how important football knowledge is to an owner or chairman; frankly it isn't. The owner's love of the club is the important bit and then she hires the right management team. Kruger has been successful elsewhere in sport, but he will take advice from others on the football matters. If he gets the business side running smoothly that will mean more resources for the team. There is just so much to be positive about, I suspect that one manager leaving will seem pretty unimportant in a short while.

 

I loved watching us playing under MP as he got the best out of some of our players, but we should remember we had a good team before who were just beginning to get used to the EPL when Nigel left. I would have been very pleased to keep MP, especially for the inspirational effect he had on our players, but we couldn't win if we fell behind and dropped the most points from being ahead of any other team. This was an exceptional season with a league of 2 halves...I'm expecting next season to be closer in the middle and bottom of the table. We had a fantastic start and they couldn't reel us in...we need to be better defensively next season and stop dropping points. This is an area we can improve...perhaps we need to compromise in one area in order to improve in defence. Diffr'nt manager, diffr'nt strokes.

 

I am excited about what's ahead of us and renewed my season ticket as a sign of solidarity.

We still have quite a weak bench and need to strengthen in some key areas goalie being one area. As long as our top 11 players were playing we did well. We then had a period where many of them were injured and we suffered badly. We went from the 2nd best defence in Europe to an average defence in the space of a month. Also we didn't have the players for a plan B and couldn't unlock teams that parked a bus

We will need to buy to fill in those gaps but also to probably replace the ones that undoubtably will be.

So I am hoping with a new manager the right new manager we can move forward.

 

Thanks to everyone who replied to my thread and thanks for keeping it friendly.

 

Just re reading some of my old threads and posts and this one in particular stood out, apart from the Ramirez thing, this was spot on although still time for Gaston to come back and make it a clean sweep!

 

I was correct about getting an exciting new Manager and adding to the squad....
The less said about the departures the better....

I always had faith in the Board to do the right thing by the club.

 

Crazy to think this only happened 6 months ago! Feels like years ago! Talk about going from one extreme to another.

 

I got called a glory hunter today. Imagine that - the words glory hunter and Saints all in the same sentence.

 

Hee-hee, one of the breed of new Southampton FC fans. You should be proud..!

 

How about that......Saints fans being called glory hunters......that is a new one.....and just about takes the biscuit! We'll be being called potential league winners next......

 

Come to think of it, I think I was considered a bit of a Saints glory hunter back in the early 80s, although there was another word for it then. I think it was idiot.