After yesterday's result dragged us into a potential relegation battle I reflected upon how two years ago we had a great team full of talented players. We had some excellent English players and talented kids who had progressed through our Academy. Not long before that we had a highly ambitious CEO who was clear about what he wanted and had the drive to achieve it. Now we have lost all of those great players, we have one pretty average ex academy player in JWP, a team of half fit misfits and our two half decent players want away. Our manager is pissed of with it all and all of the hopes and optimism have gone. So who stole that dream that we were all encouraged to believe in. Was it those other football clubs? Was it greedy players? Was it poor management? So who has stolen my dream or was I a fool to dream in the first place. The reasons people miss out on their dreams are usually: They have been discouraged from dreaming. They are hindered by past disappointments and hurts. They have settled for being average. They lack the confidence needed to pursue their dreams. There you have it. That just about sums up little old mediocre Southampton. We were all fools to dare to dream in the first place.
Godders get a grip.its a poor run but that's all it is. We should have won both our last two games and looking on the bright side that means I get bigger odds on us winning the FA cup!
Depending what you mean by "the dream" I think it may have died with Markus Liebherr. We just didn't realise at the time.
Come and support Atheltic Bilbao Godders. They are a team full of local talent and have one outstanding prospect in Inaki Williams. Given their philosophy, they always have to produce talent from Pais Vasco, and they compete well. Moreover, Bilbao is a city that has apparently reinvented itself to possibly make it one of the cities that must be visited in 2016. Just make a visit coincide with a match there.
Not sure what you mean by this??????? Yes we have so much to thank ML for but since he sadly passed away the club have got better and better and up to now improved each and every season. Kat could have done many things since she took over and actually I am quite surprised and content with her role within the club. We are an established premier league team and another 4 wins and we will be safe this year. It's so annoying losing our best players but you know what Southampton bounces back. I don't know about dreams but have belief.
Godders, sometimes I think you are Cortese in disguise, coming back to haunt our dreams with your spleen and bile. I would ask you once again, which I seem to do every couple of weeks, how much of his own money did Cortese invest in the club? And who had to bail the club out with her own money when the punitive loans Cortese took out threatened the financial stability which her father had provided? Just remember how lucky we still are to have a club at all. Yes, Cortese was part of that rescue package but he nearly blew it with his unsustainable dreams. Yes, we are still undercapitalised compared to most Premier League clubs but we are growing, albeit too slowly for most fans who want everything now. Hopefully Ronald will be given some money to invest in a new striker in the next few weeks, or we will start playing again like we did against Arsenal. A couple of wins, perhaps a cup run, and this will all begin to fade like a bad dream.
Well, I'm assuming "the dream" is Champions League, possibly with that additional target of 50% of the first team coming from the academy. Now, I've long believed that the full aim was very unlikely to be achieved (and used to say so on here years back). Champions League was certainly doable - virtually any English team could get to the Champions League if you spent enough money - but the 50% academy players target never seemed likely to me. Not to consistently have that many players in the team anyway. So for me it was all about money, because that's what football is all about these days. Going back in time a bit, I think everything that happened up to early 2013 was pretty much as Markus Liebherr and Cortese planned. However, that summer you could start to see the issues developing - rumours that Cortese was considering his position because of differences with the owners, Pochettino going public to say he would leave if Cortese did. Cortese clearly wanted more money to spend and if Markus had still been around I think there's a greater chance Cortese would have been able to convince him to pump more money into the club than there was of him convincing Katharina to do that. Basically, without large amounts of money being pumped into the club I don't see how "The Southampton Way" can lead to the Champions League and I think Markus would have been more likely to inject that money than his daughter is. We could perhaps be a top 8 club, maybe top 6 occasionally but not regular Champions League qualification. Most likely is that we end up a mid-table side for a while. Almost as likely is that we eventually follow the path Fulham have already taken (8th in 2011, relegated in 2014) and Villa are about to take (6th in 2010, almost certainly relegated this year).
I like your post and as I mentioned on another thread I think we are at a crossroads and decisions taken this month are likely to shape our future. As fans we all have dreams of winning trophies, finishing high up in the league. I just disagree that dreams died with Marcus. We were in league 1 at that point in time and the club have made huge progress and shown ambition since then and we achieved our highest ever premier league position after Cortese left. We have hit a blip but we have all the foundations to get things right again. As for 50% home grown talent, that is a difficult one and whilst I too would like to see this we have had to buy in experience. With all the players that have left (not clubs fault) and the mass of money received from these transfers if this had not been spent on new players and the academy players played, the good old assest stripping comments would never go away. I would have liked to see more opportunities given though.
You could always try living in the real world. It might be a bit more uncomfortable than living in a dream world, and failure might be as much a part of reality as success, but it's the place where anything of real value is actually achieved. Of course, you'll need a backbone.
To be frank I'm in the very lucky generation of fans that have seen Saints win two trophies in Wembley finals [I went to both too] and there is no other generation of fans in the club's history that can say that. Unless you are very old or a ghost possibly no one alive has seen us win a Divisional title of any sort, so to expect an 130 year old club with this history to suddenly start winning things and finishing in the top four of a league where it is acknowledged that to do so is nearly impossible for most clubs is being a bit naive. I just don't see Saints as any sorts of trophy winning club, that is why I never get excited about the FA Cup and League Cup and I've seen them win one and get to the final of another!
I hear what you are saying sheps but clubs like us can get on a good cup run and give fans hope. I think we all need a little perspective. I live in Kent and unlike the usual plastics, many of my mates support Gillingham, the only league club in kent. I am pleased for my mates, they follow the club everywhere in a very northern league 1 this year and they are doing well. Their 'dreams' are avoiding relegation to league 2 and then maybe making playoffs for the championship. Southampton, the very same Southampton who apparently are doing so badly this season are 13th in the premier league. We are the 13th best club in the whole of England. Out of all the 92 football league clubs and the hundreds of other non league clubs there are only 12 teams better than us. Some people think we have an automatic right to beat west ham and norwich away from home but that's not the case, this year more than ever it's a very tough league. So being 13th in the best league in the world, knowing we have the potential to do much better, I am not worried and still have faith in the club to keep our 'dreams' alive. Before we cry ourselves to sleep about how let down we have been spare a thought to the hundreds of thousands of fans that have far less to dream about. COYR
Same here me old mucker, I live in Swindon [although I come from Hampshire, Lockerley to be precise] and a lot of people I worked with supported Swindon through thick and thin and fair play to them. I have never thought we had an automatic right to beat any team in the division, after all many Saints fans go on about 'disrespect' from the top sides and they do exactly the same to sides that they think are inferior. For instance West Ham United are good side if people can't stomach that, then too bad. No, what sticks in my craw is the nature of the defeat, not the defeat. To constantly make the same mistakes over and over again, constantly get loads and loads of chances and score maybe one starts to get a bit wearing. When we used to lose regularly in the past, especially away from home, to be honest, we were often absolute crap. This is frustrating beyond belief and it seems to be the same thing week in, week out, also the guff about us being the model club in the way we sign players, our academy and finances, well, just being kind it's hyperbole at its best. But since 1969 'til now, it's just getting a bit 'tired' and this season is just 'familiar' and starting to get dull. I know this will upset some people and they'll think I should go and follow Barcelona but I'm just being brutally honest.
I agree with some of what you say. Dream may not be the best word to use in this discussion because we can all dream of anything we want, no matter how unrealistic, so of course the dreaming doesn't have to stop. I'm also less concerned by the home-grown players thing than I am by success on the pitch. With significant investment though I think the top 4 ambition could happen (or the dream can come true if we're continuing to talk about a dream). I suspect that the dream/ambition of doing it under the current ownership died with Markus though. I'm just not sure what the club is intending to do now that's so special or superior to what was done by all the other clubs that have tried to succeed? The club's commercial income can (and I'm sure will) be improved, yes, but does anyone expect us to announce some monstrous, game-changing sponsorship deal in the summer? The new deal should be bigger and we'll probably bring in a few extra million per year but that's not much more than a drop in the ocean of modern football finance. We hear all this talk but without a significant injection of money why should Southampton be able to break into the top 4 when clubs with much more illustrious histories and/or larger grounds and fanbases (the likes of Newcastle, Villa and Everton) can't do it? Our superior recruitment of players? Well for all the talk of the black box and all the research we apparently do on player background we've still signed Juanmi, who seems to be a bit of a dud, brought in Mane with his apparently questionable attitude and we still have a player like Martina in the squad that we supposedly signed largely because Erwin knows him and he was cheap. Having seen your posts since the one I quoted, your point is just that we should be happy with what we have. Change the dream in other words. Well, while that's an admirable point of view in life generally, I'm afraid that the idea of following a consistently 8th-14th place club just isn't that interesting to me. I already find the Premier League pretty uninteresting and rarely watch any games that don't involve Southampton. Without some prospect of the club moving higher than it is now I can see myself losing interest altogether.
