In the aftermath & just looking back on last summer’s PL recruitment. THB & Downes purchases - arguable whether a success or not but I understand. Now the rest! Wood, Edwards, Taylor, BBD, Fraser, Cornet, Ugochukwu, Fernandes, Lallana, Sugawara, Welington, Ramsdale. Apart from the obvious 2 & maybe big Les (loan) that’s a pretty appalling list & no wonder we failed so miserably. (did I miss anyone?)
Archer. A lot of those payers were cheap/free/loans, so whatever. It's the 20m transfers that go wrong, that are most concerning. Fernandes - good, money well spent Downes - good but badly managed Ramsdale - good but money should have been spent elsewhere THB - struggled but has potential Archer - showed signs but disappointing Those five were our big signings. And that's the list that needs scrutinising. For me, the Ramsdale money should have gone on another DM. Relying on Downes and an inexperienced teenager (Ugo) was absolute suicide. It's on RM. He was the one who thought we would be okay with one DM.
Well recruitment was done by committee, so it’s probably on them Hopefully now it will only be football people involved, mainly Spors
Article from The Athletic this morning: Inside Southampton’s relegation: ‘Slow-motion car crash’, Solak frustration and what comes next - The Athletic This section is particularly damning: The Athletic has spoken to multiple sources, all on the condition of anonymity to protect relationships, to chart the ins and outs of their 2024-25 season — and one thing has become clear: relegation was a foregone conclusion before a ball had even been kicked. “It was like a slow-motion car crash this summer,” explained a first-team source. “That’s the only way to describe it. It’s knowing something (relegation) is going to happen but you can’t do anything about it.” Before a ball had been kicked, conversations had taken place at a senior level in relation to using the season to develop some of the younger players — Dibling and Fernandes, for example — and turn them into assets, knowing relegation was almost a foregone conclusion.
I didn’t watch Martin’s MNF appearance a few weeks back but a mate of mine was talking to me about it. He said that Martin came across well and he felt sorry for him by the end, apparently Martin said (or alluded to) that he had been told/promised before the season started that he would keep his job regardless and this season was almost like a learning experience for him in the PL. The club fully acknowledged that it was very likely we would come straight back down, but he was the right man to eventually get it right. Essentially this season was a bit of a free hit for him to get some experience managing in the PL and he would bring us back up and that’s when he would be judged. Would tie in with how long it took to sack him, few of us on here said at the start of the season we would get relegated and keep Martin. I said he would only go if we were in danger of breaking Derbys record (which we obviously are), but if my mates summary of the MNF interview is accurate, combined with that Atheltic article then it does seem that we went into this season with the free hit attitude and using it as a way to prepare players/management for next time. Compare that with someone like Forest who went all in on survival and spent a fortune etc and it’s very different approaches. Could be that because Forest had been out of the top flight for so long they didn’t want to give it up, assuming it’s very hard to come back. Where as we came back first attempt so the board believe we can do it again quickly. Don’t disagree with the belief that you are very likely to come down, so have to prepare for that with your spending/expectations but keeping Martin for so long meant we have gone down pathetically. Ipswich and Leicester are going down pathetically in the grand scheme of things and we’ve made them look like they are miles ahead of us
The article said that the club were desperate not to sack him but it got too toxic in the ground and Solak snapped at the Chelsea home game with the "just ****ing clear it" comment.
I only read the snippet you put on here, but yeah that seemed obvious. They were praying that he managed to grind out a few results so we could keep him for the season. Somebody at the club really rated him. My feeling is that Wilcox did, and because there was no other football person brought in they just thought “well Jase liked him so we need to stick with him”
In amongst the hit piece, it is interesting (and worrying, and annoying) that they seem to think Ankersen is still involved in decision making, as he was in the meeting to discuss what to do with Juric.
Just stuck £10 on Cooper at 18/1. I think the club will go all out for Rohl, but if he gest offers from the Bundesliga I doubt he will come to us. Rosenior probably wont drop down to us and Cooper seems like a great option - plus he would be free in terms of compensation.
Yeah, possibly - I'd rather he wasn't involved at all, to be honest; I do have that nagging doubt in the back of my mind that he is more involved than what we're led to believe.
Can't argue with most of that apart from Downes mis-managed. Do you mean Russell being too close or Juric standing his ground
I meant that he shouldn't have been relied upon so heavily as it was essentially his first season of Prem football. He should have been given another experienced, hard-tackling DM to play alongside. Instead he had Aribo, Smallbone, Ugo and Lallana. None of them were good enough/ready. Downes has looked pretty awful because of this imo. Next to someone like JWP or Romeu he would comfortably be Prem quality. But yeah, both of your reasons are valid too, particularly what happened with Juric.
