Dusic

Maybe we missed our window of opportunity with Rohl. You don't often get a second chance if you are where we are in the food chain. Hopefully with Spors in place we can at least be decisive, whatever that ends up being. But please, not Wagner.

Russell Martin is by far the best appointment SR have made so far and achieved the goal he was given in his full season in charge. At the time I said the mid table stuff was stupid because any job has to be viewed in context and he joined Swansea when their parachute payments ran out and showed he could coach them (and us) to play the way he wanted - something the likes of Jones and Juric both totally failed to do here. As much as he made mistakes this season our recruitment massively failed him and we were all on a hiding to nothing really. As you say, Rohl has done a good job in difficult circumstances and would seem a good option that majority of fans would get behind in part due to his history/hype here. In our situation I think fan and player buy-in are the keys. Martin got both spot on last summer and whoever joins will need to do the same. This is the most important aspect as we will have better players than most clubs anyway - it was clear Martin wouldn't be mid table again and neither would Rohl. Personally not a fan of Cooper, find him extremely dull and think we a more personable man to try to motivate the whole club again. I hope Spors is able to get who he wants, whether that costs £5m in compo or is free.

Check complete - no. Please wait for 'Best Saints Marcelo?' thread.

Candidates include, but are not limited to: Wright, Forbes, Draper, Paul, Dennis, Whitlock, Bitcoin, Hughes, Walters, Fry Note: Markus deemed ineligible

Appreciate slightly early but any plans for the 16th anniversary celebration? Perhaps Duncan could reveal his paperwork alongside a kit launch?

Doing very well at Crawley of late. Some nice goals.

A shame that Sport Republic can't clone Rasmus Ankersen. The team he is Chairman of has gone from strength to strength whilst the two overseen by the now departed Kraft have suffered.

LB Stephen Crainey?

I have a "Best Saints Dirk" thread scheduled for November 2027 so hold that thought!

Don't think any clubs interested will be too bothered about his current form in a shambolic team. He has already shown his ability. In fact, it probably suits them as can try to lower the fee.

Moran, Wood, Davis, Williams, De Ridder, Wigley, Basham, Caulker, Grant all viable candidates but who gets your vote? #steve

Dipepa has done really well since joining from (I think) Port Vale where he was in first team squad. Looks physically strong as well, a bit different from many of our academy forwards of recent years. Think he has a chance.

Not as good a finisher though as David Connolly - what a player he was when fit. On the other side you have Jonno Quick. Just terrible.

Of recent times Shano and Brett Ormerod stand out. Looked for one purple patch like SL had cracked out but lets face it, you were more suprised when he scored than missed. Expert at winning cheap free kicks though Both combined well with more accomplished players which was basically their job. Other shouts?

Another hattrick for Oyekunle today - one to watch. On pro deal til 2026.

Promotion winner so fair shout amd especially compared to the replacement!

Personally would be high pressure, aggressively positioned full backs, wide players who run towards the penalty area, with a deep lying defensive midfielder similar to during the Pochettino era. Proactive, high energy out of possession - the best template IMO to catch cold teams who have better individual players. Formation not important, but always a back four.

Understood and agree to an extent - just feel that largely the managers that have done well at Saints - e.g Strachan, Adkins, Koeman, Hasenhuttl - have been strong personalities able to build a rapport with fans quickly to bring a bit of calm authority in their various ways and a personal opinion is that given the magnitude of the fuck up this season and type of character required to reunite the club (again) I'm not convinced that Cooper is that guy. Can't think of any of our "dull and uninspiring" managers who have done a good job tbh.

Not with fans by and large though. And certainly handled the summer period very well. With players also.

I'm certainly not disputing Cooper's achievement with Forest but personally find him so dull and uninspiring. One thing Russell Martin did well was galvanise a club that had just been relegated and in part that was due to personality, media handling etc. We will definitely need that from whoever takes over (and its one thing Juric has massively failed on). Personally don't see Cooper as that type.

Not sure that is fair. Shields and Wilcox both did enough in a short time to be poached by the big boys and Goldie seems to be doing ok with the Academy after a poor period previously. Their off field appointments have generally been fairly decent I would say and not their fault that those guys were approached by Chelsea and Man Utd!

He showed enough last night that one vs one he is still the best we have. Cleaely at times he has been disruptive but in the absence of being able to sell him it does seem a bit odd that he wasnt tried before now in a team that has conceded lots of goals for ages. Hopefully he plays til end of the season and we might be able to get some cash for him.

We seem to be so bad at selecting L1/2 loans for our better academy players. Both of Ballard's loans this season have seen the manager fired just a few weeks after he joined and he looks set for a 2nd season in a row of barely playing unfortunately. Shame for him as he definitely has something but in danger of just being good in age group football...

No issue with flexibility but you certainly need some overarching principles. Both Iraola and Frank play slightly different shapes but regardless the type of players they need are the same despite that. Same with Pep who often switches between 3 and 4 CBs but the overall style remains. We have shifted from pressing to long ball to men behind the ball to extreme possession to man-to man...no wonder the squad is a bit of a mess. We need to stick with something for longer than 6 months and back it up with 3 or 4 windows in a row of decent recruitment, get better at managing contracts, selling assets rather than losing them for free and somehow get fans engaged again (I like many are as unbothered as I have ever been about games now). Over to Spors. Massive job on his hands.

Its actually more of an issue that a.) Our recruitment track record the last 6 or 7 years is poor, and b.) we keep changing the "systems" and therefore have players who are not suited to what the current manager wants, e.g having no left footed CB for a manager who exclusively plays with 3 CBs. Recruitment is at the core of the reason we have been so poor the last two PL seasons and the 5 permanent managers we have had in that time have all wanted different things. Recipe for disaster.