Fitzhugh Fella

The Championship ended a fortnight ago and starts before the PL so our close season is going to be particularly short this summer.

Not sure your 9/10 stat is accurate. Route One still achieves success especially in the final minutes. I think it best to mix and match rather than rigidly stick to a style of play that can be tedious and unproductive.

Not sure it’s bed wetting just a desire to make a third bad managerial appointment in 12 months. Surely that’s understandable? I take your point re who else is there but it is a bit depressing that the best we can get is a man who basically has nothing tangible on his CV other than beating Cardiff twice and the world’s longest goal to score.

This ^ if it takes you 56 passes to get a shot on goal then I would argue something is wrong.

That MK Dons 56 pass video has finished me off but good for insomniacs.

Giving people chances is a lovely philosophy as we slowly sink down the leagues.

I want to be positive - I really do - but this playing out from the back malarkey might suit Barca and M City, but for clubs with mediocre footballers it’s suicidal. If this is Martin’s chosen style then it will end in tears and things are going to get a lot worse. Swansea fans comments have been illuminating. They don’t seem that bothered about losing him and that tells me loads. He seems like a nice bright bloke but not sure he’s the man to resurrect us.

Think you said that when we appointed Mad Nat?

I must admit I’m not a fan of watching defenders tip tapping the ball around their own half just for the sake of being in possession.

Ha I doubt it although Sam liked Tony and they got on well. Blackburn are also looking to sell apparently as there is no money there. Sams got a year left on his contract and Blackburn can then extend by a season. Baby due in the summer so not sure the upheaval would be well timed.

Mowbray is a really nice, honest bloke who was very popular with the Blackburn players. Whether or not he would be a good fit for us is another matter of course. I think Carrick is more SR’s sort of guy but he’s got a good Chairman at Boro and can’t see us tempting him away. Has done an excellent job as they were 21st when he took over.

John Arlott wrote a great report of the comeback at the Dell.

Only Terry and John still alive from that team

The serious rot had set in with Ralph, not helped with his announcement that he was going to walk away in 2024 anyway. All the Ralph cultists need to understand he started this demise. The players hated him and that in itself is enough to doom you.

The trouble with the likes of Viera is with success they would be looking at moving upwards but I guess that's football. His record at Palace with some good players at his disposal is also a nagging worry. Look how quickly Roy Hodgson turned things round. Viera had obviously lost the players. But beggars can't be choosers so like I said previously, we are going to have to accept some flaws whoever comes.

So page 19 and not really any one standout candidate or even one there is any consensus between us all. The ideal fit doesn’t exist. Everyone has a drawback of some sort. Sooner or later we will have to face a compromise then. Be it a gamble on a Plymouth/Swansea up and coming? A Spanish hipster? A failed Prem mgr (Viera/Rogers/Marsch)? Throw money at Potter? Go for a name Gerrard/Rooney? A left-field appointment no one’s heard off? If none of the above float your boat then that’s an indication of the size of the problem we now face and after yesterdays botched robotic club statement my faith in Sports Direct is even more diminished. My point is then good available managers are in very short supply so we are going to have to accept our next messiah will arrive with quite a percentage of the fan base having negative thoughts. Not a comforting thought as we try and steady the listing and rudderless ship.

Saints oldest living player, Johnny Flood aged 90, passed away yesterday - a sad day in the club's history in more ways than one. Southampton born, New Forest bred and coming from a large footballing family, I met John many times, he was a lovely chap and he would proudly show me his immaculately preserved scrapbooks. He was very proud to have payed for the Saints and to be remembered by the fans. Sadly you can't say that much these days. In a way it is a passing of an era because John was signed by Saints manager Bill Dodgin in the late 40s, a heady time to be a Saints fan. My condolences to his wife and family. https://www.saintsplayers.co.uk/player/john-flood/

Written by a robot with no empathy or understanding how fans are actually feeling tonight. But there again that is to be expected. A club with no soul, no understanding, no plan, no heart and no culpability. Bereft of any responsibility to the mess they created. One word would have sufficed. SORRY.

The last manager we got from Plymouth went down a bomb I seem to remember.

Bollocks. What relegated us was not sacking Ralph earlier and then appointing someone decent. Had we done that Ralph would have been no more than a fading memory to all but one or two of his cultists clutching their pearls and his faded photograph to their hearts.

Glad you think it funny

100s of Saints fans still believing escape is possible on Twitter and that if we come out fighting blah blah blah. What these fans don’t realise is this bunch of players and this manager just don’t know how. That’s the simple and horrible truth.

I like the way you have your priorities sorted.

I haven’t got over the 1898 FA Cup semi final defeat in a snowstorm yet.