GreenTreeFrog

Jeff Stelling was a guest on Christian O’Connell’s breakfast show on Absolute Radio about 5 weeks ago. Christian is a big saints fan. He spoke to Jeff Stelling about ‘Countdown’ and ‘Sky Sports News’ and tried to get him to agree that Matt le Tissier was the best guest on the Sky panel but Stelling diplomatically said they were all excellent in different ways – MLT mainly for his sardonic humour. Jeff Stelling said he was saddened to see saints struggling at the foot of the Championship as he considered the club his second team and always takes a special interest in saints fortunes. One of O’Connell’s co-presenters set a few conundrums (because of the countdown connection) to test both Jeff and Christian. The answers were all names of football clubs, I don’t remember the first two but neither guessed the team in the 30 seconds given. Then the final conundrum was ‘Tampon Shout’ and I thought it was far too obvious but neither managed to guess it correctly, O’Connell guessed ‘Portsmouth’ at the last second. When they were told it was actually ‘Southampton,’ O’Connell was embarrased but said he only failed to guess it correctly as he does not associate his club with women’s sanitary products. Not sure what the Portsmouth fans made of his comments there!

I wholeheartedly agree with you. There are a whole raft of reasons why we have failed over the past 4 years, and of course that includes some poor decisions made along the way. But one win instead of a draw and we would not have been relegated. A few less injuries/suspensions and it's unlikely we would have been relegated. A bit of ‘luck’ and we would have got past Derby and back to the premiership. I would agree that Crouch was probably the best of a bad bunch, but mainly because he had a very short time to mess things up. I think we shouldn't look to past personalities for the hope of survival but need a brand new start. Only if we have no choice would it be wise to welcome back Wilde or Crouch, and I hope Lowe would not even dream about returning.

Fair enough, but again, I never suggested it was the most ‘heinous crime’ did I? If you got that from what I wrote I suggest you read it again. I even said in my first post that I do not have a problem with Crouch, I just wanted to bring some balance into what appeared to be developing into a bit of a love in. Also, you are doing what Darren W (above) has done and attempted to make this about Lowe and our current situation; my comments were not looking to find who is most to blame for what we see now. My post was purely about how Crouch managed the really important issues during his short time in charge. The ‘change of mind’ Crouch demonstrated over those two weeks was not over minor things but represented a 180 degree turnaround on his own judgement. I think we need a total change and not rely on past personalities. If Crouch offered our only (or best) chance of recovery then I would welcome him back, that’s not being a hypocrite, it’s all about perspective. I would not want Lowe to come back under any circumstances as its clear it would lead only to further resentment.

Your sarcastic (and misguided) comments demonstrate exactly what is wrong with this forum. Can you point to a single comment I have made that praises Lowe? I would be amazed if you could – it was only aimed at Crouch’s (mis)management of the situation after Burley left. The reason I posted my comments was that this thread (and some others) were turning into a bit of a love fest for Crouch and many appear to have forgotten he was not exactly inspiring or decisive last time. Can you honestly say he managed that period well and is a man whose word can be trusted? There is no point in going into detail again, but the fact is he made sweeping comments and changed his mind from week to week. That is the issue I am judging him on here – nothing to do with comparing him to Lowe or saying who was ‘most to blame’ for our current situation. I believe our problems over the past 4 years are far too complicated to suggest it is all due to (Wilde/Crouch/Lowe) so have tried to avoid such discussions if I can.

With respect I am well aware of those earlier quotes (6/7th Feb) but they don’t actually change anything I have said. To be absolutely clear I don't dispute that D&G were only employed as caretaker managers initially or that we were supposed to be taking our time to make the right appointment. But the announcement Crouch/Hoos made on the 11th Feb was supposed to end all the ‘uncertainty and speculation’ and allow the team to focus on the surge for the play offs. So there is no debate to be had on that issue – I fully agree with you. However, those earlier quotes cannot cancel out the later ones where Crouch and Hoos claimed D&G had been very impressive and had ‘earned the right’ to continue ‘for the foreseeable future.’ Under Crouch we went from 'not rushing an appointment' one week, to announcing D&G had been very impressive and earned the right to stay (for foreseeable future), to dismissing them a week later only to appoint a full time manager the following day. That is the significant point here. I would imagine even the many people that ultimately believe D&G were a disaster and Pearson a hero would see that is very poor leadership.

Technically you are correct; I don’t believe they were ever actually told their positions were secured to end of season. However, surely you will agree that after heaping such praise on them, and claiming specific improvements were immediately apparent, the comment they would be here ‘for the foreseeable future’ was likely to mean more than a week? Crouch said he was delighted D&G had ‘agreed to stay in charge of the team’ and they had ‘earned that right.’ That does not sound like they were actively looking elsewhere at that moment. Lee Hoos made this comment at the same time: "Hopefully this will now end the speculation and uncertainly and enable is to focus fully in reaching at least the last eight of the FA Cup and mounting a strong challenge for the play-offs." “We still have serious ambitions to make the play-offs and we believe John and Jason can provide the spark to get us there with the kind of run we had at the tail-end of last season." Those are pretty unambiguous statements (how could D&G get us to the play offs if it was never intended they would stay the rest of the season?) and even if it was not specifically stated, it is clear both Crouch and Hoos envisaged D&G would be there for the rest of the season. If not then how can their words ever be taken seriously, brilliant one week, dismissed the next. I would think, even if we agree appointing D&G was a mistake in the first place, the handling of events at that time was not Crouch’s finest hour. http://devel.dailyecho.co.uk/display.var.2027239.0.0.php?act=complaint&cid=1121679

No doubt Leon Crouch has put a lot into the club and is as genuine and passionate as you say. But as for ‘getting it right first time’ you need to read the comments made by him about the D&G appointment. It’s true they were initially temporary appointments but that changed after 3 games in charge when Crouch made them permanent for the season. Here is what he said at the time (this was after the home loss to QPR, the third of D&Gs 4 league games in charge). "We are delighted John and Jason have agreed to stay in charge of the team. They have done a terrific job so far and I know this will be a popular move with the whole squad. "There has been a marked change in determination which is now the best it has been since the surge to the play-offs at the end of last season while performances have been far more positive." "They are experienced, they know the game inside out and they are positive and enthusiastic - and that has clearly rubbed off on the players who are showing more passion". Those are ringing endorsements justifying his decision to appoint them for the rest of the season. He did not ‘find and appoint’ Pearson either, at least not in the sense of a reasoned and careful search; the 'sacking' of D&G was a knee jerk reaction to the cup loss on a Saturday and they were gone by the Sunday. Pearson said he was amazed at the speed of his appointment, first contact Sunday night and appointed virtually on the spot. As far as we know it was Lawrie McMenemy’s agent son that organised it. When he appointed Pearson, Crouch now had this to say about D&G (a week after the praise above). "It was clear that the uncertainty of the management situation was having a detrimental effect on the players and so we have decided to bring in a new man," I believe [Pearson] is the right man to steady the ship and get us moving up the table once more". So he completely changed his mind in a week and what 'uncertainty' was causing the problem? If there was any uncertainty it can only have been over his comment that D&G would be in charge 'for the rest of the season.' It was his decision either way. I think it’s also important to realise he believed Pearson was the right appointment TO MOVE US UP THE TABLE. Judged on those words he [Crouch] failed. I wonder if that was behind the strong rumour that Crouch was set to replace Pearson at the end of the season. I want to make it clear I have nothing at all against Crouch; I just don’t agree he is blameless or infallible. He did make some poor decisions during his time in charge.

Trousers, I have just checked a couple of examples of how relegation/promotion affects attendances and it does not look good. How did relegation affect Leicester City’s average home attendances? In the Championship last season the average home crowd was 23,509; this season they have topped L1 virtually all season yet the home attendance is down to 18,639 – only 79% of what it was and despite going from a struggling team to the best team in the division by far. The next example I thought would be useful is Nottingham Forest – how did their promotion affect their home crowds? Home attendance figures for last year averaged 19,956 and this year it is 21,662 – so an increase of around 1700 despite the drastic drop in actually winning matches. It does seem you are better off struggling in the championship rather than being a successful club in League One. So I think your hope of our crowds actually increasing as a successful L1 team is wishful thinking (though I do believe we would do well in L1). As to whether we would be better off financially that is harder to say as that is more about the quality of player you need and the cheaper cost and wages of surviving/competing in a lower division and that is all rather vague. Nottingham Forest have many young players and yet were clearly one of the best teams in L1 last year; yet those same players are now struggling and Billy Davies says he has far too many ‘babies’ in his team and needs more experience. Similarly some posters on here have applauded Pearson for playing many of his young players in L1 - but I would like to see if he continues that policy in the Championship next season. I think there is a danger of setting up a team that is suited to L1 and not to the greater pressures of the Championship. I know Swansea have shown it can be done but they did benefit from a storming start with 5 wins in their first 6 games, recent results are far less impressive with only one win in the last 6 games and 7 wins in their last 24 games (as a comparison saints have won 5 games of the last 24. Life sucks, get used to it!

Is that rhyming slang or a euphemism? Anyway be careful, I hear it can make you go blind.

But Pearson was not removed to ‘cut costs’ at least not in the simplistic sense you mean (managers wages). The comparison of manager’s wages is way overblown on here and was not mentioned as a main factor in the Lowe/Wilde decision. If you go back to the unveiling conference you will hear Lowe say that, with success bonuses, JP/Woote would be on more money than Pearson was on. I think it is fairly obvious that Lowe was not a great fan of Pearson, and to be fair Pearson’s record was not so good that he made himself indispensable once Lowe took over the reins. Regardless of that I expect Lowe would have dispensed with Pearson even if the finances had not been quite so tight. It's fairly obvious that Lowe is hardly going to claim the only reason we had to let Pearson go was becasue we could not afford him, then follow that up with the comment we would actually be paying more to the Dutch pair, if they achieved the success bonuses built in to their contract. The main reason they gave at the time (for appointing JP/Wotte) was that they were already used to working in the new ‘continental structure’ that saints were now going to adopt ‘partly for financial reasons.’ Um Pahars, and others, have argued that Pearson could have fitted into that structure very well, and have quote mined in an attempt to prove this point. It would be hard to argue that Pearson definitely would not have fitted in, but both Lowe and Wilde said the Dutch pair's year's of experience working in such set ups was the big factor in appointing them rather than sticking with Pearson. They even said he and 'any other traditonal British manager' would be hampered by such a scheme. Maybe they were totally wrong in that assumption, but the point is the decision was based on saving money overall (or rather ‘losing less money’) by adopting a new continental scheme, and was never about saving money on managers wages as is often claimed on here.

Burley was a good managerial choice that did not work out for us; Strachan was a poor choice [sacked by Coventry, unwanted by many saints fans including me] yet turned out to be excellent for us. It happens all the time in football and virutally all managers have success and failure unless they stay well within the comfort zone of low expectation. For example, Billy Davies was very successful for championship Derby as he got them promoted within the first year when the board had agreed it would take 3 years to acheive that aim. If Davies had not been so successful and taken the 3 years of steady progress he would likely still be at Derby, still be a hero, and still have his reputation intact. So you can be sacked for being too successful as well as failing. We all hope Wotte is the right man for saints so why spend so much energy on trying to destroy his reputation or blame him for something he did not have full control over.

Did JFP actually ‘imply’ Woote had no input whatsoever in first team affairs? I don’t think he did. You develop this fabrication further and ‘for balance’ suggest there could only be two possible options which basically give us the choice of between ‘it’s virtually all Woote’s fault anyway’ or ‘he had nowt to do with it so must have been just standing by and watching as we went down the pan.’ Can you point me to the ‘balance’ in your post as neither of the above are really options as both conveniently work to make him look bad? Woote was not the manager and any concerns or advice he had about systems or players roles could easily have been ignored or only partially endorsed. Maybe Jan listened and respected his views but ultimately disagreed – the reality is quite likely to be far more complicated than the simple ‘black and white’ options we dream up on this forum. But certainly once Jan left Woote would have had far more flexibility in expressing his ideas directly to the players. It’s quite possible Woote is better at man management so is better equipped to first hand deal with the players on a more personal basis than Jan could. Maybe he is better at developing structure in the team and defining the exact roles of each player. It’s clear the recent addition of Saejis and Saga have helped enormously but that is another issue altogether. We can speculate all day long but Woote's role now is far more than just a name change so such musings are rather pointless. It’s what he is doing now that matters and both results and performances are speaking for themselves. Long may it continue that way.

OK, thanks Pancake and Gemmel (above) for that. I will check it out later.

When I say 'unabridged' what I mean was that printed on the OS (and shown on sky sports news). Both were quite detailed but the news media reports were quite limited. I assume the OS does not keep news archives longer than a few months, at least they dont seem to show up on google or yahoo.

Not to defend Lowe but the claims that he said we brought the Dutch pair in as we could not afford Pearson’s wages are not true. At the unveiling conference Lowe said JP and Woote would be on less BASIC WAGE than Pearson was on, but if success bonuses were paid they would be ON HIGHER WAGES than he had been on. He said it was only right success was rewarded in this way. The only problem is, as I said in the main post, I cannot trace the ‘unabridged version’ of the unveiling, where those comments are clearly stated. Only the edited (reported) versions with shorter comments by Michael Wilde are easily found and no comments on managers wages are reported there. I admit the recent transcript of the AGM adds a lot of confusion though. According to those reports Lowe claimed he did offer Pearson the job but it was turned down as Pearson wanted to keep the high wages he had been paid under Crouch (the comment was an attack on Crouch’s financial handling of club finances). IF that were true it could still fit in with the original comments (that the Dutch were on a higher wage if successful) if Pearson was unwilling to take the same bonus scheme offered to JP and Woote. .