Martin Samuel p*sses in our pool again.....

[Minty]

Already posted it in the other Samuel thread...

[Saint86]

"attacks" is a bit of a strong word. He's responding to criticism he's been sent.

 

You could spin it the other way and say he was openly "attacked" with no option for defence until he wrote this.

 

I don't like the guy but to say he's attacking our fans is extreme.

 

Hardly, the man is guilty as charged, but uses quotes out of context from our supporters, before responding with selective quotes of his own which dodge the question... It is utter manipulation to shame saints fans when in truth Martin Samuel has spent all summer milking the club and rejoicing in destabilising it from a media position. Disgrace.

[hypochondriac]

I think Martin Samuel is right. FFP is a pain and if we continue the same tactic as last summer then eventually we will go down. I don't think we will though.

[ant]

Samuel's clearly misinformed and full of opinions that he can't substantiate, but isn't it a little precious to get wound up by this?

 

I can see the logic in trying to answer criticisms, and let's be frank - if anything he just makes himself look even more dopey. 'Enough rope' and all that.

[Junior Mullet]

I dont think it's that bad.

[brmbrm]

Jeez.

 

Most days I wipe my arse but I do not spend time looking at the $h!tty bog paper.

 

Equally I do not spend time looking at the ****ty Mail paper either.

 

Don't read it: its $h!t and you know it is.....

[Fitzhugh Fella]

I think having read the whole article top to bottom he makes some quite sane observations.

[alpine_saint]

Yes, I think in fairness he's done a good job of rebutting the attacks on him.

 

All he says is true about what he wrote, but there is stil a tangible undercurrent of dismissal in his writing...

[Bwanamakubwa]

We were news when we were producing the England "elite" (who barely made an appearance in the World Cup. And we were news when we were selling our players left, right and centre. These types of journalists are looking for the extremes to write about and we went from complete stability to the other extreme in a very short amount of time. We have stablised again, at least for now.

 

The main point about being the "Class of '92" is a remarkable and highly improbable occurrence in my opinion. You really cant emphasize how different financially things were back then. The players who have left wanted one or two of the following : a) Champions League Football b) more money than we could afford. They wanted this over being a vital part in a first team. This is washed over. Maybe if we could offer one, the players would have stayed.

The headlines in the article I struggle to argue with though:

 

Southampton have a history of selling their best players - agreed we have a long list, caveat being most teams do (Ronaldo from United, Suarez from Liverpool, Fabregas from Arsenal)

 

Ronald Koeman is doing a fantastic job after the summer exodus - correct

 

Southampton could have propelled themselves into the higher echelons of English football as Man United did two decades ago - Samuel spells decades "deceades". Speculative, we have as much chance as before in my opinion

 

Instead Financial Fair Play has left them vulnerable to likes of Liverpool - Liverpool who are being investigated under the FFP rules. Add Madrid, United, Barca, City, Bayern, Chelsea to the list we are "vulnerable" to

 

Southampton are currently second in the Barclays Premier League - FACT!

 

New signings Graziano Pelle and Dusan Tadic have started well - Agreed

 

Southampton can't afford to sell more players in bulk next summer - Agreed, we probably couldnt get away with it again though I would hope calmness would remain this time

 

Nathaniel Clyne, James Ward-Prowse, Jay Rodriguez and Morgan Schneiderlin will interest other clubs - Hope so, means they are all performing

[Colinjb]

I don't think anyone disagrees with the notion that such upheaval is unlikely to be a good thing a second time... but the fact that Samuel overlooked the fact that the departures were primarily down to our chairman and manager leaving, having both contributed to the progress and expectations of the players who left.

His whole original article was based around the board thinking that it might be a good idea to do similar next year purely from a financial point of view when, whilst we did well financially, and Cortese may have put us in a position where it was needed, it was almost certainly a one-off. He didn't even touch on this.

 

Quite.

 

The very premise of Martin Samuel's article is entirely flawed and redundant because he doesn't touch on that. His shallow observations are based on truth but do not touch on the larger upheaval in the club at the time.

 

Board and managerial continuity next summer will (I hope) ensure that this off season will never be repeated.

[Wopper]

What choice does the board have when players refuse a new contract and act like c**ts.

[KingdomCome]

Not much wrong with what he is saying to be honest. He's picked the easy comments to pick apart. Very odd for a journalist to respond to comments, must have hit a nerve I imagine.

 

However, what he fails to address is the fact his original piece was warning about the perils of selling the heart of a team each year for a nice big profit and hoping for anything other than a quick jaunt down the tables. The fact that he decided to write this, whilst he might argue it was in support of Saints fans necessarily implies that it is the board's intention to do so. I find it difficult to understand how that can be taken as anything other than a slight on the board.

[shurlock]

I don’t think Southampton fans thought the replacements for those players would be so much better. That would be mindlessly optimistic. Maybe you always knew Southampton would grow stronger without five key members of Mauricio Pochettino’s team, in which case move over Derren Brown, there’s a new kid in town.

 

[KingdomCome]

"A bit of advice for you son, don't shoot yourself in the foot"

"But, I wasn't going to"

"Well just remember, son, it's a bad idea"

"I wasn't go..."

"Just heed this advice son, I'm only looking out for you"

 

2 years later

"See son, aren't you glad you didn't shoot yourself in the foot?"

"Whatever, dad"

"No need to thank me, son"

[Solid Saint]

"A bit of advice for you son, don't shoot yourself in the foot"

"But, I wasn't going to"

"Well just remember, son, it's a bad idea"

"I wasn't go..."

"Just heed this advice son, I'm only looking out for you"

 

2 years later

"See son, aren't you glad you didn't shoot yourself in the foot?"

"Whatever, dad"

"No need to thank me, son"

 

 

[doddisalegend]

I think Martin Samuel is right. FFP is a pain and if we continue the same tactic as last summer then eventually we will go down. I don't think we will though.

 

That implies the club wanted the manager to leave and to sell so many players this summer. There was no tactics from the club they would have happily kept the players and manager but they had their hand forced. I really do not believe the club plans to go through the same ordeal every summer.

[Guided Missile]

Some of the more enlightened football fans amongst us foresaw the current scenario back in June, here.

 

We led the league in possession last season, but failed to break into the top four. As the Dutch showed against the Spanish and Atletico Madrid against Barca, possession is no longer everything. The new way is quick counter attacking into space, from midfield. The rapier like football the Dutch have played in this WC has changed the landscape. For attacking at pace you need the players and let's face it, without J Rod we just didn't have the personnel to play this way. We were pretty to watch but frustrating at times and were quickly found out by, for instance, Spurs. We were just not going to ever challenge for the top 4 with the squad we had.

 

I'm hoping that the rebuilding on youth and imports that Ronald knows can play the way he likes, will shake up the whole league. He had to change the squad to fit the way football is going. I can't wait....

[Saint Pete]

Not much wrong with what he is saying to be honest. He's picked the easy comments to pick apart. Very odd for a journalist to respond to comments, must have hit a nerve I imagine.

 

However, what he fails to address is the fact his original piece was warning about the perils of selling the heart of a team each year for a nice big profit and hoping for anything other than a quick jaunt down the tables. The fact that he decided to write this, whilst he might argue it was in support of Saints fans necessarily implies that it is the board's intention to do so. I find it difficult to understand how that can be taken as anything other than a slight on the board.

 

I agree with you that it won't be the board's intention to sell the heart of the team again, but it's fair to say that if things continue to go as well as they are on the pitch at present, it's inevitable that the board will face a lot of the same pressures that we had in the summer again. If the players that we have brought in plus Morgan, Clyne, Rodriguez, etc, perform well and we finish high in the table again, they WILL be targeted again by clubs who can pay them more, and we will be faced with the same hard choices about whether to sell if they express a wish to go.

 

For me, Samuel's original article was pretty fair in giving credit for the job done in replacing the players that have left, while warning against anyone thinking it will be easy to repeat the trick again - can't really argue with that. What he doesn't recognise enough though is the difficulty our board face in keeping our quality players happy when they know they can earn way more elsewhere. It can be done as evidenced by the Schneiderlin episode, but is much harder when 5/6/7 of your first team are attracting bids from bigger clubs. I think the only thing the board could do better next time is giving a more consistent, clearer line to the players on where they stand (i.e. if certain players are judged too key to be allowed to leave, they should be told this clearly at start of window and that's it, end of discussion).

 

The reason Samuel is getting so much negative reaction from Saints fans is not so much about what he is saying now, but more about the constant stream of critical and negative articles about Saints produced by the Mail throughout the summer.

[Kingsbridge Saint]

Samuel is a bitter big club loving acolyte. Complete non story of an article with overtones of bitterness and spite. Probably a closet scouse. ***t.

[Wes Tender]

Samuels is a bit of a dinosaur; the type with a lot of bulk and a small brain comparative to its size. To back up his arguments, he uses historic examples from an entirely different era. We should be like the Class of 92 at United if it were not for FFP he says, unable to see that there might just be the same reasons that United managed to keep those brilliant players together as exist today, because they are Manchester United. Even if we had this same crop of players as a club then, we would not have been able to keep them away from the top clubs, any more than we could keep Shearer or the Wallace brothers, or indeed Le Tiss, had he wanted to leave. He cites other examples from a byegone age in a vain attempt to bolster his arguments. Having had the situation at Leeds with Jonathon Woodgate challenged, he then digs up Damien Duff at Blackburn and Michael Carrick at West Ham. What exactly is the relevance to us and our situation? Are our circumstances even remotely similar to theirs at that time?

 

What he fails to do, is to recognise the current situation in English football, that it is a rarity for a club to try and keep a player at a club if that player is determined to leave and he needs to acknowledge that if the player's wishes are usurped, then subsequently that player might be a liability in terms of their attitude. All very well citing Everton as the example of how we should go about our business, developing players internally to replace the one or two who depart, but that doesn't recognise that there were 5 or 6 players here at the same time who were coveted by several of the top clubs. That is a fairly unique position and yet he doesn't accept that it would have been impossible to have kept all of them and that in any event, there comes a point where the money offered is just too good to turn down. The higher the sum received, the more chance that there is of finding a suitable replacement, something that we have just proven.

 

But ultimately, the thing that rankles is his assumption that the board might actually consider doing this exercise again and again, even though the situation was forced on them by circumstances beyond their control. As those circumstances were partly orchestrated by the likes of Samuels in the media, it is a bit rich to have the old charlatan sounding off about how the board ought to handle matters in the future. Not that they as astute businessmen are likely to pay too much attention to the ramblings of some washed-up Fleet Street hack, thank God. Having handled this exceptional set of circumstances with aplomb and come out the other side in a better situation than could have been anticipated, I have faith in their ability to do it again if the situation arises in the future.

[VectisSaint]

Board and managerial continuity next summer will (I hope) ensure that this off season will never be repeated.

Almost exactly the words that Samuel himself said. Basically the whole point of his article.

 

I said before there really was not much wrong with what he had written, just that it was rather poor quality for a so-called football journalist. There is also not much wrong with what he has said in this follow up. The problem is that most people have not grasped his basic point, which was to say to the Board, don't think its this easy and that the model of this summer can be repeated. Sadly the comments from the so-called Saints supporters he has quoted just go to prove that many lack basic knowledge to understand what is going on. But then I guess that not only are the Saints supporters but also Daily Fail readers (since you have to be registered to make these comments). Sometimes we are made to look a bit stupid as a collective by the comments of a few.

[hypochondriac]

That implies the club wanted the manager to leave and to sell so many players this summer. There was no tactics from the club they would have happily kept the players and manager but they had their hand forced. I really do not believe the club plans to go through the same ordeal every summer.

 

Erm I just said I don't think we will do it again.

[ThaiSaint]

An interesting piece from Sarah Winterburn sums it up at http://www.football365.com/f365-says/9485016/here;

 

If Southampton's start has surprised even manager Ronald Koeman, imagine the shock amongst those journalists and pundits gleefully predicting a relegation battle, backed by bookies who were offering odds as short as 7/2 on the Saints' Premier League humiliation. It looked really sodding silly then and now looks utterly ridiculous after a start to the season that has reaped ten points from five games.

 

(Though not quite as ridiculous as Martin Samuel's argument in the Daily Mail that Southampton's excellent start is A Bad Thing as the owners will be convinced that they can sell players willy and indeed nilly without punishment.)

[KingdomCome]

I agree with you that it won't be the board's intention to sell the heart of the team again, but it's fair to say that if things continue to go as well as they are on the pitch at present, it's inevitable that the board will face a lot of the same pressures that we had in the summer again. If the players that we have brought in plus Morgan, Clyne, Rodriguez, etc, perform well and we finish high in the table again, they WILL be targeted again by clubs who can pay them more, and we will be faced with the same hard choices about whether to sell if they express a wish to go.

 

For me, Samuel's original article was pretty fair in giving credit for the job done in replacing the players that have left, while warning against anyone thinking it will be easy to repeat the trick again - can't really argue with that. What he doesn't recognise enough though is the difficulty our board face in keeping our quality players happy when they know they can earn way more elsewhere. It can be done as evidenced by the Schneiderlin episode, but is much harder when 5/6/7 of your first team are attracting bids from bigger clubs. I think the only thing the board could do better next time is giving a more consistent, clearer line to the players on where they stand (i.e. if certain players are judged too key to be allowed to leave, they should be told this clearly at start of window and that's it, end of discussion).

 

The reason Samuel is getting so much negative reaction from Saints fans is not so much about what he is saying now, but more about the constant stream of critical and negative articles about Saints produced by the Mail throughout the summer.

 

From the OP's article:

 

The board need to realise the club are bucking a trend through unique circumstances, and the luck could run out soon, because it always does.

 

If the board thinks it can get away with it year on year, there is an inevitable conclusion.

 

I would say that the tone of the original article is one of warning against internal elective decisions rather than being unable to withstand pressure to sell. He is expressing the opinion that should they choose to sell the heart again it will likely be detrimental. I agree, there's nothing wrong with the statement, I just think it's extremely condescending.

 

I think you're right about the root cause of the reaction.

[Wes Tender]

I think you're right about the root cause of the reaction.

 

Me too. Especially as we have had threads discussing the media feeding frenzy whipped up by the likes of Samuels and Ashton in the Mail. Samuel wishes to cry crocodile tears over accusations that he has an agenda against us. He is only trying to put our case on our behalf as an example of how smaller clubs are the victims of the FFP regulations he claims, and yet he knows damned well that the bulk of his rag's readership are the plastic fans of those very glory clubs who most benefit from them.

[DuncanRG]

I didn't get to the end of that (very long, quite self-indulgent) article but what I did read was bang on every time. Most of the comments from Saints fans were totally inane and Samuel butchered them. The only problem I had with the original article was that it seemed to be stating the obvious, because I can't imagine Liebherr and Krueger would consider building the team from scratch every year. Seems a lot of our fans didn't think it was so clear.

 

I can't stand this idea that journalists favour big clubs or don't like smaller ones upsetting the balance of power. They love it like we all do. They give big clubs more coverage because they have more fans who are interested in reading about them, and because when you're covering a sport it is generally a good idea to give a good showing to the people who are best at it. We're all more interested in Manchester United and Chelsea than we are Stoke City.

Edited 25 September, 2014 by DuncanRG

[pap]

Some of the more enlightened football fans amongst us foresaw the current scenario back in June, here.

 

Respect, GM. Called that.

[Smirking_Saint]

"attacks" is a bit of a strong word. He's responding to criticism he's been sent.

 

You could spin it the other way and say he was openly "attacked" with no option for defence until he wrote this.

 

I don't like the guy but to say he's attacking our fans is extreme.

 

This really, and if you take the time to read it it isnt exactly inflationatory. Neither was the article that is mentioned in the OP either tbh.

 

He has concededwe got away with it this year (so far) and we did, if you genuinely think it could happen everytime then you are sadly mistaken. You dont sell half a team and lose a manager and just dust yourself off like we have done, hence why the bookies and much of the press had us as relegation fodder. Realistically many of us thought we would be ok, I certainly thought we would stumble at first and recover to mid table but what the board and Koeman have achieved is excellent and Im full of praise for them.

 

End of the day Samuals is right. With investment this team (academy willing) could propel itself to a top 6-4 team in a few years, with the right luck and investment. Realistically it wont happen, things like that dont in football these days. He is also right that if we continually adopt this years strategy then we will eventually fail, my main gripe about that is its obvious, and I just dont feel that it will happen.

 

So I do ask myself, yes Samuals can be reactionary in regards Saints, he has in the past, but why the vitriol for his past two articles ?

[Smirking_Saint]

Respect, GM. Called that.

 

Called what ?

[Wes Tender]

This really, and if you take the time to read it it isnt exactly inflationatory.

 

Perhaps he ought to be advising George Osborne. Or did you mean inflammatory?

[Smirking_Saint]

Perhaps he ought to be advising George Osborne. Or did you mean inflammatory?

 

Thats what I meant yes, thats what you get when your trying to listen to the wife in the background

[Lord Duckhunter]

I didn't get to the end of that (very long, quite self-indulgent) article but what I did read was bang on every time. Most of the comments from Saints fans were totally inane and Samuel butchered them. The only problem I had with the original article was that it seemed to be stating the obvious, because I can't imagine Liebherr and Krueger would consider building the team from scratch every year. Seems a lot of our fans didn't think it was so clear.

 

I can't stand this idea that journalists favour big clubs or don't like smaller ones upsetting the balance of power. They love it like we all do. They give big clubs more coverage because they have more fans who are interested in reading about them, and because when you're covering a sport it is generally a good idea to give a good showing to the people who are best at it. We're all more interested in Manchester United and Chelsea than we are Stoke City.

 

Spot on .

 

Some of the comments from our supporters were clearly nonsense. Why do people feel everybody has some sort of agenda is beyond me. We have it with Lawro every time he predicts a loss or a journo writes something negative about us. As Samuels says , why on earth would he have anything against saints. He's just giving his opinion.**** me, we had supporters on here posting much more negative stuff than any journo would ever write. Most neutrals seem pleased we've started so well, even the ones who thought we would struggle appear to be pleasantly surprised.

Edited 26 September, 2014 by Lord Duckhunter

[Redslo]

"A bit of advice for you son, don't shoot yourself in the foot"

"But, I wasn't going to"

"Well just remember, son, it's a bad idea"

"I wasn't go..."

"Just heed this advice son, I'm only looking out for you"

 

2 years later

"See son, aren't you glad you didn't shoot yourself in the foot?"

"Whatever, dad"

"No need to thank me, son"

 

I have posted a blog article about all this entitled “Southampton FC, Martin Samuel, and Financial Fair Play (Part 1)” in which I quoted your post. It got overly long so Financial Fair Play will be addressed in part two.

 

http://redsloscf.blogspot.com/

 

http://redsloscf.blogspot.co.uk/

[KingdomCome]

I have posted a blog article about all this entitled “Southampton FC, Martin Samuel, and Financial Fair Play (Part 1)” in which I quoted your post. It got overly long so Financial Fair Play will be addressed in part two.

 

http://redsloscf.blogspot.com/

 

http://redsloscf.blogspot.co.uk/

 

A good read as usual, glad you liked the analogy.

[Jimmy_D]

The main reason Martin Samuel got such a negative reaction to the initial article was that it came across that Saints' good transfer window and subsequent fantastic start to the season was all down to luck, and that they deserved no credit for it.

[Wes Tender]

The main reason Martin Samuel got such a negative reaction to the initial article was that it came across that Saints' good transfer window and subsequent fantastic start to the season was all down to luck, and that they deserved no credit for it.

 

It was down to luck. We were lucky that Cortese saw something in us and pursuaded multi-billionaire Markus Liebherr to buy us. Then we were lucky to have commenced our journey back to the Premier League, achieving it at almost unprecedented speed, despite dismissing Pardew along the way and replacing him with Adkins, a virtual unknown outside of Scun thorpe and Bangor. Despite him getting us to 15th by halfway through our first season back in the PL, we were again lucky enough to appoint another manager relatively unknown to most of our fans, who was lucky enough to get us up a further place to 14th. In his second season, this new inexperienced manager made quite a name for himself and we were unlucky to lose him to Spurs. Also with additional incredibly bad luck, we lost our former Chairman and the cream of our best players whose reputations had been considerably enhanced during our climb back to the PL. Luckily though, we had appointed a new board who initially looked as if they did not know what they were doing in selling our best players, and our owner appeared to be disinterested in us and was rumoured to be selling off the club and its assets.

 

By an incredible bit of good fortune, the board was able to pursuade Ronald Koeman to join this rudderless, floundering ship and luckily for us, he was able to bring in some players that he knew about who might, if the football Gods smiled on us, be able with luck to prove that they could adapt to playing in the Premier League, in the same way that Koeman would have to adapt to managing here too. Happily, and probably because with half the team having been replaced we were a totally unkown quantity, we were able to get one or two good results against some of the lesser teams of the division, being lucky to have had such a fortuitous early fixture list. Conversely, for some reason that can only be explained by good fortune, we seem to have melded this collection of relative strangers into a well-drilled team and have retained a very good team spirit. How can this have happened to us, when the elite teams like Liverpool and Manchester United have also had several changes to their teams and have failed so far to get them to play well together?

 

But as Samuel rightly points out, our luck will run out sooner rather than later and when those elite teams get their acts together and the other teams in the division realise how to counteract Koeman's plans A/B/C and D, the normal hierarchy of the division will be restored.

Edited 26 September, 2014 by Wes Tender

[Redslo]

It was down to luck. We were lucky that Cortese saw something in us and pursuaded multi-billionaire Markus Liebherr to buy us. Then we were lucky to have commenced our journey back to the Premier League, achieving it at almost unprecedented speed, despite dismissing Pardew along the way and replacing him with Adkins, a virtual unknown outside of Scun thorpe and Bangor. Despite him getting us to 15th by halfway through our first season back in the PL, we were again lucky enough to appoint another manager relatively unknown to most of our fans, who was lucky enough to get us up a further place to 14th. In his second season, this new inexperienced manager made quite a name for himself and we were unlucky to lose him to Spurs. Also with additional incredibly bad luck, we lost our former Chairman and the cream of our best players whose reputations had been considerably enhanced during our climb back to the PL. Luckily though, we had appointed a new board who initially looked as if they did not know what they were doing in selling our best players, and our owner appeared to be disinterested in us and was rumoured to be selling off the club and its assets.

 

By an incredible bit of good fortune, the board was able to pursuade Ronald Koeman to join this rudderless, floundering ship and luckily for us, he was able to bring in some players that he knew about who might, if the football Gods smiled on us, be able with luck to prove that they could adapt to playing in the Premier League, in the same way that Koeman would have to adapt to managing here too. Happily, and probably because with half the team having been replaced we were a totally unkown quantity, we were able to get one or two good results against some of the lesser teams of the division, being lucky to have had such a fortuitous early fixture list. Conversely, for some reason that can only be explained by good fortune, we seem to have melded this collection of relative strangers into a well-drilled team and have retained a very good team spirit. How can this have happened to us, when the elite teams like Liverpool and Manchester United have also had several changes to their teams and have failed so far to get them to play well together?

 

But as Samuel rightly points out, our luck will run out sooner rather than later and when those elite teams get their acts together and the other teams in the division realise how to counteract Koeman's plans A/B/C and D, the normal hierarchy of the division will be restored.

 

The problem with putting this all down to luck is not that you are wrong--you aren't--but that pretty much all of life and certainly all of sports comes down to luck. Man City and Chelsea were lucky rich guys bought them. Man U was lucky to have hired Alex Ferguson. Each and every goal a teams scores is lucky. Each and every shot the team's opponents miss is lucky. Signing players who work out is lucky.

 

There has to be some credit given to talent and competence. We, as fans, may be lucky that the Liebherrs came along and that, right now anyway, Katharina doesn't want to sell the club, but her choice of who should run her club and their choice of who should manage the team and what players to sign should be viewed as a manifestation of their skills, for better or worse, and not just luck, either good or bad.

[CanadaSaint]

The problem with putting this all down to luck is not that you are wrong--you aren't--but that pretty much all of life and certainly all of sports comes down to luck. Man City and Chelsea were lucky rich guys bought them. Man U was lucky to have hired Alex Ferguson. Each and every goal a teams scores is lucky. Each and every shot the team's opponents miss is lucky. Signing players who work out is lucky.

 

There has to be some credit given to talent and competence. We, as fans, may be lucky that the Liebherrs came along and that, right now anyway, Katharina doesn't want to sell the club, but her choice of who should run her club and their choice of who should manage the team and what players to sign should be viewed as a manifestation of their skills, for better or worse, and not just luck, either good or bad.

 

Indeed. And sometimes the best perspective comes from people who aren't as close to the club as us:

 

http://www.fansnetwork.co.uk/football/queensparkrangers/news/36364/

[Whitey Grandad]

Indeed. And sometimes the best perspective comes from people who aren't as close to the club as us:

 

http://www.fansnetwork.co.uk/football/queensparkrangers/news/36364/

 

Thanks, very interesting. It's nice to have a balanced view from outside.

[Deano6]

Indeed. And sometimes the best perspective comes from people who aren't as close to the club as us:

 

http://www.fansnetwork.co.uk/football/queensparkrangers/news/36364/

 

Good article, tho the one bit I'd take umbrage with is:

 

"[Pochettino] allowed the final few months of the season to drift by with five defeats and two draws from the final 13 games when Southampton could easily have qualified for the Europa league."

 

Even notwithstanding these stats are cherrypicked to best support the point (what's special about 13 games, other than the 14th last game was a win?), this statement says, in other words, that we won 6 of our final 13, drawing 2. That's not a bad record at all - indeed I remember being pleasantly surprised by our end to the season, especially with how the previous one petered out.

 

It's also disingenuous to imply that with a bit more effort we could have qualified for Europe (via the league; cup is an entirely different debate)...despite being 8th, we were still a long way off Man U in 7th in the end (was it 10 points?), who themselves didn't even qualify for Europe.

[Redslo]

I would also dispute the "He rode roughshod over the club's history, inflicting a series of disgusting home shirts of his own design onto the place" remark. NC was in charge while the design was chosen for 2010-11, 2011-12, 2012-13, and 2013-14. The first was a commemorative design that could hardly be called disgusting. The second was the regular stripes that every likes so much. Maybe they were bad stripes, but hardly disgusting. The third were the pinstripes. I liked them but for the sake of argument, assume they were both designed by NC and disgusting. The last one was a cookie cutter design by the kit manufacturer. Possibly that was disgusting, but it was not designed by NC. In other words, the part of the quote about the shirts was was nonsense. The roughshod over history is probably accurate.

[CB Fry]

I would also dispute the "He rode roughshod over the club's history, inflicting a series of disgusting home shirts of his own design onto the place" remark. NC was in charge while the design was chosen for 2010-11, 2011-12, 2012-13, and 2013-14. The first was a commemorative design that could hardly be called disgusting. The second was the regular stripes that every likes so much. Maybe they were bad stripes, but hardly disgusting. The third were the pinstripes. I liked them but for the sake of argument, assume they were both designed by NC and disgusting. The last one was a cookie cutter design by the kit manufacturer. Possibly that was disgusting, but it was not designed by NC. In other words, the part of the quote about the shirts was was nonsense. The roughshod over history is probably accurate.

That article clearly not referencing the centenary kit, calm down. Obviously a reference to the all red abortions Cortese foisted on us in the Premier League.

 

Still, the experts on the forum said we had to make a choice between "precious stripes" and success on the pitch because apparently the two were linked, not least because of the "scientific proof" that plain was better, and of course the millions and millions of fans in "the far east" who became instant Saints fans when we started to wear plain red. Them experts knew what they were talking about, and no mistake.

[supersonic]

Having read the original article, I don't actually see what Samuel has done wrong. His points make complete sense.

 

Yet another example of the attitude that some of our narrow-minded fans who label anyone who doesn't kiss the clubs arse as a "moron". Pretty sad really

[angelman]

Deano, interesting. I felt the end of the season was a huge anti climax. It wasn't helped by JRod's injury leaving us a little toothless. Opinions opinions.

[Miffy]

Indeed. And sometimes the best perspective comes from people who aren't as close to the club as us:

 

http://www.fansnetwork.co.uk/football/queensparkrangers/news/36364/

 

Thanks for the link, I like this guys writing.

 

In another article 'High Flying Saints latest Hurdle...', there was a real laugh out loud section about Redknapps pre-match press conference.

 

"this week something interesting happened. Somebody actually asked a question. A proper question. In the “presser”. Yeh, I know, I couldn’t believe it either. Where were you when JFK was shot? Where were you when somebody actually asked a proper question of Harry Redknapp in the pre-match press conference? Scenes.

 

The question went something like this: “Harry, given that Swansea City went to Manchester United and won, and MK Dons beat Manchester United 4-0, and Sunderland and Burnley both got a draw against Manchester United, and Leicester (promoted along with QPR during the summer) beat Manchester United five (5) three last weekend, do you regret going to Old Trafford, sitting back, trying to soak up pressure, attempting to get a 0-0, playing to their strengths, and getting done 4-0 before describing it as a ‘bonus game’?”

 

Well you could cut the atmosphere with a butter knife. Redknapp, who’d only just finished talking about how much time he’s got for European Ryder Cup captain Paul McGinley, seemed a bit stunned, and muttered some bits and pieces about hindsight being a wonderful thing. "

[Wes Tender]

The problem with putting this all down to luck is not that you are wrong--you aren't--but that pretty much all of life and certainly all of sports comes down to luck. Man City and Chelsea were lucky rich guys bought them. Man U was lucky to have hired Alex Ferguson. Each and every goal a teams scores is lucky. Each and every shot the team's opponents miss is lucky. Signing players who work out is lucky.

 

There has to be some credit given to talent and competence. We, as fans, may be lucky that the Liebherrs came along and that, right now anyway, Katharina doesn't want to sell the club, but her choice of who should run her club and their choice of who should manage the team and what players to sign should be viewed as a manifestation of their skills, for better or worse, and not just luck, either good or bad.

 

Red, my response was laden with heavy sarcasm in response to the idiot Samuel's assertion that we had relied a lot on luck to arrive at the situation whereby we replaced all those players arguably with better ones.

 

Of course I agree with you that credit must go to Katharina and the board for their choice of Koeman as manager, and the way that things subsequently panned out owes far more to good judgement than luck.

 

The use of withering sarcasm as a weapon of ridicule is very much an English thing, and is labelled the lowest form of wit by those who are the target of it. Coincidentally, Samuel is the lowest form of journalist.

[SaintRobbie]

To be fair - I read this this morning, and I can't argue with it too much. He has a fair point.

 

It's a warning, especially the bit about the Boardroom thinking they now know everything about football and the warning they may get over confident. Our Boardroom have got lucky... They got Koeman. Our success is down to Koeman, I can't see us being in 2nd place and beating Arsenal with anyone else.

 

But, the piece is still fundamentally negative and Martin Samuel does look foolish.

Edited 27 September, 2014 by SaintRobbie

[Redslo]

That article clearly not referencing the centenary kit, calm down. Obviously a reference to the all red abortions Cortese foisted on us in the Premier League.

 

Still, the experts on the forum said we had to make a choice between "precious stripes" and success on the pitch because apparently the two were linked, not least because of the "scientific proof" that plain was better, and of course the millions and millions of fans in "the far east" who became instant Saints fans when we started to wear plain red. Them experts knew what they were talking about, and no mistake.

 

To be fair, I bought two pinstripe kits for the (then) five year old daughters of my two paralegals. I would not have bought stripes for them because I know they would not have worn them.

 

Also, part of my point is that NC could not have designed more than one (the pinstripes) of the disliked outfits.

[Redslo]

Red, my response was laden with heavy sarcasm in response to the idiot Samuel's assertion that we had relied a lot on luck to arrive at the situation whereby we replaced all those players arguably with better ones.

 

Of course I agree with you that credit must go to Katharina and the board for their choice of Koeman as manager, and the way that things subsequently panned out owes far more to good judgement than luck.

 

The use of withering sarcasm as a weapon of ridicule is very much an English thing, and is labelled the lowest form of wit by those who are the target of it. Coincidentally, Samuel is the lowest form of journalist.

 

I apologize for missing the sarcasm. This is the first time that has happened to me. I will make sure it never happens again.

 

Also, I should have looked at the name of the poster. That would have clued me in.

[Redslo]

I have just posted a new article entitled “Southampton FC, Martin Samuel, and Financial Fair Play (Part 2)” in which I begin my analysis of Samuel’s claim that Financial Fair Play imposes a “glass ceiling” on Southampton’s progress. Alas, the article got too long so I have decided to post part of it now and finish and post the rest in a few days. On the good side, I finally figured out how to make the £ sign on my American computer.

 

http://redsloscf.blogspot.com/

 

http://redsloscf.blogspot.co.uk/