Mistakes that have cost us

[Whitey Grandad]

Only two mistakes:

 

1. Hiring this clown

2. Not firing this clown when it was obvious that he was a clown.

[doddisalegend]

For me it all started when rumours came out that the board/saints where taking the club in a different direction, if I rememer correctly Guan eluded to this at the time, subsequently we then hired Puel.

 

My interpretation (I could be totally wrong I know) is that after Koeman they decided to hire a lower profile manager with less demands, a manager who was more compliant with the southampton way rather than building up his own profile via success.

 

I believe that the summer Koeman left and Puel arrived was also the time that the news of the Chinese take over first broke. It seems to me that the prolonged take over and the desire for the new owner to maintain the status quo has to a degree rather than push on has caused the change in the clubs direction.

[Kingsbridge Saint]

Playing for a 0-0 draw at home to Hapoel. Textbook Puel. If we'd got out of that group he would have kept his job and we would have stability now instead of this goon and chaos.

[Dalek2003]

Falling out with Lawrie Mac

Sacking Chris Nicholl too early

Sacking Branfoot too late

Failing to replace Shearer

Failing to value Matt Le Tissier

Staying at The Dell too long

The reverse take over

The PLC years of neglect

The focus on radio stations and catering

The return of Lowe

The yacht slipping anchor

The death of Liebherr

The inertia whilst the club was up for sale

The lack of investment in the academy cosches

The change in football style with out the right change in players

 

Basically it all stems from not bring invited into Division Two when it was formed if we had been we would have got up to the top flight earlier and we would now be a footballing powerhouse. The best club in the South ignored by the northern ****s and left playing catch up ever since.

 

Actually you are right.

[Dr. Kucho]

Another mistake is our recruitment of players, the board seem to go the ‘West Ham way’ of buying players. All we seem to do is hunt for bargains on the continent and hope they turn out allright. Would like to see us look for raw talent in the lower leagues that suit the way we play (my preferred option would be 4-3-3).

[cambsaint]

Self-delusion of fans who think we can keep or attract the very top class talent

Hindsight is always 20/20 and totally pointless.

The only way to rationally analyse this decision is to think what you would have done in the same situation at the same time.

Most of our problems were inevitable, and don't forget the power of agents in players moving on, they all want their £5million or however much they can get from persuading a player to move to a richer club.

There are therefore only really two or three questions to ask yourself.

Would you have sacked Puel?

Who would you have replaced him with (who would have come)?

Would you have gone all out for a striker of proven quality?

Would you have sacked Pellegrino at year end and who would you have replaced him with?

Simple isn't it.

My answers for what they are worth are:

I would have given Puel another year, despite fan pressure.

I would have tried everything for the very best striker.

I wouldn't waste time trying to keep unhappy players.

As for sacking Pellegrino at year end- yes but only if I could have lined up a better successor.

 

I still hope and think we will stay up, many have forgotten that most of the nineties were just like this, but I do think that with Stephens still learning his craft and a new goalie, we should play all three centre backs when fit, and use a 3421 pattern of play. We definitely have the players to stay up, how many of our closest opponents players do you envy, very few except a couple of strikers and goalies I think.

[OldNick]

Falling out with Lawrie Mac

Sacking Chris Nicholl too early

Sacking Branfoot too late

Failing to replace Shearer

Failing to value Matt Le Tissier

Staying at The Dell too long

The reverse take over

The PLC years of neglect

The focus on radio stations and catering

The return of Lowe

The yacht slipping anchor

The death of Liebherr

The inertia whilst the club was up for sale

The lack of investment in the academy cosches

The change in football style with out the right change in players

 

Basically it all stems from not bring invited into Division Two when it was formed if we had been we would have got up to the top flight earlier and we would now be a footballing powerhouse. The best club in the South ignored by the northern ****s and left playing catch up ever since.

i thought the radio station was a good idea. Transmitting Saints propaganda over the south’s airwaves.

did you know that when Pompey were in the PL when they were flying they were going to do the same. That would have been galling.

in principle it was a valid idea

[Ultimatt]

The biggest mistake was changing the focus from on-field performance to the value of the squads players.

 

We stopped recruiting in-form players like Mane/VVD/Tadic/Pelle who were at high market value and instead went for out of form/out of favour players who were at low market value. All or most (depends who you ask) of these players have struggled to cement a spot in the team and continued to spend a lot of time benched.

 

We stopped moving players on that weren't good enough and instead gave long term contracts to every single player bar Davis (34 when his contract ends) and Gardos (injury plagued). Rewarding players for mediocrity and massively bloating the squad based on the false assumption that it'll significantly increase their market value (it relies on clubs being interested and that's just not the case for most of the players).

 

It was a clear change in strategy summer 2016 that also saw a greater focus on improving sponsorship/our profile overseas etc. The club totally lost sight of what really matters; on field performance; and began making every decision based on $$$, including cheap replacements in every area of the club.

 

https://www.saintsweb.co.uk/showthread.php?58613-Great-strategy-at-the-wrong-time

[Saint Garrett]

I find it hard to believe Cortese leaving made any difference to Pochettino going. As soon as he knew Spurs wanted him he was likely to want to leave, it is hard to see why he'd view Saints with Cortese as preferable to Spurs.

 

Backing Koeman with what? Saints reportedly him £86k per week wages, which is a very large figure in world football for a manager. Everton just offered more and huge amounts in the transfer market that Saints don't have available, the line had to be drawn somewhere.

 

Supposedly he was willing to stay, but on the basis we didn't sell our best players, we did, he left...and who could blame him.

[doddisalegend]

Supposedly he was willing to stay, but on the basis we didn't sell our best players, we did, he left...and who could blame him.

 

 

Yeah it is any easy thing for him to say after the event I still think it was an easy excuse for him. We will never know for sure but had NC stayed and spurs had come calling for poch I still think he would have gone not many people are going turn down spurs when they are at Southampton.

[ally_uk]

Don't blame managers for leaving clearly they saw the club had no ambition...