Dragan Solak interview w/ talkSPORT

[The Cat]

4 hours ago, SotonianWill said:

I believe there was a strong distinction between criticism for the owner, Solak, of which there was none, and Sport Republic, of which there was genuine questions asked. From the top of my head most of these posts were in the form of feeling bad for Solak having spent a lot with these lot in charge.

There's one quote directly referencing him, and others which state "owners" which must include him as that's what he is.

No doubt you are right about some of the posts, but for the others maybe people need to better articulate their thoughts rather than coming out with blanket, kneejerk, hyperbolic statements.

[hypochondriac]

33 minutes ago, The Cat said:

There's one quote directly referencing him, and others which state "owners" which must include him as that's what he is.

No doubt you are right about some of the posts, but for the others maybe people need to better articulate their thoughts rather than coming out with blanket, kneejerk, hyperbolic statements.

To be fair the people in charge absolutely shit the bed last year and were quite rightly complained about in the strongest terms. How they tried to navigate things with our managerial situation, the players we bought in and then how we panicked in January was just totally unacceptable. Fair play to them then that they listened and seemingly sorted things out this year. I wouldn't really blame anyone for expressing frustration this time last year, it was a natural reaction to failure at all levels. 

[east-stand-nic]

We'll try to spend to the maximum we can, but also we try to spend wisely. We'll try to continue developing young players, but also we also learned one thing. You cannot just have young players and focus on only player development. You need the leaders on the pitch.

Glad to here this bit.

[manji]

Greetings comrades 👍🏻 and please stop focussing on the stadium expansion that will be a few years off. Let’s get the team stabilised in the PL. The last week has shown the potential of our fanbase and once the initial Leeds brown nosing died off a lot of goodwill has come our way. 
looks like Adam Lallana will be joining us and a lot of the other links seem credible and sensible. 

[Miltonaggro]

21 hours ago, sfc4prem said:

I think that putting a roof on the Chapel end fanzone as per the artist's impression would be a serious error - you wouldn't be able to hear Saints brass, smell the delicious food on offer or take in the vista of the collapsed warehouse (though to be honest that's now got Dragan's dabs all over it).

[miserableoldgit]

22 hours ago, The Cat said:

Plenty of recent comments on the Sports Republic thread stating things like "fucking terrible owners", "worst owners in a generation", "I wonder what Dragan's next inevitable fuck up will be, probably extend Martin's contract", "woeful owners", "fucking pathetic owners" etc etc.

People making themselves look like bellends when they literally have no clue about running a club.

When has that ever stopped them?

Edited 29 May, 2024 by miserableoldgit

[Saint Scott]

All sounds really promising. Dragan is no mug and has clearly learnt a lot since taking over.

The most important decision he has to make is appointing a new director of football as quickly as possible. Has there been any news on this since Wilcox left?

[The Cat]

4 hours ago, hypochondriac said:

To be fair the people in charge absolutely shit the bed last year and were quite rightly complained about in the strongest terms. How they tried to navigate things with our managerial situation, the players we bought in and then how we panicked in January was just totally unacceptable. Fair play to them then that they listened and seemingly sorted things out this year. I wouldn't really blame anyone for expressing frustration this time last year, it was a natural reaction to failure at all levels. 

Yes, I understand that. 

All the quotes I put were from within the last 2 months when we had, at worse, a nailed on play off spot.

[hypochondriac]

1 hour ago, The Cat said:

Yes, I understand that. 

All the quotes I put were from within the last 2 months when we had, at worse, a nailed on play off spot.

Yes I think that's a bit silly really but then we've all posted things after a bad loss that were knee jerk and that we probably regret with hindsight. Had we lost at Wembley I'd wager there'd be at least some validity to the argument that we had essentially failed. Glad to say I didn't slag off the board after the summer because to be honest the team did better than I expected even if we hadn't gone up. 

[SaintsLoyal]

2 hours ago, Saint Scott said:

All sounds really promising. Dragan is no mug and has clearly learnt a lot since taking over.

The most important decision he has to make is appointing a new director of football as quickly as possible. Has there been any news on this since Wilcox left?

The only news in past months is that Darren Mowbray and Mark Bitcon where involved and that a new DOF may or may not get appointed, if we got promoted.

Edited 29 May, 2024 by SaintsLoyal

[S-Clarke]

Nice to hear from him, he seems a decent bloke and someone pretty trustworthy to me. Forget the stuff Rasmus has cocked up, I think Dragon has been fairly consistent in his approach and has funded a hell of a lot of his own fortune into us. He openly admitted to not knowing a great deal about football, so all he can do is provide the funds and hope others make the right calls. 

Regarding the stadium plans - it will be way down the line of the 10 year plan he speaks about, maybe one of the last things in that plan. This isn't something that's happening today, tomorrow or next year - we're talking years away and lots of established time in the PL to back that up. With clubs like ourselves we are only ever a single bad window away from relegation again, so we have to be careful - priority for the next good few years has to be squad building.

[Harry_SFC]

"Dragan, welcome back to the Premier League! 

DS: Thank you so much. It is so good. I told the guys from Championship, I really enjoyed the season.

I think it's a great competition. I love the competition. I had so much fun. But obviously, I'm so happy we are back to Premier League.

But I really love the Championship as well. I think it's a bunch of unbelievable clubs and it's always a great weekend."

Well that explains it all, the owner loves the Championship so much he's ordered Russ to relegate us as quickly as possible! 

 

Edited 10 December, 2024 by Harry_SFC

[OttawaSaint]

26 minutes ago, Harry_SFC said:

"Dragan, welcome back to the Premier League! 

DS: Thank you so much. It is so good. I told the guys from Championship, I really enjoyed the season.

I think it's a great competition. I love the competition. I had so much fun. But obviously, I'm so happy we are back to Premier League.

But I really love the Championship as well. I think it's a bunch of unbelievable clubs and it's always a great weekend."

Well that explains it all, the owner loves the Championship so much he's ordered Russ to relegate us as quickly as possible! 

 

Reads like Donald Trump. 

[Dark Munster]

Reads like someone with lots of money who knows the square root of f*ck all about football.

[spyinthesky]

Championship it is then with the hope we can keep positive, get regular doubles against our friends down the road, and hope to one day to get promotion to the top tier and COMPETE!!

[die Mannyschaft]

Any expansion would rely on fans being Able to walk to the ground. I can't see fans from Eastleigh or Winchester diving in as the traffic congestion would be back to thier front door. The trains are jam packed. On the plus side more beer sold and burgers. The Northam bridge needs expanding, by the time I get to train station the away fans are already there.

If the club don't buy any new players then £32m is a bargain 

[pingpong]

I actually agree with him, the championship is a much better league, properly competitive.  Last season was better than this one. Next season will be better than this one.

The best we will ever get in the Premier League is a 6th-10th place finish, which would be boring as anything.

[Toussaint]

There is a huge assumption we will storm the championship. What if it doesn’t pan out that way, what if we don’t dominate Pompey. What if the squad gets ripped apart. What if Russell stays but this time every team has worked out how to nullify us? To me the risk is too great. We should at the very least give it everything to attempt to stay up. New manager, couple of good January signings…. Anything is possible until it’s not. 

[Wade Garrett]

12 hours ago, pingpong said:

I actually agree with him, the championship is a much better league, properly competitive.  Last season was better than this one. Next season will be better than this one.

The best we will ever get in the Premier League is a 6th-10th place finish, which would be boring as anything.

Yes, Brighton, Brentford and Fulham fans are bored out of their heads.

I long for games against Plymouth, Preston and Stoke.

[Gloucester Saint]

12 hours ago, pingpong said:

I actually agree with him, the championship is a much better league, properly competitive.  Last season was better than this one. Next season will be better than this one.

The best we will ever get in the Premier League is a 6th-10th place finish, which would be boring as anything.

Because finishing 6th and 7th, back to back to wins at Old Trafford, 8-0 against Sunderland, 6-1 v Villa, 4-2 Liverpool and Man City, under Ronald, that was so boring wasn’t it, leading to playing in the boring San Siro?

And it’s so interesting this slow, error-ridden, constantly losing and not competing style under Russell Martin. 

[Miltonaggro]

14 hours ago, Harry_SFC said:

"Dragan, welcome back to the Premier League! 

DS: Thank you so much. It is so good. I told the guys from Championship, I really enjoyed the season.

I think it's a great competition. I love the competition. I had so much fun. But obviously, I'm so happy we are back to Premier League.

But I really love the Championship as well. I think it's a bunch of unbelievable clubs and it's always a great weekend."

Well that explains it all, the owner loves the Championship so much he's ordered Russ to relegate us as quickly as possible! 

 

So there we have it, the fucking hat trick:

[Lee On Solent Saint]

17 hours ago, pingpong said:

I actually agree with him, the championship is a much better league, properly competitive.  Last season was better than this one. Next season will be better than this one.

The best we will ever get in the Premier League is a 6th-10th place finish, which would be boring as anything.

This must be a wind up?

[Tom57]

I guess the question is, how fun is it being a Bristol City, Preston NE, Millwall or Stoke fan? Because if we're spending almost all of our time in the Championship and rarely if ever playing in the Premier League, that's what it'd be like.

[Turkish]

Just now, Tom57 said:

I guess the question is, how fun is it being a Bristol City, Preston NE, Millwall or Stoke fan? Because if we're spending almost all of our time in the Championship and rarely if ever playing in the Premier League, that's what it'd be like.

A lot of fun i'd imagine. Proper football clubs followed by local fans who have built up friendships over decades. 

[sadoldgit]

2 hours ago, Lee On Solent Saint said:

This must be a wind up?

Why? The EPL is a waste of time unless you are owned by people with more money than sense. Even then there is no guarantee that you can be competitive. It is full of overpaid prima-donnas and VAR. I wouldn’t have a problem with staying in the Championship. It is much more like Division 1 when I started following football back in 1965/66.

[Sunglasses Ron]

I think we probably all want the same thing...

For all the big clubs to bugger off to their European 'Super League' and for us to be challenging around the top of the new Division 1 (which I think would be a perfectly reasonable expectation).

[Gloucester Saint]

7 hours ago, sadoldgit said:

Why? The EPL is a waste of time unless you are owned by people with more money than sense. Even then there is no guarantee that you can be competitive. It is full of overpaid prima-donnas and VAR. I wouldn’t have a problem with staying in the Championship. It is much more like Division 1 when I started following football back in 1965/66.

It wasn’t under Adkins, Pochettino or Koeman when we were being run properly. Or under WGS. It is shit when SFC board decides that it knows better than anyone else - Lowe, Reed although Ankerson through SR is entering a ‘demolish it Dave’ league of his own for incompetence. 

Edited 11 December, 2024 by Gloucester Saint