Southampton Banter Archive January 15 2014

15 Jan 2014 23:42:59
Yes NC did some tremendous work but I for one don't want a tosser is a chairman who throws his toys out the pram every time he doesn't get what he wants (ie more transfer money)
He also wanted a Dictatorship at Saints where he couldn't be challenged. This in the long term is unrealistic and dangerous in any profession or walk of life. KL has every right to insist on there being a voting board and to say no more transfer funds. Saints is so much bigger than just one man and it caught up with him in the end.

Yeah that's right, let's just sell our best assets at the whim of the boatd, i'm sure shaw/lallana/clyne/spidy/ossie/gaston/dejan will all go on to good some great things, oh and lambert off to west ham, also possibly 2nd best academy in the world, yeah he has been brash and elusive but he had his plan and stuck to it for the good of the club and completely turned us around along with 3 good managers, could we compete in epl with, davis, fox, jos, fonte, chambers (he will be gone nxt yr) cork, davis, guly, jwp, jrod, Gallagher. No we would be a topish championship side

He did waste £12m (or however much it actually is?) on both Ramirez and Osvaldo who, let's face it, if played for West Ham, Portsmouth, Chelsea or Manchester United etc we'd say they were (politely) "rubbish". Decent players on their rare day, but definitely not worth those silly prices.

So, it's swings and roundabouts again, really.

10 mins 'til we may know more.

Saint Etienne.

You mean the Ramirez and Osvaldo who will be playing in Brazil for their countries, rather than Pompey? Perhaps there are some other players with the same names.

Just because we haven't seen the best of either yet does not mean that they are not good players. I prefer the half full glass-if both have a lot more to produce for Saints (and I believe they do) we could have the equivalent of two "new" signings already within the squad. MoPo is the guy to draw it out of them.

Remember how everyone was raving about Fellaini and then the price tag he generated going to Utd.? Players can take time to settle and I remain optimistic (but not so about Fellaini!)

Saint Martin

15 Jan 2014 23:06:57
Just another quiet January then, eh.

Shows how much some of the experts on here know.

Cortese has left his "baby".

I have to say "I told you so!"

Now, let's just hope 1) If we sell the club it's to a good owner (hello Dave Whelan!) and not a total person who'll send us back into the bad times (hello Rupert) or ruin everything we've been building and make us a laughing stock (hello Vincent Tan, hello Venky's, hello Dr Allan, all of you, get lost!)
2) If Pochettino also resigns, I hope his replacement continues the great work (started by Pardew, taken to further levels with grand success by Adkins and advanced football methods by Pochettino) and we remain an exciting club and team.
3) The club doesn't lose its ambition, or suddenly fall backwards. It's so easy to spiral down into the wilderness, been there, done that, don't want it again. Ever.
4) We keep hold of our good players and still have designs to sign top quality players to improve our squad
5) Hopefully Katharina Liebherr does the right thing.
6) Thanks Cortese for your great efforts during your time, and, despite being a harsh and somewhat annoying businessman, for having the courtesy to give this beautiful, brilliant football club hope, spirit, ambition, dreams, belief and overseeing the continuation of the youth academy production line, and employing (give or take with Markus Liebherr) not just one, not just two, but THREE brilliant managers. The recruitment of Pardew, Adkins and Pochettino showed a great strength. All three have played their part - Recovering the wreckage and winning the Johnny Paints Trophy (cheers Pards, great days!), leading us to back-to-back promotions, amazingly into the Barclays Premier League (cheers Adkins, mwaaaah, you genius!) and taking us even further up the table, with a very sexy style of football (I'll give Pochettino a big bround of applause for this!)
7) Luke Shaw (or any other talent) do what you like regarding the transfer talk, stay and be a club legend and an icon, our leave for the big club and always be appreciated by the Saints faithful, but remembered as "not as good as Bridgey!"

And finally, I have a hunch that Pochettino deliberately doesn't speak any in press conferences or interviews not because it's his way of being crafty or making sure nothing's misinterpreted, but because he can't. And because he knew he wouldn't need to learn, as he'd inevitably be flying off to Europe (not with Saints on a Champions League mission though, but to work with another club) pretty soon.

Arrivederci, enjoy Milan.

Saint Etienne. (I await the menacing backlash!)

Agree both off to Milan, (which I don't mind as there 'my foreign team' after growing up watching boban, saviecivic, big george ) anyway back on track still seems a little bizarre but you would have thought katerina would have wanted to carry on marcus's vision, one good thing if fulham were worth £150m then we must be £175m-£200m and this were rule out some dodgy investors ie gaydamak/ venkys and people of similar ilk and although this will limit our suitors we could be assured new investors would have massive funds

15 Jan 2014 22:12:38
Saints WILL be bought this year, by Chinese investor (s).

15 Jan 2014 21:07:14
Cortase has official resigned from southampton, this may be the begging of a huge down fall: (

Don't be so quick to leap to conclusions, stay loyal and wait and see.

Saint Phil

No don't think so cllub are in a strong position but ow will be the new chairman

15 Jan 2014 20:26:21
Not happy about NC leaving you lot, was a match made in footballing heaven. Hope everything works out for the best you the saints. Got a real soft spot for you.

Best of luck for the season guys.

15 Jan 2014 19:59:13
Gutted

15 Jan 2014 19:24:29
Confirmed : cortese has left and katherina leibherr has taken on the roll as non-executive chairman until a new chief exec can be found. Now it's a waiting game to see if pochettino leaves as well

Of course he will leave, katrina not interested in football so installs herself as non exec chairman. The club will be sold £100m+ profit for her plus the sale of Shaw

Probably confirms Saints will NOT sell any players this window-it would simply reduce the value of the club.

Do not be so sure, we do not know for sure Katarina does want to sell up or sell the players. She may be interested in her father's legacy. Cortese may actually be the one who wanted out of the club for other reasons. I suspect he is looking to return to banking and make a whole bunch more money.

Sad day for us saints fans. I can't say a bad word about cortese and good luck to him he's turned our club around. we are a massive club with huge potential and ambition and I trust we get the right chairman/ manager comvo if poch goes. we face a battle to keep our top players now. I can undastand osvaldo ramirez leaving but we rly have to fight to kerp the youngsters and lovren lallana lambert. we've been knocked down before so its time to get bk up and rly get behind our boys now! saint forever! saint woots

15 Jan 2014 17:46:57
I can't believe we are here again, I agree with St Stuie he has left us in good shape and we would surely be a really good buy, and be able to attract the right manager?

COYS

15 Jan 2014 15:17:50
Maybe all this is a distraction of us signing a big player and they are using this to keep the media off of it?

I think that is a bit hopeful mate, this kind of media spin will put people off joining.

15 Jan 2014 12:29:20
Cortese resigns.

Ed, I have little knowledge of the running of a club but of its true everything goes through him and comes through him, where will this leave us now? Will we have a plan already in place or a new chairman waiting? Or will this really lead to a downhill spiral as many suggest. Its hard to believe all the good work and success of the club to be undone because of one resignation? I appreciate the difficulty of the topic and understand you may have limited knowledge but any insight or even opinion would be most welcome. Thanks

{Ed001's Note - he has the final say on major decisions, but minor things, such as training routines, food in the canteen etc will carry on as normal. It is in the long term that you feel a change in chairman. They usually set the club's philosophy, they deal with high level staff changes, such as the manager. Negotiations of player transfers are done through Cortese.

Short term it will have little effect, the day to day routine will continue and the players will keep playing etc. The problem is that Cortese will have set long term targets, put plans in motion to achieve them and a new man will have different targets and plans. So there would be disruption, but it wouldn't really be felt immediately and it is difficult to say how it would affect the club.

Southampton have one of the best in the world, maybe even the best, right now, it would be very difficult to see how any change in chairman could be for the better.

Easiest way to think about it is to see the chairman as the manager of the club, in a similar way to MoPo being manager of the team. The right change can lift the club, the wrong change can tear it apart, in the same way that changing a manager can either lift or destroy a team. It just takes longer to see, as the decisions of a chairman are played out over years, while you can see changes a manager makes on the pitch each week.}

Cortese has worked wonders for us, him leaving would surely disrupt our long run goals but we are in a much better position for having had him as Chairman.

The simple fact for us is that he has given us almost world-beating training facilities, improved the youth set up even further with more talent than before coming through, brought in some of the best players we have ever had and he has also done all of this while keeping us financially stable! Any chairman taking over has an awful lot to work with thanks to Cortese and this is why him leaving baffles me so much! He has turned this club into a massive success and frankly Katarina should be aware of the increasing value of the club from a simple business point of view under Cortese's leadership.

But to summarise, I hope this all turns out to be some weird publicity stunt or just amounts to nothing as Cortese is the best thing for our club right now, but he has had such an impact on the club it would be unlikely his departure would be the end of the world for the club.

[Also thanks Ed for the useful and clear explanation :) ]

{Ed001's Note - you are welcome mate.}

Hi Ed001. The problem with regards to Cortese leaving is that he has sold a vision to everyone at the club. Potentially we could well see a mass exodus should Cortese leave. That exodus would include the Pochettino, his first team coaches, along with members of the first team, and several backroom staff.

Also in the case of Cortese he is involved with day to day decisions. He's a control freak, and little is decided without his say so. filling his void would be a huge task.

Cortese stated shortly after Marcus died that if the vision wasn't shared by the Liebher family, he had other investors that would be prepared to invest in Southampton Football Club.

Let us hope that if Kathrin Liebher does indeed wish to sell, that Nicola can pull this off.

{Ed001's Note - like I said, I think Cortese is quite possibly the best football chairman in world football, so I would agree with you. He is almost irreplaceable.}

This whole saga has been absolutely run through the ground by the media that it's impossible to know what exactly the real situation is. Every hour it's changing slightly from Cortese isn't happy, to Cortese might resign, Cortese has resigned, Cortese's resignation hasn't been accepted, back to Cortese hasn't resigned. but the club is being put up for sale. The club ideally should release a statement to calm the wave of media outlets churning out further developments, as they see fit.

15 Jan 2014 10:39:34
saints won't actually buy anyone this transfer window. if they do, it will be a young player who will start in reserves or on a youth contract.
no one will come in to boost the squad

boruc

clyne
lovren
fonte
shaw

wanyama
schniderlain

lallana
j-rod
rameriz

lambert

thats a good team to play with week in week out if there all fit

Agreed that is a great team. But they can't play week in week out. When we have a few injuries, we'll drop like a stone as recently proved