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Comment | Time For Accountability At St Mary's
at 19:05:17
I agree with the view that the buck stops with the owner(s). Katarina has retained a 20% stake in the club and insisted that she did due diligence before accepting Gao as the new majority owner. Krueger is a Liebherr man, connected to the minority shareholder, so what channel of communication and rapport does he have with Gao? Who is the piper calling the tune? Who is calling the shots?
It seems that Gao borrowed all, or substantially all, the £200 million or so to buy his 80% stake. Is he now looking to take cash out of the club to reduce his indebtedness? The January window raised about £67 million (after paying Celtic their share) and only about £20 million was spent on a single signing. So there's some £47 million net to do something with. Is Gao unwilling to reinvest this in the club? Is he looking to withdraw at least a large chunk of it to reduce his debt or invest elsewhere than in the Saints?
Recent reports that Gao was looking to develop commercial interests around the club, including buying up property around St. Mary's, worried me immensely. Perhaps he plans to build a casino (the Chinese love to gamble big time) and fly in plane-loads of Chinese to patronise it! The football club needs more investment if it is to thrive (and even just to survive in the Premiership). Does Gao have the financial wherewithal to take the club forward? I have my doubts.
I agree too that Krueger and Les Reed have dropped the ball and that the manager is out of his depth. I almost hope we lose at WBA on Saturday because that may be the final straw and bring about Pellegrino's sacking, leaving some time for a more worthy successor to salvage our season. But it should never have come to this sorry state of affairs.
We've seen what happens to most teams who fall out of the Premiership, most recently Sunderland and Hull. I fear that Saints may be on the same slippery slope. |
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Comment | Saints V Crystal Palace The Verdict
at 12:28:01
A fundamental problem week in week out is Saints' failure to turn defence into attack quickly. We (like Man Utd under LvG) need many, many passes (mostly short ones) to get the ball up into the last third, by which time the opposition's defence has got itself well organised and Saints find themselves having to breach a fortress wall. We are stuck in the idea that we should try to play a multi-pass, possession game like Barcelona. That's OK if you've got an attack with Messi, Niemi and Suarez's ability to score goals in tight situations. Saints don't!
The successful 'smaller' clubs this season (Leicester, West Ham, Stoke, Palace and Watford) are moving the ball quickly forward and catching defences on the hop. This is smash-and-grab football, scoring on the break out of solid defence. It's not 'long-ball football'. I think it accounts for so many unexpected results in the Premier League this season. Apart from Mane and Long we have little pace in our team. Yesterday, by the time they were given the ball, the Palace defence was all set up ready for their runs and easily snuffed them out. Tadic is not a pacey winger; he uses footwork and trickery, shifting the ball between his left and right feet and doing step-overs to open up a line for a cross. That all takes time and the oppo's defence has plenty of it to prepare for the cross when eventually it comes.
The tactics need to change. Less of the slow, multi-passing game and more speed from defence to attack. The opposition's defence will then be more open and our forwards will have more space to exploit. RonKo must surely see that, otherwise he's not up to the job. Unless, of course, the players aren't playing to plan (LvG's excuse, it seems). |
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