It is fine to put the blame on Jisheng Gao, but the stark truth is that he does not run the club day to day, we have a board of directors with no experience running a football club and that is now coming back to haunt us.

Those who are calling for Gao to go are doing so in blind panic, this is not the same situation as 30 years ago when football clubs where run by local businessmen and could be easily replaced.

Gao is the owner of Southampton Football Club and spent £20 million buying it, a few protests won't make him resign or go away.

He could however simply decide to stop having an active role and that would lead to absolute chaos.

The truth is that there is not a queue of potential owners at the door and if there was the chances of one of them being one of the few people these days being able and willing to invest the fortunes that the owners of Liverpool and Manchester City have done is even more remote.

The big players in football ownership look at the big clubs with the potential to become a Big Six club, that means a big fan base that stays loyal whatever and turns up week in week out, because big fan bases generate big incomes.

So the problem is not Gao per se, he is running the club in the same way that Markus Liebherr and Katharina Liebherr have done with success, the issue is not money spent, but what you do with it and we are paying the price for not spending the money wisely.

The main reason on the playing side we are doig badly is a failure to replace Jose Fonte and Virgil Van Dijk over the past three years and that is down to the people employed by the owners to run the club.

Ralph Krueger and Les Reed have paid the price and a large part of the fan base cheered their demise, conveniently forgetting the work they had done and blaming them for a bad couple of years and demanding they go.

Gao bowed to that pressure, but the problem now is that after the departure of Ross Wilson there is absolutely no one on the board with any sort of experience in running a football club and more worryingly no real footballing knowledge either from a playing side of things or just what makes football fans tick.

Martin Semmens has no experience running a football club and he has no one under him with any real knowledge to impart to him.

Hence the appointments made to the first team coaching staff, it was jobs for the boys which after the departure of Danny Rohl left Ralph Hasenhuttl with a coaching staff with no experience in the roles they are in at Premier League level and to be blunt even Football League level, Kelvin Davis, David Watson & Craig Fleming would not have got assistant coaching jobs at League two clubs let along a club like Saints with aspirations of a top ten placing and Europa League football.

This was an appalling lack of foresight and judgement by the board presumably advised by Ross Wilson.

Now he is gone it is urgent that we appoint a director of football and a head of recruitment now, they need to be in place withing weeks so they have a clear run in during the January transfer window.

January will be crucial, we need to sign a central defender, there are certainly several candidates around, we need to sign one perhaps two, bring in an experienced head, plus someone young and up and coming.

But we cannot do any of this whilst the board has only none footballing men on board, it needs someone who knows what they are doing.

The news leaking out of St Mary's is that a new Director of Football will be in place very soon, possibly this week or next and that will be followed by a shake up on the coaching staff.

Hopefully this will provide impetus on the pitch and help us move forward, last season after Ralph arrived we were a good team, we could win games, we needed only a central defender or two but instead signed two attackers.

But we still have a stronger squad than last season, so why have we become a worse team, the answer is poor coaching and poor team selection and for the latter Ralph Hasenhuttl has to shoulder some responsibility, yes he has been let down by the tools of the job not being provided in his coaching staff and transfers, but he has chopped and changed too much and needs to sort out the defence.

So Gao is not the problem aside from the fact that it is his decision to appoint the board to run the club day to day, his employees are failing him and if anyone should go it should be the executives who run the club not the owner.

Those who say Gao should have been throwing in millions are deluded, he never promised that when he came in, he has not reneged on any promises nor has he run the structure of the club any different than his predecessors in the Liebherr family, Ralph Krueger and Les Reed understood both running sports organisations and in Reed's case football.

No one is saying they got it completely right, but there departure has left us bereft of that vital sporting knowledge needed and this is the core of the problem.

It is a big problem, but a good director of football can set things right and so can some good defensive signings.

We as fans have to stop thinking the grass is greener on the other side, we have to try and change what we can change, Gao is no different to any other Premier League club owner, he is worse than some, but better than others, blame those who deserve blame not those who don't, look how many of our players out on loan are now flourishing, perhaps it is not the Premier League they are playing in, but they are getting confidence back and that comes from the supporters being behind them not on their backs.

If we want Saints to be in the Premier League then we need to get behind the team during the games, it won't mean immediate improvement but we will have a better chance with the supporters behind the team than dragging them down with negativity.

Hopefully in the next week we will see changes made, give those changes a chance and we might have a chance of pulling out of this, ask yourselves where you want Saints to be come next season, no one is saying things are perfect, but sometimes it has to be a siege mentality.

I'm sure I will get some negative comments on this article, all I will say is that when I felt that the club needed to be stood up against I did it along with other like minded people, we did not sit back and moan in the pub or any other medium available back then, we got out and did things.

Either get out on the streets or put up and shut up, happy clapping is not just backing the club whatever, it is doing nothing about something you believe in and leaving it to others.

Harsh words, but commenting on social media is not protesting it is ranting nothing else and ranting does not get you anywhere.

Photo: Action Images

SanMarco added 11:56 - Nov 13 The article is actually illogical. Owner is responsible for putting the board etc in place. The board etc are rubbish. Therefore it is not the owner's fault. You don't need a degree in philosophy/logic to see that it is not logical. I think two different points get conflated when we discuss this: One is efficient and effective running of the club (the point that the article discusses) and the second is investment on the playing side. I agree with the few above who pint out that it is not that we haven't spent - it is just that we have spent very, very badly. I don't expect Gao to pump millions in - I do expect him to know how to run a top football club or appoint someone who does. Which leads me to the usual topic of Cortese. It is often forgotten that the journey from the third division to the first under ML and NC was a very different kettle of fish from challenging once we got to the top. Once the backbone of the squad that brought us from 3rd to 1st started dispersing we needed astute purchases and for a while we got them. Lately most of our purchases are rubbish. For Cortese 'the next level' was essentially splashing the cash - that was never going to be KL's or Gao's cash. So Cortese's return would need another sugar daddy - but this time someone with a lot more cash than Markus. I doubt that will happen so our medium term prospects are dependent on us starting to identify and then purchase the right players (perhaps an effective DOF would help). In the short term we are in trouble because the people in charge are more likely to buy duds in January than miracle-workers...

3

wibbersda added 14:37 - Nov 13 Get Ready with your downvotes. from what I can see the club is full of yes people with no backbone or character to either inspire nor give any authority. I think the new term is "Snowflakes". So to that end, we need to bring in someone like Big Sam. Hit the Down arrow now, lol.
7

saint66 added 19:30 - Nov 13 Well Nick as you have all the answers to the woes of Southampton Football Club,perhaps you should pop round and see Mr GAO the next time he takes the unprecedented decision to turn up to a match and advise him to spend some of the £180 million which he did not spend on purchasing the club on improving the playing squad if your figures are correct as quoted in your article. Perhaps the fans should keep totally quiet regarding our concerns as it seems to touch a few of your raw nerves.

5

TeamCortese added 17:05 - Nov 17 Even Football Daily are talking about our situation 😂😂😂😂😂😂 (start at 12:43)
0

Blogs 31 bloggers

Crystal Palace Polls