Ahead of a major exhibition on the club to be held at the Sea City Museum in the Civic Centre, Saints fans are being asked to vote on who they think is the best Saints team.
Being one of the two supporters asked to compile a list of Saints players to go before the final panel to hone down the list ready for the vote I have to say it was a task that was not as easy as it sounds.
Firstly how do you set the standards for qualifying to be on the list ?
The vote would only be for players who played after 1945, the reason for this was that there would be few supporters who would have seen us in action pre the Second World War and therefore not many votes would be cast for the pre war era players and most of those would be based more on heresay.
Secondly we discounted those who are currently at the club, so that their contribution could be assessed fairly after leaving, if this vote was being compiled at the end of last season there would be those who would want Virgil Van Dijk in, but not now for obvious reasons.
The first players in were easy, we simply picked the 12 on duty for the FA Cup Final at Wembley in 1976, although perhaps not as many of them as you would think would make the ultimate XI, the truth is that these 12 players remain the only Saints to have won a major honour for the club and therefore deserved to be in the running for any ultimate team.
Then it did start to get tricky, we decided that the first thing to do was get a list of those that had played 150 League games for the club and work from there.
After that we added those that had not played 150 League games but had made a major contribution ie Kevin Keegan for instance.
The list was all about the player's form for Saints and not about what they may have done elsewhere, Gareth Bale has arguably gone on to be one of the best players the club has ever produced, but the fact is that he had one full season at Saints in the Championship and therefore for Saints at least he cannot be considered one of our greats.
The difficulty was also in selecting just how the formation should line up, over the 72 years were selecting the side from formations changed over the years and players would be considered to be different depending on what era they played in, for instance when Matthew Le Tissier started his career at Saints he would have been considered a forward, but within a few years he would play a deeper lying role and although his position hadn't changed he would now be a midfielder.
Likewise Terry Paine spent most of his career as a winger but by the end of it was a wide midfielder.
Therefore we decided on a fairly traditional line up to make it easier to select a team rather than a group of individuals that would not really fit into any sort of formation or team.
Voting will be easier in some positions than others and there will naturally be a bias towards the players from the past few years due to more supporters having seen them play.
Personally I have gone for the following.
Manager - Lawrie McMenemy - Only two real options here i think, Ted Bates who built the foundations of the modern club in the 1950's and Lawrie who took us to our only trophy in 1976, for that reasons Lawrie shaded it for me.
Goalkeeper - Peter Shilton for me, when he arrived he was the best goalkeeper in the World and was throughout his five seasons at the Dell when he was Englands undisputed number 1 throughout, youger fans might go for Anti Niemmi but he was not as good for Saints as Shilton.
Right Back - Jason Dodd for me, there were a couple of other options, but for me Dodd was a steady performer who just about shaded Ivan Golac due to his longer service.
Left Back - David Peach for me here, I might have gone for Francis Benali due to his number of games under many different managers a fact that perhaps showed that he was a decent player as they all could not have been wrong, but Peach got it due to his performances, his penalty taking ability and quality.
Central defence- I chose Chris Nicholl and Mark Wright, Nicholl was a mainstay of a team that won promotion and he then was the rock as it established itself as a top flight club again and even challenged for the League, he was a virtual ever present for six seasons and worth his place right to the end.
Wright was class from the moment he first stepped into the team and like Nicholl was virtually ever present apart from breaking his leg in a Cup Semi Final for five seasons,a time in which he went from unknown teenager to an England regular we have had better centre halves in more recent history, but none played enough games to get on the list, but Wright was the best of the rest.
Midfield - Matthew Le Tissier, no explanation needed , quite simply the best player Saints have ever had in every level of qualification you could apply.
Midfield - Terry Paine - I only saw the last few years of his Saints career, but he played for 18 seasons for the club and was a member of the 1966 England World Cup Winning squad, this vote cannot just be about players that you saw at their peak otherwise it will just be a best of the last 20 years, Paine was truly one of the greatest players we have ever had.
Midfield- Steve Williams - A lot of possible options here including Alan Ball, Jimmy Case, Adam Lallana & David Armstrong, but Williams gets it for me he was in the side as a teenager, he gave us 8 full seasonsplus a bit in two others and like Wright went from starlet to England player, we saw him at his best, if he played in our midfield now we would not have a goal drought.
Forward - Mick Channon - Like Paine & Le Tissier, Channon is a club legend, I would almost have insisted that all three not have to have even been voted for but in automatically
Forward - Kevin Keegan- Keegan is the one player in my list that hasnt made the 150 game benchmark, but his signing for Saints truly put the club on the map, he was the European Footballer of the year when he arrived from Hamburg and arguably the best in the World at the time with very few up to his standard, it made the world look at Southampton FC and take us seriously and we were genuine title contenders in his time at the Dell.
Forward - Rickie Lambert - He is in because he was the talisman of the club rising from adversity after Markus Liebherr took over, he lead us in a fairy tale rise from League One back to the Premier league scoring goals galore and winning an Engalnd cap.
My head says that probably Ron Davies should be in ahead of Rickie Lambert more games for us, more goals and all in the top flight, but my heart says that Rickie was a talisman who was at the heart of our resurgence and meant so much to so many people he should be in there, so Big Ron has to do with a place on the bench, mind you he will be in exalted company.
Vote for your team now on the club's official site using the link below.
https://southamptonfc.com/2017/10/13/southampton-fans-ultimate-xi-sea-city-museu