The 49-year-old’s coaching career to date has been spent in Italy, most recently with European giants Roma, but with notable success across spells in charge of Mantova, Crotone, Genoa, Hellas Verona and Torino.

Speaking after signing his contract, Ivan Jurić said:

“I’m very pleased. I think it's a really big challenge but I’m very optimistic because I saw a team that can do better.

“It's important to immediately be connected with the fans. I want an aggressive team and I think that fans of Southampton will like that.”

Although this appointment is not the experienced Premier League manager that some Saints supporters were demanding, having previous Premier League or English top flight experience as a manager is no guarantee of success at Southampton FC.

Indeed over the past 70 years Saints have had 31 managers and only 9 arrived having previously managed in the top flight of English football.

Alan Ball, Graeme Souness, Glenn Hoddle, Gordon Strachan, Glenn Hoddle, Harry Redknapp, George Burley, Alan Pardew & Mark Hughes.

It's fair to say that their time at the club had mixed results, the truth is the Southampton way has always to identify managers who could be described as young and hungry with something to prove and that is certainly the case in Ivan Juric.

So I would say that whatever our opinions on this appointment and I appreciate there will be a few different ones in this case, that he is the manager now and we have to back him to get things right.

That should hopefully be quite an easy task, to be blunt we have been appalling this season, so we should at least improve results, whether there will be enough improvements to save us from relegation is another thing.

Welcome Ivan Juric and good luck !

All Photos Via Reuters

underweststand added 08:42 - Dec 22 It's easy to prejudge managers /players on the basis of past achievements, but there is a huge difference between playing and managing. We have seen legendary names like Gerrard, Lampard and lately Rooney struggle to manage even mediocre club sides and it's obvious that personal success doesn't automatically translate to managerial success as soon as they set foot in the door, and such has been the case many times in the past. Indeed some of the most successful manager / coaches since the Millennium had little or no playing career of note; Wenger and Klopp are prime examples of this. Ivan played much of his football in lower level clubs in his homeland and Italy but seems to have succeeded in helping certain clubs an so now that Ivan on board we can hope that irrespective of results we might see a brand of attacking football that has been absent since the departure of Ronald Koeman. An interesting observation is that having invested 100 mill. or more in the club, perhaps Ivan may have been Dragan's personal choice as they both seem to hare the same European heritage?. Regardless of that decision it remains to be seen if he is the solution to rectify our problems as we sit in the Last Chance Saloon until the end of the season.

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Colburn added 09:00 - Dec 22 Welcome Ivan and good luck! We’re all behind you! We can stay up 💪
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Block8 added 10:08 - Dec 22 It will be interesting to see his team selections which, if all we read about his playing style is true, will be very different from RM. Hopefully he will enable defenders to play in defence, midfielders to play in midfield and develop a style of play to help the strikers. We are all behind you Ivan, lets march on (forward) we've had enough of sideways and backwards.
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dirk_doone added 10:26 - Dec 22 Welcome to Southampton. You will get great support from our fans.
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highfield49 added 11:32 - Dec 22 Welcome indeed Ivan, I suspect that several players who RM wouldn't even allow on the pitch will be raring to go and have a point to prove. What a shame that Charly Alcaraz was sold in August I think he would have flourished under the new manager's style of play.
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sandywelsh added 12:29 - Dec 22 Lets hope that Bella-Kotchap now gets a start and we have seen the last of Stephens. There must be some hidden gems in our large squad that Martin never gave a chance. Things can only get Better!!!
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NewburySaint added 12:51 - Dec 22 Being a follower of Italian football this is a good appt. - he’s slightly mad and very passionate so he will probably lose his s*** with our players straight away! But joking aside, he is the antithesis of Martin which is probably what we need now….
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DoctorSleep added 21:39 - Dec 22 Welcome Ivan The only way is up!
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