The last two days have been ones of frustration for fans of Southampton Football Club, after a toothless display at Wolverhampton Wanderers, many were convinced that this would surely be the end of the line for the Saints manager.
According to footballinsider247.com those making the decisions at St Mary's have come to one today (Monday) they report:
"Sources say the stance of club chiefs as of Monday morning is they are currently willing to keep Martin on at St Mary’s Stadium but they will be left with no choice but to replace the Scot if their poor form continues."
Although this should be made clear that this is only a rumour and there seems to be little substance to it as of yet, it will infuriate Saints supporters who having watched their team lose all but two of the eleven Premier League games played so far feel that enough is enough.
They have watched a team that is playing a type of game to a level they are not good enough to play and subsequently are constantly getting exposed, they see a team that on Saturday, against the worst defence in the Premier League failed to get an attempt on target, they see a manager who should have learned lessons and adapted his tactics, but hasn't done so, they see a manager who desperately chops and changes hist team and makes poor substitutions and if that is all not enough they see a manager whose team is losing confidence and whom are going backwards.
They are asking just how long is a poor run of form before the manager is sacked ?
If a worse start to a top flight season in living memory wasn't good enough, perhaps the worst start in the club's history should have been.
The start made in 1993/94 season by Ian Branfoot was bad enough, but even that was better than this season with Branfoot getting 5 points out of his first 11, he managed to win his 12th game a televised fixture against Newcastle 2-1 to save his job.
Likewise the "Great Escape" season of 1998/99 even that awful start saw 6 points out of the first 11 games, perhaps these are the bench marks that Sport Republic are looking to, when they give Martin more time.
2008/09 season when the club were heading towards Administration and Jan Poortvliet was hired to oversee what was basically the club's academy team, saw a better start with 3 wins and two draws out of the first 11 games giving us a point per game average.
Things are really that dire and the problem for most Saints supporters they can see little changing, we are not cutting out the errors, we are still playing a rigid type of game with no leeway to go off piste sometimes and have a shot or clear the ball.
We thought we had taken a little step forward when we had beaten Everton, but truth is nothing had changed and we are now getting worse in the way we are playing.
So the above headline is bad news for most Southampton supporters, although perhaps it could be good news, we have an international break, those in charge have some leeway to take stock of the situation and sound out a replacement, they have a week's grace to re evaluate and consider options.
The fact that the sources are saying he is staying are perhaps the first signs of a smoke screen being put out to let the club quietly get on with things, with the next 5 fixtures being tough ones against 5 of the top 10 teams as it currently stands, I cannot see that waiting for these games to be played is going to do anything other than leave us less games to pull out of trouble.