St Mary’s Draw Highlights Saints’ Staying Power

In a season which has seen Southampton uniformly showered with plaudits, Mauricio Pochettino will perhaps be more encouraged by Saturday’s display against Manchester City than any of the headline-grabbing results his side have recorded since August.

With first-team mainstays Boruc, Wanyama, Clyne and Schneiderlin all sidelined by injury the Saints starting lineup was an unfamiliar one, and coming off the back of a midweek defeat to Aston Villa the home fans could be forgiven for fearing the worst prior to kick off. Defensively they had looked decidedly fragile in the absence of their Polish keeper, while their makeshift midfield had lacked the its usual authority during Wednesday’s setback.

Hopes of avoiding a fourth successive defeat were quickly dented when City took the lead on ten minutes; Kolarov’s overlapping run took Chambers out of the game and his cross somehow dissected five Saints defenders and fell to Aguero, who comfortably finished past Gazzaniga. In recent weeks Manchester City,’s strikers have been scoring freely and this pattern looked like continuing as they threatened to breach the Saints goal again in the opening quarter of the game. Kolarov glanced a header wide from Nasri’s corner, while Zabaleta’s pull-back was badly wasted by Aguero who spooned his shot over the crossbar.

As the half wore on, however, Southampton began to assert their own attacking style on the match, and the visitors struggled to retain possession of the ball under pressure from their hosts. Jack Cork and Steven Davis may lack the physical presence of those they replaced in the lineup, but their energy and distribution were slowly turning the balance of play in Southampton’s favour.

Davis, Cork and Ward-Prowse all threatened with shot from outside the area, while Lallana and Rodriguez’s positive running were always a worry to the City defence. Luke Shaw was finding more and more space on the left, and when he was afforded time to cross he brilliantly picked out his side’s other young full-back Calum Chambers, but he was just unable to direct his header inside the far post.

These encouraging signs reawakened the home support and noise levels had increased accordingly, only to be sent off the scale by the sheer quality of Southampton’s equaliser five minutes before the break. Lallana and Davis combined neatly to release Osvaldo who was being tracked closely by Kompany on the left-hand side of the penalty area. The Italian twisted and turned, shaking off the attentions of Kompany and two further defenders, before curling an audacious effort over the not insignificant frame of Pantillimon and back under the crossbar in the far top corner. It was an immaculate finish, and the perfect way for Osvaldo to ingratiate himself to a fan-base whose patience with his start to life in Southampton had been wearing thin.

Southampton continued to stifle their illustrious opponents in the second half; Cork, in particular, impressing as increasingly he was winning his duels with Yaya Toure in the centre of the pitch. Rodriguez came close from a Ward-Prowse corner before racing onto a loose ball in front of the City penalty area and ghosting past three defenders, only to be thwarted by an excellent Pantillimon save, and Osvaldo’s composure failed him with the follow-up. Saints’ record signing came closer with his next effort, a snapshot from a narrow angle, but was eventually replaced by Lambert to appreciative applause.

At the other end, Aguero, frustrated by a lack of clear openings, managed to evade Fonte with twenty minutes remaining but dragged his left-footed shot wide of the far post. In truth, the Saints’ defence had looked comfortable throughout the second half and neither side seriously threatened again as an entertaining game drew to a close.

Their away record may have hamstrung City’s title-bid thus far, but they may come to look back on a point at St Mary’s as a positive result, despite the home side’s injury list. Saturday’s game demonstrated a hitherto unseen strength in depth in Southampton’s squad as they comfortably contained City with a team that contained four 18 year-old academy graduates at the end of the match, with another waiting in reserve.

The next test will be supplied by a visit to in-form Newcastle next week, but Pochettino’s squad will be buoyed by a result the manager described as ‘psychologically significant’; injuries or not, this is a side that can go into any game with hopes for maximum points.

Adkins, Cortese and Why We Keep Coming Back

One of the biggest challenges in writing about sport is the difficulty of imbuing everyday sporting events with any kind of real-world significance and sentimentality. Beyond the factual and occasionally the analytical, there is often very little left to say about what is essentially a large collection of adult men - ranging from board-room executives to youth academy products - all scrabbling to get to the top of their respective piles, for that season at least.

What elevates football from being nothing over and above what I have just described are the ongoing plots and sub-plots where a manager and his team become something more to their fans than temporary mercenaries, where they have become part of the fabric of the club to the extent that their personal characteristics can almost be equated to that of the club itself. During Nigel Adkins’ reign at Southampton FC, he reached that status. You will understand, then, that I have had no such difficulty imbuing sentimentality into Friday’s events; Adkins changed the way everybody thought about the club for the better.

Upon hearing news of our manager’s sacking yesterday morning I experienced the crushing realisation that the qualities of loyalty, unity and dignity ran only skin-deep at the club; those who possess the ultimate power see little merit in them. Perhaps I was naïve to believe otherwise.

It goes without saying that I believe the ‘decision to relieve Nigel Adkins of his duties’ is as unwarranted as it is unwelcome given the remarkable job he has done since October 2010 - but what really makes this news so heartbreaking goes far deeper than the simple matter of our on-field prospects, with relegation still a very real possibility. What is truly painful about this episode was summed up in a concise email I received overnight from my father who provided me with a link to the story and wrote simply: ‘And I thought we were different.’

Cortese is undoubtedly an excellent businessman. The change he has overseen at Southampton has been dramatic and far-reaching, and it should be remembered that he is one of the main reasons why we have a football club to support at all. The decision to recruit Mauricio Pochettino will have been painstakingly researched and, as he said, ‘has the long-term ambitions of the club in mind.’ For that reason, I have little doubt that our new manager is of a very high pedigree and can be a success at St. Mary’s. Putting aside my furious response to the injustice yesterday’s events (no easy task, I can assure you), the truth is that Nicola Cortese might not have made a bad business decision yesterday – he rarely does. Nevertheless, on sporting grounds his dismissal of Adkins is completely inexcusable.

I had hoped that our Chairman understood that the memories Adkins’ side have supplied me with over the past few years are what make the time and effort people like me dedicate to supporting a football club worthwhile. The moment I heard the news, though, it became abruptly clear to me that the Italian’s idea of what Southampton Football Club should be and my own are two very different things.

Cortese has now shown our true colours – and the most depressing thing about that is that I now know that the man shares none of the things that I value about sport. This is what made yesterday morning’s realisation so tough to take – it was the realisation that I support a business. Until that moment I was enjoying life as a football fan in the truest sense of the word – I was a Rickie Lambert fan, an Adam Lallana fan, a Nigel Adkins fan. These men could be identified as Southampton FC, something we all were a part of - ‘together as one’.

Today I cannot remember what it is that I support. We are a faceless entity, ready to dispense of its tools as soon as it identifies an upgrade. I anticipate having real difficulty in emotionally reinvesting because I, too, had thought we were different, and stood for more than the burning personal ambition of an Italian businessman.

When the Saints travelled to Loftus Road in November with just five points on the board, the fans’ feelings could be heard loud and clear from the very start of the game– unequivocal support for their manager, displaying the unity he did so much to promote. It was a demonstration of just how far his influence had spread; the fans bought into his philosophy - as Nigel might say, they were all on the bus.

Yesterday we were effectively informed that Adkins’ rejuvenation of Southampton FC was little more than a means to an end. Having taken on Cortese’s five-year plan in League One and bettered it, Adkins’ sacking has lain bare our Chairman’s intentions for the club for all to see: Nothing is more important than the most efficient fulfilment of our goals. Cold, hard business decisions now run roughshod over any concerns of those whom the game is really for, and for whom the game means most.

That being the case, it will take some time for me to look back on the Adkins years without a bitter melancholy that they were cut short well before they had reached a natural end. Adkins more than deserved a chance to take us further and really build something special on the south coast. Now the mantle passes to Pochettino to try to satisfy our Chairman, and if he can do that he will have done quite some job.

In a typically defiant display of his positive outlook, Adkins left a note to his players in the dressing room at the training ground before he departed. It instructed his team to smile, remain positive and to believe in what it was they were doing. It is in this spirit that I resolve to move forward as a football fan, as a Southampton fan. All clichés aside, Adkins’ legacy may be further reaching than he knows – I for one will be tuning in for Monday’s visit of Everton.

One day I would love to thank the man personally for making me proud to be a Saints fan for the past two and a half seasons, it has been truly memorable. That pride is lost for the moment, but give me a few months - a successful relegation scrap perhaps – and I might just be able to look back on the journey we have been taken on and smile: Thank you, Nigel. That was one hell of a bus ride.