trousers

http://soccer.nbcsports.com/2016/06/09/how-ronald-koemans-southampton-tenure-unraveled-quickly/ (apologies if already posted - don't think there's anything particularly new in it)

Fair point. I'm just starting to get a little bored with the whole thing so have resorted to making up wacky theories

Vitor Pereira doesn't even make it onto that list of 69 managers, most of which are highly unlikely. Makes it even stranger that The Echo have plucked his name out of the blue IMO...

[video=youtube;SOt-5IiMI9U]

Carlsberg don't do ideal candidates, but if they did... Surprised this chap has seemingly been below the radar up to now. New poll please mods!

I see there's a connection between Pereira and AVB. How about the possibility of them rekindling their management partnership at Saints ...? #clutchingatstraws https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V%C3%ADtor_Pereira_(football_manager)

Bingo!

This. Or at least close this one and just use the 'new manager' sticky. IMHO of course

Indeed. Chronologically, what event came first? The news that Koeman had changed agents or the Les Reed 'contract talks going well' video...?

Seems a bit odd for the Echo to randomly throw in a hitherto un-mentioned candidate at the end of an article about De Boer, doesn't it? A plant from the the club perhaps to gauge reaction? (oops, sorry, forgot the 'conspiracy theory klaxon' that time )

# conspiracy theory klaxon # Maybe (in a far fetched kinda way), Reed discovered that Koeman was about to do a u-turn on his contract talks with Saints due to having his head turned by the Everton offer. So, the club came up with the idea of Reed doing a "contract talks going well" YouTube video so that the outside world (including us fans) will see that Koeman is the 'villain' in all this and that the club have done nothing wrong. Without Reed's video, would we have known how far down the line the contract talks were between Saints and Koeman? So, rather than the Reed video being an embarrassment to the club, it could be viewed as designed to show Koeman in a bad light.... No? Ok, perhaps not. I think I'll have to trade these tablets in for something more powerful

Irony and/or self-awareness was never one of their strong points

-3.7/10

0.6/10

As much as I would love to claim ITK status, I posted that on behalf of another poster (keithmorg98) who was having a spot of bother posting images.

That's one of my theories too. Wouldn't surprise me if both clubs see the eventual outcome as a win-win.

A cynic might suggest that the announcement has been rushed out in order to make it 'timely'. Good job that I'm not a cynic though...

http://www.saintsfc.co.uk/news/article/2016-17/20160608-southampton-virgin-media-announce-shirt-partnership-3138459.aspx

Any update on who our new manager is going to be, please sir?!

Southampton FC ‏@SouthamptonFC #SaintsFC is delighted to announce @virginmedia as its new main club sponsor

Apologies for not being on this thread for a few days. I've been distracted by some posters from another club on the main board who seem even more delusional than Pompey fans. I think I've got it out of my system now though so time to get back to some proper nutjobbery. One thing is for sure though, Everton will never be able to compete with Pompey's "we're the biggest and bestest" levels of delusion... http://www.portsmouth.co.uk/sport/football/pompey/catlin-airs-doubts-over-league-shake-up-1-7420137

I think the simple difference people are highlighting is that 'we' (Saints fans and local journos, in the main) don't/wouldn't spend days gloating about it on other fans football forums and in opinion pieces in national newspapers. I don't recall 'us' rubbing Palace's noses in it when we snapped up Fonte, for example. Ok, yes, that's a lower key example than Koeman going to Everton but I'd like to think 'we' wouldn't start banging on about it as much as the Everton fans/journos have if we were to find ourselves in a similar position. (but who knows, maybe that's just me being naive..."Saints tinted glasses, blah, blah, etc") In the words of Fun Boy Three and Bananarama...."It Ain't What You Do, It's The Way That You Do It" Btw, I don't see many people on here denying that Everton are historically a "bigger" club than us. To me, talking about club size is a red herring though. It's more important to me as a fan whether we are "better" at any moment in time, rather than "bigger".

Nah, can't be. Not a single mention of corner flags or dugouts... But, yes, it does appear that Merseyside's answer to Factless Allen has been scouring this forum to source much of that diatribe. So, a big SWF 'Hello' to Chris. Sadly, it's only a 3.4/10 from me though.

There might be a train of thought (Devil's Advocated, granted) which says that our subsequent success in the last 2 years could make us less attractive to prospective managers as the chances of them being able to 'take the team to the next level' are less than it was for Koeman (and Pochettino before him)...."Glass Ceiling, blah, blah, etc". In other words, there's perhaps a greater risk to a manager's reputation if he takes over us now than if he had done so two years ago. Anything less than top 6 would be seen by some (rightly or wrongly) as a failure.

1.7/10