S-Clarke

A great player for us, a leader throughout all the teams, even before he was the captain. He was one of the players people felt would struggle with the PL step up, more so than Jos, but it was totally opposite. He was a cultured CB and matured into one of the best leaders we've had. I hated the way it ended, but he'll never have a bad word echoed about him at Southampton.

So they are basically waiting for someone else to make the decisions for them, as expected. I guess in a way that's good news, as they may be realising that their decision making is shit. But still, where's the accountability and taking responsibility? I won't ever get over our response to this. We were on the brink of the PL, had it taken away from us due to club individual stupidity, and they haven't set out anything to the fans about how they're going to rebuild the trust. Before we know it, Season Tickets will be announced before they've even spoken to the fans about this mess. They are hideous owners.

Not really, sure it's lower ranked European sides, but the accolades are similar to the Europa League. It's a major European trophy. Palace didn't have any trophies in 2024, but they now have an FA Cup, Community Shield and a European Trophy to boot. Credit to them. And they sold some of their best players during that period too. I'm with others in the frustration. We had Pele, Mane, Morgan, Wanyama, Toby, Fonte, Clyne, Bertrand, Tadic all in the same team at one point - sure, we finished 6th and 7th to get Europe, but our first effort was a shambles as we didn't even get to the groups, second time we didn't get out of the groups. A really poor showing all round. And don't get me started on our FA Cup opportunities under Poch....(Sundarland away...)

That's really sad, that's no age what so ever.

Which begs the question as to why the hell we decided to partake in this sort of activity in the first place. We already had legitimate advantage from a financial standpoint. I get all the 'try every angle to gain an advantage' bit - but that's only truly relevant when you don't have the money to compete, so you have to find other ways. We had the money to compete, we didn't need to find other ways.

Lessons are never learnt by SR, hence the absolute deafening silence for the last week. The same PR disaster is ensuing in front of our eyes.

You're losing your head Manji.

I must admit, I didn't know all the detail around what happened between them and Derby, but I've read up a bit and it just shines even more of a bad light on those morons. Derby in administration, hammered by minus points, struggling to get buyers, going to get relegated. So what does Steve Gibson do? Kicks them whilst they were down, launches a legal case because due to their admin he said their playoff place the season or two prior was 'false', and Boro should have been there. He came to some sort of financial agreement with former owner Mel Morris in the end, as Gibson was stopping any takeover happening until he had his compo. An Open Letter From Steve Gibson To The Joint Administrators Of Derby County FC What is this utter prick on?

I'll be honest - I don't think the club knew it was going to get much worse, I honestly think it caught the club by surprise as much as the players. That's not defending the club, because it shows they haven't been over this at all.

That's the key takeaway really. We didn't defend ourselves or offer any form of response to the EFL, we didn't even try to. Some of our antics when we were first charged was school-boy stuff, and the EFL probably made their decision right then. It's the worst defence ever. ''Hi Southampton, we've recieved this complaint - care to comment?'' ''Hi EFL - This isn't true! Us? No! We're good, we don't have things like that happening! This is not the Southampton Way. Nothing to see here" ''Hi Southampton, we have proof that you have done this'' ''Hi EFL - Oh, yeah I think you're right. To help mitigate I'll admit we did it at Oxford and Ipswich too. Can we get a fine and call it a day? I've already had a quiet private chat, outside of this process, with Steve Gibson regarding a financial settlement''

Oh sweet justice if Boro were also caught to have been doing the same.

Was one of our U14's for a few years, probably doesn't even remember being here!

wtf?

They will - prepare for it. We will once again suffer for their incompetence, whilst they bask in the glory of 'player trading' profit.

First comments from Peretz - I'll miss the guy, he was immense. Hope he gets a good top European move in the summer. 'I was there' when Southampton had a GK.

Luke Edwards, North East reporter. In 2019: Luke Edwards, North East reporter. In 2026: I'm sorry, what...? How can the same crime recieve such striking differences in media response? Rule or no rule, it's the same fricking crime.

Absolutley not, and two wrongs certainly don't make a right. Their response and pressure was awful, and a stronger response from the club would have pushed back on that. But even so, we still did what we did - even if it's small in the grand scheme of things - we were still stupid enough to try it, get caught, and then fail to defend it.

My true opinion is that Parson's simply did not know the full detail, and whilst his approach to assuming we'd get a fine and offering to pay a fine isn't bad in it's self, it's shockingly naive. A good CEO should be all over this, there should be governance within a club to ensure things like this don't even happen. I'm all for giving staff independence to make their own decisions, but the CEO still needs to be over those and still needs to be aware of what is going on. The more and more I read it seems that he was blissfully unaware, and if he was blissfully unaware of this, then what else is he unaware of? Same as Dragon and the others. That's incompetence. That's why we need adults in charge, because taking football out of the equation for a second, this is a huge organisational governance failure. And the buck stops at the top with that, that's why they're paid the big bucks.

I mean we can dig and dig and dig if we want to, but like others have said - at the end of the day, we still made the decision internally. If Boro set a honeytrap, which I do believe they did, it's still our fault we fell into it. We didn't need to fall into it. Boro's actions were equally as murky as ours, and the media onslaught is something worth investigating as I do feel it influenced the EFL's decision. But the end story is that we still did this, we still gave the EFL the bullet to fire at us. We still made this decision. Boro didn't hold a gun to our head and tell us to fall into their trap.

That's one of the biggest killers, someone who had not been known to this club or fans this time last year, has orchestrated something which has harmed our club for it's supports for a generation. We can all go on about the proportionate of the sanctions, but what he has instructed is still absolutley dumb as fuck. He'll end up in Europe in a year, doing some backend analyst role, the whistle-blower will probably end up still employed at Boro, and Salt will still be studying and training. None of those people have any connection with Southampton like the fans. But we will be here in 1 year, 2 years, 3 years, 4 years, still suffering from short-term decisions by a cohort of people who will be given the chance to have a clean break. We don't get a chance to have a clean break, as we are the fans and the lifeblood of this club. We now have to take the beatings for their actions.

That is an amazing read, really enjoyed it. Thank you for posting it, you've nailed every point. It should be published and circulated around the media! I still feel SR get off lightly with all of this.

The sun, it was too hot and caused the team to lose the game.

Hopefully they keep their strikers though.

Might not have a choice

Hull signed him for free.