S-Clarke

Appreciate your input. He does, indeed, look a very food signing. Pleased that he's left footed as it fits in with the position we need to cover. Could work well with Jose.

Sometimes a change just freshens things up. I don't know the ins and outs of Espanyol, but I know that time and time again that one bad season doesn't make you a bad manager, and one bad season doesn't make you a bad player. You see it countless times. Player A is awful at Club A. Gets a move to Club B, and he's great again. Manager is **** at Club B, gets a move to Club A and turns it around. He's obviously shown promise in the past, but himself and the club drifted apart that season and the relationship soured. That's all I can gauge from it. I don't know a great deal about this guy if I'm honest.

It was odd hearing the poem he recited on Solent earlier on, then realising..we're not going to hear any of his inane ramblings anymore. Such a nice bloke, will be a big miss.

Yep. Makes more sense regarding that link now as well.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/21084201 within this interesting BBC article.

Cortese wants sexy now that we're in the PL, and Adkins was just not sexy enough for him and he didn't feel he was ''sexy'' enough to attract the players he wanted. That's what I think anyway, incredibly harsh.

An interesting sub-plot for Southampton fans is the potential summer arrival of talented Espanyol midfielder Joan Verdu, a creative playmaker widely regarded as the Catalan club's best player. Verdu, 29, is out of contract at the end of the season and has not agreed a new deal, with the club struggling to find funds to pay him as they seek to reduce their debts. A host of clubs across Europe are known to be keen on securing his services for nothing in June. Considering his history with Pochettino, it's fairly safe to add Southampton to that list of suitors.

I don't agree with the decision, I think the way it's been done is horrific. I'm embarrased about it. But what good is protesting going to do? As you say, we can't change it. Cortese won't give a ****, he doesn't care - he's shown that time, and time again. Just support the club, support the players and try to accept the new bloke. We can let this change derail the club, or we can rally around it and try to salvage something. Protesting, in my opinion, will not salvage anything. It'll just make the entire situation worse.

He is a complete mentalist tbf.

What's the point? Just accept what's happened has happened, there's nothing we can do to change it. What we can do is potentially make the whole situation worse. I don't agree with the decision, but I'm still going to support my team. Sod protesting.

And to add to that, his replacement has been ''researching us'' for the last few weeks. There are ways to go about things, and this isn't the way. I'm stunned at people who are accepting this and just going ''Oh well''. Jesus, he's been treated like a **** for achieving 2 promotions.

NC will continue to sign all players.....

It just doesn't look right, at all. Does it?

We will play exactly the same way we have played this year. There is a club philosophy for all levels to play a certain formation primarily, but obviously have the scope to change it. He will follow the philosophy of the club.

It must be a bloody comfortable fence you sit on.

They don't half drag their feet on official announcements don't they. Looks a good player to be fair, but it does make you wonder who actually signed him.

He didn't say that though did he? It was usual candid manager speak after listening back to it. I heard from a third-party that he said that, but actually if you listen back...he didn't. Just keeping his cards close to his chest. One of the reasons why NA's future was often speculated about was his failure to ''lure'' top European names here (which is a load of **** IMO). Well, let's see what this guy can do in the remaining few weeks.

It's hard to have a balanced view today to be honest. Just feel we've gone about everything the wrong way.

Pardew was an odd one, he didn't have a huge fan base if I'm honest. He got mixed results here, and really should have got us playoff football that season. But he laid solid foundations, and for that we were able to progress forward. The appointment of NA felt right though, I liked him. He was young, enthusiastic, massively positive about the opportunity and was so honest. He also had success at his previous club for years. This fella is an unknown, complete non-entity to English fans. He was sacked because he wasn't getting results. Why are we sacking Adkins to go for a sacked/failed manager? I can understand if we go for a new manager who is high profile, will shock football etc, but why dispense of a hugely popular and successful manager for a complete non-English speaking unknown? It's also been done at an even worse time, because we're in a tricky position, mid-way through the season. It would have been bad enough in the summer, or this coming summer - but at least we'd have had a bit more leeway in terms of prep. He's been thrown into the lions den here. It just has to work immediately, there's no room for failure in this move.

Come on mate, jump off the fence on this one. He has shown he is a prized ****, but has got results. He's today shown that he is once again, a prize ****. The jury is still out as to weather this is the right call. It needs to work straight away.

What I meant was dragged back into the bottom 3, adrift etc.

This is exactly how it was going to be seen. It will be a shot in the arm for all our rivals. The managers will use that in their team talks against us. Brilliant. I'm kind of lost for words, still.

It's mental that this should even be a question we're having to ask. Unbelievable.

I'm not afraid to stand up and admit that I've stuck up for Cortese, because he's always got results for us - and he was the one in control of this football at the time. This decision has made me fuming though, it just makes no sense what so ever. I tell you what, this new fella really needs to hit the ground running, because if he doesn't and we end up being dragged right back into the mire then he can get roundly booed as far as I'm concerned.