Nineteen Canteen

Colin problem is people won't necessary identify with that new entity and as Wes alluded to below there was an Option 3 and there is no guarantee that option will not become important once again leading to pressure on that new entity's future. The existence of 1 that is identified in both the local community and the wider football/national community is of paramount importance. Having that 'name and associated history' that the local community can support knowing it is also acknowledged nationally as a known entity encourages support or at least it should IMO. The entity should be permanent whereas the local community that supports it will change and move with the times but like you say the bed rock of support remains. Remove the entity in this case Southampton FC and its long and rich history and people who may no longer be part of the local community (plenty on here) will have no more reason to continue their support and perhaps look for opportunities in their own local communities. That erodes the bed rock of support and because of the loss of the national identity instilling pride in their club the local community will also lose interest in a new entity IMO no matter how connected it is to what has one before. Perhaps a bad analogy but in Tennis we have 4 Grand slams, 3 identify the nation and one is called Wimbledon. Why not change the name to the British Open? Again perhaps another bad example but if Man Utd went bust would they be as well supported as Trafford Rovers? (Unable able to use the City suffix). I think the brand name is king and there are examples of those names being changed in the past it is usually to create synergy with a global name and it is usually not well received by the public. Saints simply won't be the same if they are not Southampton FC

Its not my alledged hero I'm worried about, it's the club and I was just in the minority of fans who post on this forum who actually believed Lowe was actually what was needed. A hard nosed arrogant businessman who would be prepared to upset a few for the greater good of the club - it's survival. A desperate solution and in desperate times and had there been a viable alternative to the carrot dangler then I would have taken it. Fact remains if we had averaged 20k as we did and more in the previous and equally poor season then we would be celebrating another successful survival campaign!

Thanks for pointing out my error btw. I guess I have been listening to much to the happening beats on Radio Solent and got my Administrators and 80's front men mixed up. Mark Fry does have a touch of the new romantics about him or like a lot of accountants are secret Gary Numan fans who live with their Mums or least that is what I am led to believe about a certain high profile poster.

ABC - and he is about to shoot his poison arrow

To busy dealing with calls from those desperate to be in the loop like Stephen Godwin, alledgedly.

Thought Martin Fry said a lot about nothing when it could have been precis down to 5 words: Not much we can say or It's too early to say or we go about our job

All I can say is that the the Community of Man City never deserted them when they were in league 1. So I identify with our club the entity but I don't identify with the community that deserted it from the heady days of 2003 to now. There is something wrong with our community that can't support the past two games as they supported the Man U and Sheff U games and frankly the fact we haven't been able to maintain an average of 20,000 just makes me bitter and angry at any attempts to recover what we didn't need to lose in the first place. To me support isn't a choice its a given and the club will hopefully be rebuilt or god forbid extinguished and renamed but unity in the community is lost and will take a long time to heal and that is no ones fault but those who chose to stay away. Support is not a choice IMO its a way of life.

Nothing fine about this hour. It's our darkest hour and are most infamous and this club's bedrock of support has been eroded to the point of extinction. People will put a gloss on it but 23,000 in our greatest hour of need is frankly a joke in a game far bigger than Sheff Utd last season or to watch the Man U glory boys. We are barely limping and can't find a full house to give the club our support to get it over the line? Its pathetic but not unexpected so for the past 2 -3 seasons the so called best supported club in the South has become a sad shadow of it's former self. If we want to blame anyone, blame your neighbours who have diisappeared from the seat next to you and then the pair next to that and those in front and behind until there is just a loyal handful left and acres of red and white seate. Don't blame anyone but them as they let the club die by walking away insipidly over a number of years so yeah COYRs! We were a Premiership club with what transpired to be small town lower ranking Championship support. I would prefer to let the club die gracefully than sully its memory of a once well supported club through thick and thin. First game in League 1 next year assuming we survive and how many to show support to the new investors? 16,000 max? Pass me a bucket I want to throw more than change.

Colin the club won't be better off without me because The Saints will be finished, over, done, extinct, expunged (Courtesy of UM Pahars) and something that doesn't exist can't be better off with or without anything. I was part of the loyal fanbase and have religiously bought Season Tickets and additional match day tickets for years regardless of the directors, chairman and performances. Bottom line we were not enough to get this club through and seriosuly let down especially by the missing 5,000 from last season to this from Day 1. Day 1 Colin, why? 50% because of recession and 50% because of stupidity? Apart for the loyal and committed following if this club dies it will be no worse then the extra 10,000 to 15,000 who have suddenly materialised over the past two games will have deserved. As a result I will have nothing to with a team that I will have no affinity with from the one I decided to support watching the 1976 cup final as a young boy. I hope it doesn't come to a bitter end but if it does it's over and I take my dose of regular football closer to home.

Much LOL? Due diligence on 34 bids and some suggested cross breeding so the pigs develop bigger snouts for the trough is going to take longer than a week in my humble opinion. Not forgetting a small matter of a FL investigation hanging over us still to be resolved. Morph is connected but he is not the Adminstrator so call Fry tomorrow for your answer as Morph can't answer that anymore than Barclays. Roger and out.

He switched from supporting Lowe to supporting Wilde at the 11th hour forcing Lowe out. The rest as they say is history and Crouch has been like a headless chicken ever since trying to always be popular with the fans IMO as if he was running for mayor in some small time town in America. People worry about this club going out of business and there is one thing that worries me more than this club dying....... We can only hope Crouch doesn't suddenly come into bud during the cross-pollination, we need robust and hardy solutions not poison ivy creeping everywhere IMO.

Isn't cross pollination a term used to create hybrids and in the plant (no pun intended) world more robust hardier plants or making more edible plants a little more palatable and therefore easier to swallow. Maybe the best deal for creditors but hybrid solutions will ultimately mean compromise and maybe some potentially unpalatable faces arriving on the board. So we had 3 'big shots' who couldn't work together and I am assuming Morph's 'Management speak' means a pooling of bids to reach the magic £15m so we could have many more 'big shot's' renewing the boardroom power battles of the future. Saints Trust will be busy bees they won't know who to go and pollinate but I suspect Stephen Godwin will be kept in the hive this time.

Winchester are bottom of that league having lost at home today so that is probably one local derby that won't be happening. If Southampton FC cease to exist then so will my support. I'm afraid there are to many other local non-league sides worthy of our support with a committed fan base keeping them afloat regardless of who is in charge.

Stephen it seems to me that you and your little pal Dave will soon be out of the loop for good and that can only be good news for the club, this forum and those who are weary of alledged ITKers. Steve Grant is involved with SoS in a senior capacity and like you had a high profile with the Trust so why have you not been invited to the party? Balance? See you at the game with your text books.

The amount he invested is small beer for a man who told us he wasn't worried about losing £1.9m in shares. Cost of a statue and £50k when it was too late is hardly something to get excited otherwise it was always offers with conditions IMO. Remember he was never slow to let us know he was 'investing', make a good mayor but football chairman? NO

Leon Crouch's time has passed along with the rest. It would be an unmitigated disaster if he or any ex-director had a role in the future running of this club in the interests of unity and avoiding mistakes of the past. SaintLee's article IMO rams that point home more eloquently than I could. We can't afford gullible leaders.

Stephen I just called you by your name as everyone else was calling you Steve. Seems now you are in need of some new friends as you have been left amongst the tumbleweed of the Saints Trust . On a more sincere note what has happened to Doug? Concerned he has stopped posting although he was getting a bit irratic I enjoyed talking with him.

Give us a kiss

Seems I have made a new friend

The club would have been funded by the Holding Company and any profits from the club rolled back up to the holding company. Would this be a correct assumption and if so does that relationship stop because the holding company has gone bust?

Derry the might of the football league can't distinguish the difference without employing forensic accountants so a big ask for the ordinary fan to accept the club is fully ring fenced. SLH had no other revenue streams so is the debt just being ramped up paying Fry's fees, debit interest etc? I've got about 100 Tescos vouchers for schools and clubs if that'll help?

Mike I won't go and hopefully next season we can enjoy some common ground if supporting the same club isn't already enough.

I seriously had no idea Stephen and to say I was surprised would be an understatement. I'm assuming you haven't been asked to help with Save Our Saints with David, Duncan, Steve and Ron? I may not always agree with them but as fellow Saints fan I certainly respect them but unfortunately you have made yourself into a parody of an important fan and the exception to the rule. You tried Stephen and failed and whilst there is nothing wrong in that the way in which you now choose to conduct yourself renders your posts the bleatings of a bitter and twisted indiviudal with little support despite towing a populist line. Sad really.

How do you know for a fact those meetings with Barclays did not take place? I suspect as FD, Jones would be making daily calls with the bank given the circumstances. As for the wealth of Lowe and Wilde I simply can't comment but Lowe's treatment by the fans was hardly conducive to him lending any money and Wilde? Seriously, who knows. I would like to have seen Crouch make his offer of £2m without condition and offered the chairmanship of the FC Board and leave Wilde to play around with his fans parliament which in hindsight did look a ridiculous notion. Its all ifs buts and maybes and no doubt in time the truth will come out.

Trouble is Vectis the season before our 1st home game against Palace (from memory) was c25k and then dropped off around the 20k mark on average (exact figures have been posted on here b4). First match attendances are always high. I don't think we had hope under NP anymore than we do now and the first two games this season were entertaining and full of promise and we were deemed to be very unlucky so your logic that attendances fell steeply off the back of two very promising performances is either flawed or bears witness to how unrealistics some fan's expectation had become. Pity really and not much more I can say on the subject. Revenue - it does exactly what it says on the tin.