Its time that the political in fighting stopped.

It is easy for Rupert Lowe to sit back annd reveal that last season the Club's income totalled 81% of income and he is right to say that this is a shocking statistic that highlights how badly the club has been run, however it only goes to show that you can make statistics read what you want, and confirms that Saints demise isnt the result of one man and one man alone but a catalogue of poor management by virtually everyone who has called themselves a Saints director in the past three years.

Before we start its perhaps important to point out a couple of things, firstly when Lowe talks about Rasiak, it was Lowe himself who brought the Pole to the Club on these wages, on loan at first but with the permanent deal set up for the summer, perhaps Lowe wasnt Chairman when this deal became permanent, but he was the man who arranged it.

Secondly it is disgusting that individual players find their wages plastered across a newspaper, of course many will find these sums obscene, especially when measured against performance, but like any employee, a player is entitled to have these things kept private, yes Lowe was right to bring up the ratio of wages to income, but completely out of order to name individual players wages, this cannot serve any good for squad morale, in fact the only reason I can find for this to be done is that in some way Lowe hopes it will shame a few of these higher earners out of the Club, whilst many supporters would perhaps agree with the sentiments, the fact is a professional employer should not behave in this way.

As for the blame for the situation it cannot be laid at the feet of one man, it has to be laid on everyone who has served on the board of Saints over the past three years, it would be easy to blame Michael Wilde, yet from the very moment that he ushered in chage Wilde found himself in a boardroom split into three factions, him, Crouch/McMenemy/Corbett and the Executive directors he had brought in to run the club on a daily basis, barely six months after his arrival Wilde found his position untenable, within three months of his departure caretaker Chairman Crouch found in turn himself ousted by the Executives, Lowe had not been gone three months, yet power in the club had changed hands three times, is it any wonder the mess we now find ourselves in.

The truth of the matter is that most of the wages in question now were authorised when Wilde, Lowe & Crouch were not at the Club, the real period of financial mismangement was July/August 07, the three major shareholders were out and the Club was being run by Jim Hone and his Executives, in effect the tail was now wagging the dog in some respects, but even that doesnt tell the full story, on the face of it Hone presided over some financial folly, however he was presiding over complete and utter chaos in the boardroom and was in real terms having to apply martial law, to be blunt he was also trying to placate supporters dismayed at the loss of several players ie Bale Jones etc and wanting to see some of that money used to replace them, in this respect the man to blame is George Burley, he brought in a load of over priced underperformers, he failed as a manager and Hone failed to ensure that we didnt pay over inflated prices, one word in his defence though, he couldnt win, if he dindt pay the money he would have been branded by the supporters for not spending money and if he had blocked the spending he would have been accused of interfering with the football side of things, sound familiar ?

So to be truthful no one minds paying decent wages when the players perform, but when they turn out to be worse than average fingers have to be pointed, here they have to be firmly in the direction of George Burley, he was a manager where his boardroom backed his judgement with money.

But Wilde/Crouch/Hone/Lowe are not the only ones in the boardroom to blame, what about Club Financial Director David Jones, yes it was his signature on the checkbook, but it could be said he wasnt calling the shots, the contracts were being drawn up by another executive director Lee Hoos, was Jones more of a book keeper than the man calling the shots, the go ahead for the expenditure would have been at board level not one  mans decision.

Also Lawrie McMenemy and Mary Corbett, in the case of the latter it has to be said her credentials are impeccable, the daughter of Sir John Corbett whose business acumen during his directorship was a major influence in its recovery in the 50's onwards, however whilst Mary Corbett herself is a passionate supporter of the Club, in all respects a fan on the board it could be said, albeit one whose family are very rich rather than your average supporter, she clearly had no real business experience, certainly not in running a football club, there is no doubt she was marganalised at this time, however she surely must have been aware of the financial folly at the time, she was in a position where she could have stood up and been counted and made public her concerns,, however she didnt and neither did Lawrie McMenemy.

Lawrie of course is a man who will ever be linked with the club and deserves his place in the history books (and the boardroom wall come to that) at this moment in time Lawrie is very vocal about how he thinks that the Club is being badly run and many would say quite rightly so, however at the time these player emmolluments were being authorised he was saying nothing, again I have no doubt that he like Corbett was being marganalised, indeed the meeting of the football club board at this time was described to me as nothing more than a coffee morning, being that Lawre & Mary were out on a limb, however he was still a director and he with his high profile was in a perfect position to ask questions, he was entitled to ask them in the boardroom as he was a director and if he had asked them in the press as he is now could it have changed things at Saints earlier and before we had gone too far down the road to financial meltdown.

Of course Lawrie and Mary might have had their reasons for staying quiet, firstly Lawrie was also an employee of the Club and would undoubtably be have been in an untenable position and also as we know Leon Crouch was working on another boardroom coup, perhaps the tactic was that it was better to keep them inside the club with their finger on the pulse rether than to see them both ousted alongside both Wilde and Crouch.

But the fact remains that Saints are in a difficult position, Lowe is firmly in charge now and as far as we know no one is in a position to oust him, that being the case then surely the priority should be to keep Saints in the Championship and out of administration and with that in mind alongside the fact that virtually no ex director is blameless in all this, they all need to try and work together and if they cant do that then the least we supporters should expect is that if the club goes down its not through friendly fire as they now call it, ie being hit bythose sussposedly on your own side.

Many will read this and start firing the accusations that I am pro Lowe, nothing could be farther from the truth, im not pro anyone as much as Im not anti anyone either, all I am is Pro Southampton Football Club, I want what is best for that, whatever my personal feelings and whoever is in charge.

It is easy to try and make this a one man withc hunt, but this situation isnt black & white, of course relegation put us in a bad psotition, but when we were relegated in 1974, within two years we were FA Cup winners and embarking on the best period in the clubs history, like in life itself setbacks are always going to happen, its about how you respond to them, in my life I have always tried to be positive and change the things that I can when setbacks occur whilst not whinging about what has put me there and that I cannot change, its time that Southampton Football Club and all those involved started to realise this themselves.       

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