Southampton news: Opinion – Adam Blackmore on Saints leadership

Over the course of Thursday, BBC Radio Solent’s Adam Blackmore has delivered four Saints blogs. Parts one to three can be found further down the page, while these words focus on structures at the club and the immediate future.

Amidst all the doom and gloom – and boy Saints had a lot of gloom – there are small shoots of hope. The appointment of Johannes Spors is a good one as the new technical director.

In my mind, you go two ways; if Dragan Solak is serious about taking over the running of the club by making himself chairman, then Spors and Parsons should report to him, in the same way that Thiago Pinto and Jim Frevola report to owner/chairman Bill Foley at Bournemouth, as respective head of football and business.

Parsons has done a lot to drive costs down and generate much-needed revenue streams, and his work with the council to resurrect the area around St. Mary’s in the long term could be great for the club and the city.

But the main thing is that the football operations are run by Spors – and he at least gets a chance to create a co-ordinated, consistent, aligned football policy from academy to first team, that sees him oversee everything, working hand in hand with the new manager to provide him with the players he needs to be successful. It won’t work if Spors gets overruled by Ankersen or anyone else, bar him having to work to the financial restraints of the club. He’s done enough at Red Bull and 777 to at least be trusted with the keys. I imagine he’d walk if he felt compromised.

After all, Sport Republic are hardly in a position to tell him how to do his job. They have at times been casual in their decision-making, lacked the strength to see their plans through without buckling under pressure, lurched from one footballing direction to another, and made an absolute mess of most of three and a half years in charge. And they have done this without engaging with supporters publicly in any regular or open way, even in times like now when leadership from the top is really needed.

I am pleased that Solak has resumed control and that gives me hope. But if they do not get promoted at the first time of asking again in a year’s time, there is a chance he may have had enough. We will see. What I do know is that the next managerial appointment is huge. While Danny Rohl has been a target for a while, and a good target in my opinion, he may get more attractive offers. So whoever it is, it needs to be a serious footballing appointment, not a crazy gamble when there are more surer-fire options out there. And I trust Spors to deliver that person more than I trust the owners.

Southampton Football Club and its supporters deserve to be taken more seriously than they have been. When you own a football club you have a responsibility to a whole city, a fan base, and well over 100 years of history and tradition. Like the Premier League, it’s to be taken seriously. It’s not a tech startup or a vanity project for those who are its custodians.