Southampton F.C- A New Generation

[SG Cesc]

THE STADIUM

St. Mary's Stadium Info

Capacity: 32,500
UEFA Rating: 4 stars
Built: 2001

St. Mary's Stadium was built in 2001, back when Saints were in the Premiership. The stadium cost 32.5 million, which is as much as Man City bought Robinho for. In the year 1998 Southampton were in the Dell and it wasn't an all seater and the F.A announced that starting 2001 all stadiums had to be all seaters. Which meant Saints had to get a move on. Unforuantly Saint's ran into financial trouble, because of the stadium and now the team is still facing big loan debts.

Southampton F.C are a professional football club that were founded in 1885, when founded they were known as St. Mary's young men association. In the early years of the club the team played at the local common. In 1894 the club joined the southern league and changed their club name to Southampton F.C and it has stayed that ever since.

After three years of southern league glory the club raised enough funds for their first
proper stadium, they named the stadium The Dell. Just before the end of the 19th century the club had good luck turn their way and reached their first F.A cup final, but ended up losing 4-0 to Bury. Two years later the club again reached the F.A cup final, but again were defeated. This time 2-1 vs Shefield United.

After the first world war the club joined the new football league and started of in Division Three(League One). A year after the start of the football league, League Three was divided into South and North sections. The end of the 1920-1921 season finished in delight for everyone involved with the club with them earning promotion to Division Two. For a short amount of time Saints were forced to share stadiums with rivals Pompey at Fratton Park, due to a bomb landing on the pitch during the war.

1953 was a sad year for all Saints supporter as they plummeted back into Division Three. Which was very unlucky considering a few seasons before they lost promotion to the First Division, by 1 goal with Shefield United finishing ahead of them.

After relegation to the Third division it took the club four years to earn promotion back to Division Two. After establishing themselves as a Division Two club, having spent six years there, the club earn promotion to the promised land, the First Division. in the year of promotion Ted Bates was manager and Chivers scored 30 of the teams 85 goals.

In the following season the club avoided relegation, despite having a -18 goal difference, scoring 74 goals with yet another player having the majority of the teams goals, this season it was Ron Davies, a new signing, scoring 43 goals. Southampton stayed in the top division for eight years, in that time entering the Inter-Cities Fairs Cup and the UEFA Cup.

Half-way through the 1973-1974 season Ted Bates resigned and that led to Saints announcing Lawrie Mc Menemy as manager. But unfortunately he was unable to stop the club sliding to relegation.

Under Lawrie Mc Menemy the club earned its division two status back, after being relegated twice. But soon the greatest moment in the history of the club came, the 1976 F.A cup final at the old Wembley. It turned out that Sot'on legend, well So'ton legend after the match, Bobby Stokes gave Saints the winner in a one-nil match against Manchester United, who famously blamed the loss on their grey shirts, one thing the Saints fans said was.'' You chose the shirts!''.

In the 1978 season the club earned back its Division One status, by finishing second to Bolton Wanderers. In their fist season back in Division One they finished 14th. The next season turned out good for the club returning to Wembley for the League Cup Final losing to giants Nottingham Forest 3-2. At the end of that season he signed one of Southamptons best ever players Kevin Keegan.

Lawrie Mc Menemy left the club after 1984 season something that all Southampton fans were disappointed about. The club then hired Chris Nicholl as manager, who despite keeping them in the top flight got sacked after six years. He was then replaced by Ian Branfoot. By then arguably the best Saint ever, Le Tissier was in the first team. In 1990 Le God was voted PFA Player of The Year.

In 1992 Southampton F.C became founding members of the Premiership, having been in the top flight since 1978. In 1994 Ian Branfoot was sacked, with Saints facing the prospect of relegation. The manager after him was Exeter manager Ian Ball, who kept Sot'on in the Prem and the next season led them to tenth place, with Matt Le Tissier being purely inspirational.

Ian Branfoot in 1995 was lured to Man City, that left Southampton with yet another manager hunt. Luckily coach, David Merrington, stepped up to a job in management. In this season the club avoided relegation on goal difference.

Because of Merrington's poor season in charge they replaced him with Graeme Souness. Yet another manager failed to impress with the club again dodging relegation. One of the highs of the season was a 6-3 victory over Man U.

With Souness resigning the fans had another round of the great Southampton manager guessing game to play.
But few close to the club could predict this round with experienced Dave Jones being appointed manager for the 1997 campaigain.

But in the 1997 season the unexpected happened, again. With manager Jones bringing in some quality players the club finished 11th in the Premiership. A lucky risk from the board.

Manager Jones resigned for personal reasons and the next Saints manager, Glen Hoddle. Glen did a top job keeping the club away from the drop zone, but then received an offer he couldn't refuse, from Tottenham Hotspurs.

The next important part in Saint's history was the appointment of Scottish Gordan Strachan. In his first season he just set the mistakes right that the manager before him made. But in his next season he made miracles happen with Southampton reaching the F.A Cup final, which they lost to Arsenal and finished eighth in the Prem. Unfortunately Gordan resigned in March 2004.

The season after Strachen the club were relegated to the Championship and have dwelled there ever since, but their now out to change that and earn back their Prem status.

[SG Cesc]

CLUB RECORDS

Top Goalscorers
1st, Mick Channon: 185 Goals
2nd, Matt Le Tissier: 162 Goals
3rd, Terry Paine: 160 Goals

Biggest Win: 14-0 Vs Newbury Town.
Biggest Loss: 0-8 Vs Crystal Place
Most Appearances: Terry Paine: 815
Most Goals In a season: Derek Reeves, 44 Goals
Most goals in one match: Albert Brown, 7 Goals
Most spent on a player: 4 million for Rory Delap
Most received from a transfer: 12 million for Theo Walcott
Record attendance: 32,151 Vs Arsenal

08/09 Home kit

08/09 away kit

GREATEST PLAYERS

Matt Le Tissier: Matthew Le Tissier or Le God as Saints fans called him, is arguably the best player in the 120 years of the clubs history. He also scored one of the clubs best goals ever when he took on a 40-yard strike, which hit the net and was voted Premiership goal of the season. He spent his entire career at the club and retired in 2002 aged 33, he also earned just eight caps for England, but he would have earned more had his performances been more consistent.

Kevin Keegan: Kevin Keegan, the permed hair hero. King Kev was only at the club two years but was one of the best players in the clubs history. In his two seasons at the club he scored 37 goals, averaging a about goal every two games he was at the club. When brought to the club, the season before joining he had won European player of the year and achieved 6th place in the First Division the highest in the clubs history.

[SG Cesc]

Kelvin Davis

Position: GK
Country: England
Age: 32
Height: 185 cm

Bartosz Bialkowski

Position: GK
Country: Poland
Age: 21
Height: 193 cm

[SG Cesc]

DEFENDERS

Micheal Svensson
Position: Center Defender
Age: 33
Height: 184 cm
Country: Sweden

Chris Perry
Position: Center Defender
Age: 35
Height: 175 cm
Country: England

Wayne Thomas
Position: Center Defender
Age: 30
Height: 188 cm
Country: England

Lloyd James
Position: Right-Back
Age: 21
Height: 178 cm
Country: Wales

Olly Lancashire
Position: Center Defender
Age: 22
Height: 186 cm
Country: England

Jan-Paul Saeijs
Position: Center Defender
Age: 31
Height: 190 cm
Country: Holland

Jack Cork
Position: Center Defender
Age: 22
Height: N/A
Country: England

[SG Cesc]

MIDFIELDERS

Andrew Surman
Position: Midfield
Age: 22
Height: 178 cm
Country: England

Paul Wotton
Position: Center Mid
Age: 32
Height: 180 cm
Country: England

Lee Holmes
Position: Left Mid
Age: 22
Height: 173 cm
Country: England

Morgan Schneiderlin
Position: Center Attacking Mid
Age: 20
Height: 181 cm
Country: France

Simon Gillet
Position: Center Mid
Age: 23
Height: 165 cm
Country: England

Jake Thompson
Position: Center Mid
Age: 20
Height: 180 cm
Country: England

Jason Euell
Position: Center Attacking Mid
Age: 33
Height: N/A
Country: England-Jamaica

[SG Cesc]

David McGoldrick
Position: Center-Forward
Age: 22
Height: 185 cm
Country: England

Marek Saganowski
Position: Striker
Age: 31
Height: 178 cm
Country: Poland

Bradley Wright-Phillips
Position: Center-Forward
Age: 24
Height: 173 cm
Country: England

Grzegorz Rasiak
Position: Striker
Age: 30
Height: 191 cm
Country: Poland

Adam Lallana
Position: Centre-Forward
Age: 21
Height: 173 cm
Country: England

Tomasz Pekhart
Position: Striker
Age: 20
Height: N/A
Country: Poland

[PavaniCagliari]

Good luck nice graphics

[SG Cesc]

Yeah i know, but i'm not taking credit, Notts County made them.

[SG Cesc]

WOW.A 5 star vote already!

[LeeXD]

The op is very good, vastly improved. Lets hope that the reports can live up to that standard, I will be following

[SG Cesc]

Thank You. This will hopefully be allllllot better

[LeeXD]

Lets hope no 1* n00bs will come now, and when will the first report be up or are you filling in the op first?

Do you have facepacks?

[SG Cesc]

The order is OP then Update.

[SG Cesc]

Goalies up

[PavaniCagliari]

nice

[SG Cesc]

Thanks

[SG Cesc]

Strikers Up

[SG Cesc]

I'm off.

[Le-God7]

finally a saints one, gonna follow this.

[SG Cesc]

Midfielders up

[GK01]

Nice start so far even for a Arsenal fan, any chance you could tell me where you got your logos?

[The Legend]

Hope Soton don't get relegated

[SG Cesc]

Originally Posted by GK01

Nice start so far even for a Arsenal fan, any chance you could tell me where you got your logos?

What the OP graphics? Cause NottsCounty(Steve) made them, if that's not what you meant please specify.

[SG Cesc]

Player profiles completed.

[.DJ]

Very nice. Any updates coming?