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The final throes of Southampton’s league campaign is how Christmas Day usually ends.
Burned out, sprawled on all fours and enduring a severe come down after the early morning festivities.
Presents unwrapped, dinner eaten and by the time the Queen’s speech has finished, granny is sleeping on the sofa and you’re slouched on the chair opposite. All the good stuff has come and gone and now you are facing up to the cold harsh reality that today, the day you had such high hopes for, is ending with a puff, rather than a bang.
Fatigue has pervaded the limbs and despite some exhilarating early moments, you have nothing more to give. Not even the thought of the Eastenders Christmas special or in Southampton’s case, 10,000 fans returning, can reinvigorate the mind.
Southampton’s league campaign is coming to a sad ending after a more than promising start. European dreams have proven to be a mere fantasy and now the club is consigned to another season petering out into nothingness – and that is if you’re lucky (this writer promises not to use the R-word yet).
Southampton’s latest defeat to Brighton – their 10th in 12 games – was probably their most disappointing of the season. It was a sombre, timid display, fraught with lethargy and tinged with regret. Though perhaps the most disappointing and unexpected aspect of the whole day was how those in red and white lost any semblance of belief midway through the second half.
Manager Ralph Hasenhuttl also cut a strangely subdued figure throughout. Make no mistake, Saints’ season has come to a grinding halt. All early optimism has dissipated and instead proven to possess severe misgivings of the actual overall quality within the side. The incremental improvements the squad had tangibly demonstrated under Hasenhuttl over the previous two years have altogether stalled.
Players are tiring, the manager is growing more frustrated with each passing defeat and the overall mood within the club appears crestfallen. Supporters, meanwhile, are condemned to watch from home, shouting at the television in desperate hope that the players can somehow hear and be reminded to actually get the ball forward.
“There was not enough energy or power,” Hasenhuttl told Prost International. “To go for these balls, to fight. The deliveries of the balls were not good, the positioning was not good. It was too slow when we changed the side.”
The change Hasenhuttl is referring to transpired midway through the second half, soon after Brighton went ahead for the second time. His side still had 34 minutes, along with added time, to rally a resurgence. The Saints boss elected to change shape, deviating away from his trademark 4-2-2-2 in exchange for a 3-5-2 system, hoping structural alteration could extract some much-needed intensity.
Instead, nothing of the sort came. In fact, Southampton actually got worse. Hasenhuttl viewed their last half hour in some form of 30 minute microcosm nightmare, calling it ‘chaotic’ and without ‘a plan.’
All through the Hasenhuttl/Southampton dynamic, one thing you could never dispute was the work ethic of the players. Whatever the result, win, lose or draw, you could habitually guarantee those eleven men would leave every single bead of sweat out on the field. Heck, only two months ago this writer assembled a 2000-word love letter to this trait after victory against Liverpool.
But now, the club and Hasenhuttl are tail-spinning into something dangerous. The manager’s winter suspicions that this squad of players is on the brink of reaching their Premier League ceiling has proven prophetic. Recent weeks have seen Hasenhuttl be staunchly categoric in his desires for next season.
On record and seemingly repeated in every fleeting meeting with the media, the Austrian has stated the club need to find a way of improving next campaign. There is a rather significant snag to that viewpoint though. He doesn’t think the marked development can come courtesy of the academy. Rather, Hasenhuttl sees the only beneficial route to be through “a lot of” new additions.
Greasing the wheels for the summer window can only occur when Southampton have guaranteed what league they’ll be in. Hasenhuttl’s comments underline how pining for the end of this condensed season is the only way they can halt the slippery slope they appear fastened on.
Only when afforded respite can time for clarity in thought prevail. It’s painstakingly obvious Hasenhuttl and his team need some form of extended break, longer than the brief interludes they’ve been getting over the past 12 helter-skelter months. Hasenhuttl’s words after Brighton mirrors the current situation at the club – chaotic.
Think back to when Southampton have achieved any guise of success in recent years. Prosperity has usually arrived after being built upon a platform of stability and long-term strategic planning.
A truncated, undercooked pre-season has meant by the time the 2020/21 season finishes, it will be more or less a year of non-stop football for this team. While it’s true all squads have had to tussle with the same issue, the fragile contours of this Saints side means they have been afflicted by the schedule more than most. ‘Project Restart’ began last June – this season concludes at the back-end of May.
The campaign’s conclusion, unprecedented to the extreme and rife with an overarching sense that you are constantly side-stepping ticking time bombs, will signify Ralph Hasenhuttl’s defining period as boss. He and chief executive Martin Semmens will finally be afforded a period of time to reset targets, re-discover their identity and forge a new path in which they can begin to tread.
Winning is a habit and on the flip side, so is losing. It is a tendency that permeates through the entire team and when the general malaise has fully set in, it’s then difficult to shake. But Sunday’s latest case was the most revealing and showed where this group is psychologically at.
While the second half drop off is an alarming pattern than needs to be solved, the discernible lack of fight now presents an altogether more daunting challenge. It indicated a sense apathy had spread across the entire team and reached a point where questions can be asked in regards to motivation.
Instability within the ownership model has now correlated into something similar on the pitch and players look unsure what direction they are supposed to be heading in. When there’s a wilting squad with an opaque goal, the fall from grace will only grow more acute.
Safely negotiating the end of the season is a must. Forget a top half finish or any other fanciful ambitions. Secure safety and then be provided sufficient time to rest, recover and build. How they exactly do the latter remains unsolved. Whether it’s finding a solution for Ryan Bertrand’s contract or supplying a new stimulus to the squad and coaching staff, the can needs to stop being kicked further down the road.
Perhaps the quarter finals of the FA Cup next week will prove all is not lost and this year will not just be another one that pales into the forgotten chapters of the history book. Right now, Southampton need to find some breathing room, a clear head and a transparent strategy. They know the current ownership model won’t do them any favours so need to be creative in sourcing solutions.
Get through this whirlwind of a season and start afresh, bringing the catharsis they all crave. And maybe, who knows, you’ll remember that feeling of Christmas morning again.
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