Southampton Youth Forced to Jump Ship

The QEII set sail for its last voyage on a brisk Southampton evening recently. The most prodigious cruise liner was leaving the docks and travelling the world, before settling down in Dubai to become a floating hotel. Southampton has seen the back of many famous iconic belongings before.
Southampton Football Club, unfortunately, has followed a similar stature.
Those who are born down in the South Coast built the QEII, like many other cruise liners. Generally, they are always sold to the highest bidder after going into retirement. Normally they go to the Far East where the money seems to grow on trees. The powerhouses and money always tend to get what they want.
Southampton Football Club follows in a similar blueprint again.
The relegation in 2005 contributed to the free fall of the fragile club. Promotion was necessary as money quickly dried up. The club has seen Harry Redknapp, George Burley, and Nigel Pearson come and leave, promotion has rarely been insight.
The wrong end of the table is more often or not is where you will see Southampton. Only an amazing survival mission last season, led by Pearson, confirmed their Championship status on the last day.
Now in the latter part of 2008, new coach Jan Poortvliet has only the youth team to, more or less, choose from, it is obvious that any potential gems would be snapped up as the Saints are in desperate need for funds.
Rupert Lowe is trying to sort the finances to make the club self-reliant. Attendances have been spiralling and the ticket prices cannot be reduced because it would not cover the expenditures. Lowe relied on a minimum of 18,000 turning up every game but that figure reads more like 14,000 currently. They are literally scraping the bottom of the barrel. Sending big earners like Stern John, Nathan Dyer, Marek Saganowski, and Grzegorz Rasiak out on loan to cut costs in an essential process.
Young players have to be the ones to rely on, Andrew Surman, Adam Lallana, Oliver Lancashire and David McGoldrick are vital to the team’s success. The fans irritably know that if any of these performers play well enough constantly they will be soon joining the bigger clubs.
Many homemade Saints players leave in a similar way to the QEII. Leaving to the highest bidder and forgetting the sheer foundations they began with. The glorified money from the Premier League and Dubai run hand in hand. The lure seems too much for some. They both seem to want everything and it is the teams like Southampton and their productive youth system that suffer.
Players like Gareth Bale, Theo Walcott, and Wayne Bridge have been prime examples of overzealous fat cats digging their claws in the smaller teams.
Bale was casted off to Tottenham Hotspur when he was worth something. He is young, gifted and an uprising pinnacle star for the Welsh nation side, so it was no surprise he attracted the big clubs. He was worth more than the mere £5million they receive for him.
Walcott was keenly sold to Arsenal. His potential was huge and he rightly made a massive profit for his former employers. He sparked plenty of talk and publicity for the club as his worth of £12million remarkably helped fund the team.
Bridge was another left back that appealed to the masses of the Premier League; he left for Chelsea and their Russian Revolution for £7million, after establishing himself as a regular England squad player.
Chris Baird is another well-established international and another one that graduated through the Saints academy ranks before leaving and plying his trade in the Premier League.
Do you remember Alan Shearer scoring a hat trick on his full debut against Arsenal? Looking how his career has unfolded.
However, some gems do stay on board. The famous of which must be Matt Le Tissier. He graced the club with so much prestige and class that he never wanted to leave. The closest he came was when he was on the brink of joining Tottenham Hotspur before he chose his heart over money. Not many players can do that this day and age.
Francis Benali was Southampton through and through. He has spent his complete professional career at the Saints, now he is winding his career down with a few appearances for Eastleigh.
Jason Dodd was a permanent fixture at right back for 16 years; he learnt his trade through the Academy as well. He was good enough to move on and if he did, he could have had England credentials.
Dodd was another shining example of the fine academy Southampton has provided.
Well it seems blatantly obvious that Southampton’s strength is also its downfall. Producing high quality players year in and year out, but having to be under the severe pressure to sell them when they are undervalued and before they reached any sort of peak.