Nice article from the Guardians daily email ....
It's minus 47 degrees outside – at least we assume so from the way everyone is dancing – but the Fiver's got hot hot heat over Southampton's decision to sack Nigel Adkins and appoint Mauricio Pochettino. And not just because it's yet another example of them foreigners coming over here and taking our jobs. Let's look at the hairless facts: Adkins's win percentage of 54.03 is the highest by a Southampton manager since the 19th century; he achieved back-to-back promotions from 2010-12; Southampton have lost two of their last 12 Premier League games and are 15th in the table.
Not that Adkins was sacked, of course. Southampton announced that they had "relieved him of his managerial duties", the most lamentable euphemism since Weird Uncle Fiver starting rambling about Mr Sheen and Kojak. "This decision has been made with the long-term ambitions of Southampton Football Club in mind," spraffed the club's palpably sane chief executive Nicola Cortese. "Whilst we acknowledge the contribution Nigel has made during the past two years, for the club to progress and achieve our long-term targets a change was needed."
Adkins has essentially been sacked for excellence. It is common to see newly-promoted managers sacke … sorry, relieved of their duties, under such circumstances. It's football's Pochettino Principle: chairmen sack a manager for failing to satisfy expectations that only exist because the manager overachieved to such an extent as to create a deluded sense of entitlement among the showers-that-be.
"I'm shocked at the timing, it's very strange and it's an odd thing to come to terms with today," said Matt Le Tissier. "It seems to be the way the club's being run under the chairman. Nothing's surprising and it's a bit of a laughing stock." Le Tissier is one of many reasons why the majority of football fans have been pretty fond of Southampton down the years, but plenty won't give a stuff what happens to them now.