Former Arsenal and England centre-half Martin Keown has stated that he believes Southampton have uncovered another ‘gem’ when it comes to Austrian gaffer Ralph Hasenhuttl.
With Hasenhuttl coming in as Mark Hughes replacement earlier in the 2018/19 season, Southampton have turned from a club with successive struggles, back into one where there are now genuine hopes that we can start moving back up the table.
With survival looking likely now in the Premier League given the gap to Cardiff, victory over Bournemouth later today could see relegation back to the Championship go into the mathematically impossible category and then preparations for next year can really begin.
Keown is probably mostly known for his BBC work, but he also writes a regular column for the Daily Mail and in Friday’s Tackle Keown Q&A session, he felt the Saints were now back on track with the appointment of Hasenhuttl and that as long as the Board backed him, we would return to the developing success we had under Mauricio Pochettino and Ronald Koeman.
“When he took over from Mark Hughes, Southampton were 18th in the table and three points from safety. Now they’re on the brink of salvaging their Premier League status. Ralph Hasenhuttl has been a breath of fresh air. Southampton have a habit of this. They have had some good managers in the past, such as Mauricio Pochettino and Ronald Koeman. Players, too, with a good chunk of them being sold on to Liverpool like Sadio Mane and Virgil van Dijk. Now, in Hasenhuttl, it looks like they’ve unearthed another gem. They should back him in the summer and let him build the club up.”
He’s not the first pundit to have noticed the massive swing in form we’ve seen, even if there are still areas to improve on and some results haven’t gone our way still and there are a large number of fans who see similarities with the manager’s we’ve had in better days, so again, there’s every reason for optimism moving forward.
