The UGly Inside strips away all the emotional padding and takes a pragmatic look at the possible return of two former boardmembers. 

According to latest press reports former Chairman Rupert Lowe and major shareholder Michael Wilde are about to join forces and march back into St Mary's.

The first reaction of many Saints supporters would be one of horror, but would they be right at such a reaction ? lets look at a few facts rather than the emotional fiction that has been a major contribution to this club's downfall.

My gut feeling on this unholy alliance is that Wilde and Lowe have given Leon Crouch enough rope to hang himself, they allowed him to fight a personal battle with Jim Hone last December in which Crouch made several statements about how Hone was conducting the club, including that Hone was exagerating the financial situation for his own benefit, Crouch followed this up with similar outbursts about Saints not needing to sell players in the January transfer window, in the meantime as Crouch deposed Hone, Wilde and Lowe sat back and let him, did they know that what Hone had stated was true and were they quite prepared to let Crouch take the flak ?

What is for sure is that after the departure of the executives, that there is no one within the Club capable of running a multi million pound PLC or a football club of this magnitude come to that, Lowe and wilde knew this and merely had to sit back and watch the Club decline, players were rleased in the January transfer window for financial reasons, a Chief executive for the PLC was not forthcoming as promised at the AGM and then Crouch took a big gamble in not replacing George Burley for so long, the duo on the sidelines must have been rubbing their hands with glee.

With no imminent signs of new investment in truth, if we take away all the emotional baggage, Wilde and lowe are quite right to demand a seat on the board, major shareholders are usually represented so why shouldnt they be, but it looks likely that they will be a lot more than just board members, in effect they will want to wrest power from Leon Crouch, with perhaps the only thing they have in common being the fact that both hate Crouch more than they hate each other, in this respect it cant be good for the club.

But in other respects it could be good, for all his faults, Lowe and presuambly Andrew Cowan, actually know how to run a football club and a PLC, their mistakes were not made in the boardroom but in trying to interfere too much in the football side of things, it pains me to say it but Lowe and Cowan actually have the expertise that this club needs in this time of crisis, keep them away from the manager etc, but apart from that give me a man with the knowledge and expertise above inexperience anyday.

So from this perspective their return could be a good thing, the problem before was that Lowe was only accountable to himself, now he wouldnt be, the idea shouldnt be thrown out, out of hand.

But to be blunt this would only be another reshuffle of the pack, the same faces doing the same thing and although it might stabilise us for a short time, it wouldnt make us turn the corner overnight, in truth the long term future needs to be sorted out, board members in any companies let alone football clubs are not there to run the operation themselves, their first role is to represent the shareholders and their second to counsel and advise the executives running the company.

With this in mind surely the best solution would be to appoint a Chief Executive to run the company, set him the blueprint for running the club and then let him get on with the job, the major shareholders should then sit back and fulfill their true roles and that is not the day to day running of the club. 

In truth this is what Michael Wilde's original manifesto proposed, he installed a Chief Executive and other exec's to run the club and the intention was to sit back and let them run it, unfortunately to secure the majority shareholding he had to "buy" the support of other shareholders like Crouch and Mary Corbett and the price he had to pay was a seat on the board for them and this is where the problems started.

So the possible return of Michael and Rupert might be an improvement on the current set up, but it sure is a long way from being ideal for Southampton Football Club.                    

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