Big Sam was 5th in the Premire League with a fecking Bolton. Leipzig, the new sugar daddy football club? Nothing special finishing 2nd in Bundesliga with that squad. In the last 2 decades, Bremen and Wolfsburg were winning it with a worse squad by miles.
Mate, you're having a shocker. Bolton never finished higher than 6th with big Sam in charge. It happened in 2004-2005 and even then that team was filled with a mix of international and experienced players. Here are some of them: Jaaskalainen, Ben Haim, Hierro, Ivan Campo, Kevin Nolan, Jay Jay Ochocha, Gianakopulus, Gary Speed(RIP), El Hadji Diouf, Ricardo Vaz Te and Kevin Davis(feck him injuring Cleverly). The reason I'm mentioning them is because all of them are vintage PL players. You can't think of the PL in the Mid '00 without thinking at least about one of these guys. And do you know why? Because they were really good PL players.
Now compare that to the current Soton side and we only have Ings, Ward Prose, Walcott, Long and Forster who are comparable. Everyone else are good players, but nobody is going to remember them in 5-10 years time. You'll see them mentioned in one of these "Players you've forgotten that existed" threads.
Yes we saw the same Southampton here, the same mid-table football club for years. They are playing with the same game plan every match. Pressing high early, then sitting back when their energy is going down. They counter attack the opposition side by using Ings and Adams strenght, then here comes the set-piece advantages. The only difference between him and Big Sam is pressing high early in the first half, but that would be costly when the players are getting tired in the 2nd half. Their goal-differences are 3rd worst in the 2nd half just behind Sheffield and Westbrom.
Well damn. I guess the CEO is doing the coaching and training then if all of the coaches change, but their tactics are the same. Ralph must be stealing a living. Must have some the best job in the world where you just show up collect your paycheck and nothing changes because that's the way the club is run.
I can clearly tell that you're not watching a lot of football. Soton has a lot less resources then some of the clubs you mentioned. They are the modern day equivalent of Wigan Athletic. Unlike other clubs you mentioned such as West Ham and Leicester who can keep their core groups of players for years running, Soton is a small selling club. They constantly have to sell their top players just to balance their books. A PL equivalent of Monaco and Ajax.
This is why Ralph has them playing the way they are. A bare bones squad require bare bones solutions, hence the other reliance on set pieces. Or do you want to tell me that set pieces are an inferior tactic? That Fergie's Treble winners were also set piece merchants because we literally won the CL final via 2 corners and started our comeback against Juve via a corner as well.
And one thing you should take note about Soton is how good their recruiting is in general even amongst managers. If they were a success there, they were a success elsewhere. Poch at Spurs and Koeman is now managing Barca. Those lads clearly know what they're doing.
And what is your obsession with Big Sam? Bring up Moyes. The man literally finished 4th with Everton. He also relied on set pieces to earn points with Fellaini and Tim Cahill being really good headers of the ball. And right now he is going a pretty good job at West Ham.