For the second year running, Southampton lost key players in the summer. Instead of panicking, however, they simply kept faith with the philosophy that had already served them so well.
Morgan Schneiderlin, Toby Alderweireld and Nathaniel Clyne were vital components of the side that finished seventh last term, with their departures to Manchester United, Tottenham Hotspur and Liverpool in the summer robbing the south-coast club of three talented stars approaching the primes of their careers.
A year earlier, Southampton lost even more first-team players: Rickie Lambert, Dejan Lovren, Adam Lallana, Calum Chambers and Luke Shaw all moved on to pastures new.
Mauricio Pochettino, the manager, also left, for Tottenham, leading many to predict Southampton would face a relegation battle.
That they were never threatened by relegation, and actually spent much of the campaign challenging for a Uefa Champions League spot, is testament to the fine work done by Pochettino’s successor, Ronald Koeman, and the long-term planning, direction and infrastructure in place behind the scenes at St Mary’s.
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Southampton have long given the impression that they are routinely thinking two steps ahead.
Potential replacements for players likely to leave are earmarked months before bids are submitted, with the continent also scoured for managers who might fit the bill should the position at Southampton suddenly become vacant.
There is a thriving analytics department that seeks out the marginal gains that are seen as so important in modern sport, with another group of staff dedicated to recruitment.
Southampton’s academy, meanwhile, is arguably the best in England, with Gareth Bale, Theo Walcott, Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, Lallana and Shaw among its most notable alumni.
Les Reed, the executive director of football, is responsible for ensuring the operation runs smoothly and that Southampton’s work in different areas is coherent and coordinated.
It is an eminently sensible way of running a Premier League club in the modern era, where the average tenure of managers decreases almost year on year.
The set-up is sacrosanct at Southampton, with incoming individuals forced to fit into a pre-existing structure.
Such a system prevents an over-reliance on a single figure, and means that when coaches or players move on the established way of working does not follow them through the exit door. At Southampton, continuity is paramount.
The approach has brought a great deal of success in recent years; it is easy to forget that Southampton were competing in League One, England’s third tier, as recently as 2011.
After a difficult start to the current campaign, Koeman’s side have been excellent of late, losing just one of 10 top-flight games since mid-August.
Arguably their best performance came in the 3-1 victory at Stamford Bridge in September, when champions Chelsea were vanquished in style, but subsequent displays against Liverpool, Bournemouth and Sunderland were also impressive.
Their terrific run has gone slightly under the radar, but Koeman’s men now find themselves up in seventh place, ahead of Liverpool and just a point behind Tottenham, who have rightly been lauded for their own fantastic form of late.
Chelsea’s capitulation means fourth spot is there for the taking, and while Southampton are, at best, third favourites to finish there, they certainly should not be written off.
Whether or not an unlikely place in the Champions League is achieved, the likes of Sadio Mane, Dusan Tadic, Virgil van Dijk, Victor Wanyama and Jordy Clasie are sure to attract attention from elsewhere next summer.
Koeman, too, has won plenty of admirers and could be a target for a major European side in need of a manager ahead of the 2016/17 campaign.
His current employers will not panic if the former Feyenoord coach does decide to move on; that is simply not how they work.
As another push for European football gathers pace, Southampton continue to act as a shining example for similar-sized clubs to emulate.
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