As expected Russell Martin has restructured the first team coaching set up in a move that sees 4 new faces joining him at Southampton, with only one of last years coaching staff remaining in place.
The news of new faces is coming thick and fast in the last couple of weeks at St Mary's and now just a week after his own appointment Russell Martin has unveiled his coaching set up in an article on southamptonfc.com
As predicted Martin brings in four of his staff from Swansea City, the new Assistant manager will be Matt Gill who was in the same role at Swansea, Gill had a long playing career that spanned 8 clubs and 353 League games plus another 104 in the National League before going into coaching in 2014 as Assistant manager at Tranmere, followed by positions at Norwich, Ipswich and MK Dons where he linked up with Russell Martin again after both had been team mates at Norwich in 2009-11.
Dean Thornton also joins Martin on the move from South Wales as Goalkeeping Coach, Thornton was with Martin at not only Swansea but also MK Dons and has spent the past 7 years being 1st team goalkeeping coach in various jobs before joining MK Dons in 2019, including Swindon Town and the Taiwan National side
Also arriving from Swansea are Rhys Owen, as First Team Sports Scientist, and Ben Parker, as First Team Tactics & Insights Analyst.
The final cog in the 6 man coaching set up is already at the club, Carl Martin remains as a first team coach.
Left to right: Ben Parker, Carl Martin, Dean Thornton, Russell Martin, Matt Gill, Rhys Owen.
Dave Horseman and Louis Carey who spent the latter half of the season just gone seconded to the first team have now returned to their normal roles, however Head of Sports Science Alek Gross and Goalkeeping Coach Andrew Sparkes have left their positions and the club altogether.
TUI Comment.
Whilst these appointments are not household names and therefore do not excite at first reading, like Russell Martin himself, it seems the club are putting in place those with experience at doing the job in hand, unlike Nathan Jones who was brought into an environment he had no experience in, all of the coaches now in place have experience at the level that we need them to operate in, we are putting square pegs in round holes, rather than going for those who maybe are star names as players, but have little coaching knowledge at this level.