Mauricio Pochettino will not discuss a new contract till the summer, but as he is quick to point out, this should not be a cause for speculation.
Saints manager Mauricio Pochettino has been quick to point out that he is not out of contract in the summer but has another year on his deal left to run, this being the case their is no hurry to sign up a new deal.
The Argentinian is right, manger's contracts are not like players deals, effectively there is no transfer fee for a manager, if a manager is poached by another club during his contract, something that happens all the time in football, then usually his new club will compensate his old one by paying up his contract, given the short shelf life of managers at clubs especially in the Premiership, most managerial contracts are far shorter than players, Pochettino himself arrived on a 2 1/2 year deal and is only half way through at present.
Of course longer deals only really mean one thing to a club and that is higher compensation payment if the manager is poached, but for a Premier League club that compensation being only the paying up of the remaining term of the contract is minimal compared to a players transfer fee.
In the case of Pochettino though many Saints fans are looking towards the manager signing a new deal as a statement of intent, not just from the manager himself but from Katharina Liebherr and her new executives.
This being the case though, that in itself is a good reason why contract talks will not have begun in earnest, Gareth Rogers has only been a temporary CEO up until last week and we have also been waiting for Ralph Krueger to finish his Olympic commitments, this means that not only did we not have the team in place to hold negotiations until last week, but that the manager himself would want to know who he is going to be dealing with before committing himself in future.
British football fans have in the main not grasped how the contract system is used on the Continent, over there they see a contract as just that, if they sign for 3 years say, then that is how they view their employment with the club, no more no less, they do not see the need to change that contract unless there is a good reason, Pochettino has repeatably stated he is contracted here for another year, many choose to ignore that and think that unless he signs another deal then his loyalty is in question.
At the moment his loyalty is exactly where it should be and that is to the team, if we look at things logically there has been a big upheaval at the club, any manager would want to see just how the new regime works before committing themselves and i think that would go for any employment situation, football or otherwise, a wise man would see what is in place and if he likes it be happy to consider a new deal, but to ask Pochettino to sign up before Krueger is in place, before a new CEO is appointed is ludicrous, but that hasnt stopped some supporters demanding it and suggesting that every day he doesnt shows that he isnt committed beyond the summer.
No Pochettino is right, the summer is the best time, both parties will have had time to assess each other and whether they are both right going forward, hopefully Pochettino will like what he sees being put in place, he will want to stay here and take us further forward, however he will get other offers and will be tempted, any manager who does well will be put in those positions, he will also know its a precarious position, he knows what happened to his two predecessors and he will also know that many of his managerial colleagues have not taken big jobs and never had the chance again, he will have to balance things up if that arises.
One thing we should be sure of though, yes the situation has changed at St Mary's and yes this may change Pochettino's view of his job, however he is no fool, he knows about the shortcomings of his previous line manager and just as much as he may be disapointed that Nicola Cortese left, he might actually think that things are more stable here now and he is in a better position, after all if he and the Chairman were so close, why did he not jump ship when linked with jobs earlier in the season as he would surely have known that Cortese was in his notice period, as I say if Real Madrid offer Pochettino a job, he would just as likely have taken it six months ago as he would now.
So we Saints fans should take note of what our manager says, the time for discussing his contract is the summer, there are more important things to concentrate before that, firstly in at least equalling our previous best Premier league finish, the 8th achieved under Gordon Strachan in 2003 and then we can concentrate on contracts although as Pochettino himself acknowledges, the three players who will have a year to run in the summer are a bigger priority than him, as after all players do attract big fee's managers dont.