Saints Chairman Ralph Krueger has explained the rationale behind the board reshuffle that has seen Katharina Liebherr leave the board of the football club.
Ralph Krueger has spoken to the Daily Echo of why there has been a sudden re jigging on the Saints board and says that it is not the signal that there will be an imminent completion of the proposed takeover by Lander Holdings.
Indeed it seems to have gone a little quiet on that front although Krueger does hint that this restructure will stay in place if and when it does happen and with no CEO in place this could mean that this position would be filled by someone chosen by Lander Holdings, either way it does suggest that Saints and Lander are in close communication even if nothing is happening at present.
Chairman Ralph Krueger, vice chairman of football Les Reed and vice chairman of business Martin Semmens will lead the club as part of a three man strategic board.
There is also now an operational board that sits below that, responsible for running the club on a daily basis.
Finance chief Toby Steele, legal expert Tim Greenwell and commercial boss David Thomas have all been officially confirmed as the first raft of directors to sit on it.
Krueger told the Echo.
"In the reorganisation we will not have a CEO anymore and we are not looking to hire anybody.
"We have an extremely strong, young, dynamic, very intelligent, well-educated group of operational managers.
"We will have an interim managing director in Toby Steele, who will retain his CFO role.
"At the strategic board level we now have a three person strategic board. That is myself as chairman, Les Reed will be elevated to vice-chairman of football, and Martin Semmens, who has been key in forming our strategy, in particular with commercial and the way our brand is developing, will take the vice-chairmanship of business."
"We will be the strategic board of the club and Toby Steele will be the connection as the CFO/interim-MD to the operational management, which is very youthful and dynamic.
"I think it will give people comfort to know we have that strategic board and the operational board, which is something we are developing the final steps in right now.
"We have built a foundation as a business, and like on the pitch we never want to let our guard down, we always want to look at ways to improve and to get stronger, and that’s what we are doing at the moment here internally.
"No matter the ownership position moving forward, this is the group driving the club forward, and this management team will stay intact.”
Saints appear to have swept the decks clean ready for Lander to take the major shareholding and it would seem that the Chinese company would want this structure to remain in place if they take over with the addition of their own man as CEO to oversee.
Whatever happens it seems that Saints have a structure in place to adapt, certainly Krueger as Chairman of the strategic board would seem to have a bigger role to play than before as with the departure of Gareth Rogers as CEO, someone has to take charge of the company as a whole.