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CEO Phil Parsons Praises Loyalty Of Southampton Supporters.

Phil Parson's has been on the charm offensive ahead of this week which by the end of it will probably see the end of the Spygate saga, whether that verdict will be good or bad for the club.

The chosen outlet for Parson's thoughts on the matter seem to be BBC Sport with whom he has given an interview which is being put up in snippets,

Today Parson's has talked about the loyalty of the Saints supporters over the past 5 months, he is right to do so, because one thing we know from the whole sorry incident is that the one innocent party in all this is the Southampton fans.

None of us knew anything about the spying going on till the news broke and all of us spent good hard earned money on following the team throughout the season, indeed some fans lost money on travel and hotel rooms booked for the Play off final at Wembley where they were unable to get refunds with Saints kickout of the game by the EFL so close to the game itself.

Parson's had this to say to BBC Sport:

"Its been a tough summer, lets not pretend this has been an easy situation to get through..

"Not just for us, this is the fans coming together, this the community around Southampton, how businesses are impacted.

"You start going into 'how will season tickets go?' We've got incredibly loyal fans and they've come back in huge numbers and supported us."

Southampton reported in July, that more than 15,000 supporters had renewed their season tickets for the 2026-2027 season.

Chief revenue officer Greg Baker said at the time:

"The response has been fantastic and it's a real reflection of the passion and loyalty of our fanbase."

The average attendance for their opening four Championship matches at St Mary's this season is 28,945, an increase on the 28,444 across the 2025-26 campaign.

The Southampton CEO also went on to reiterate the commitment to the club from owner Dragan Solak and Sport Republic and that the outcome of the upcoming FA verdict will not impact this.

"Dragan talks to everybody very regularly. He loves the club. He really wants to take it forward in the right way.

"We've got some really interesting projects around the club longer term. It's not just a one-year piece.

"The football is always about wanting to get back to the Premier League. You want to compete as quickly as possible, and financially that is quite draining on a club.

"I think Dragan's commitment is higher than ever, but I think that's a question for him."

This is going to be a tense week for all Saints fans but as I mentioned in yesterdays article Could Southampton look to repeat managerial solution of january-2000 losing a manager to external circumstances is not a new experience for the club or it's fans.

Back in the 1999/2000 season then CEO Rupert Lowe has some difficult issues to deal with after manager Dave Jones was charged with some historical allegations regarding his time as a care worker in a childrens home.

That mean a change of manager at short notice and Glenn Hoddle was brought in from the cold to replace Jones, something that our current board some 27 years later might well need to look at and consider in the next few days.

Whatever happens at the FA hearing it will finally enable us to move forward as a club and put this behind us.

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