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Maurico Pellegrino Marches Into Saints Job

Southampton’s albeit short search for a new manager has come to an end with the news that Mauricio Pellegrino has been appointed as the man to take over the St Mary’s hotseat. The former Valencia defender takes over from the previous incumbent Claude Puel after signing a three year deal.

With Southampton finishes eighth last season it could have been construed as somewhat harsh when the decision to sack Claude Puel was made last week, in terms of not just the league position and also a trip to Wembley it could have been viewed as a relatively successful season.

But this is a side that finished eighth with a points tally which was closer to the relegation places then it was that of Everton in seventh, in addition to that the football that Southampton played under Puel was not all that easy on the way and drew a lot in the way of criticism towards the former Monaco boss.

That meant that even with a healthy looking league finish under his belt the writing was on the wall for the Frenchman and it came as perhaps no real surprise when the two parties partied company just over seven days previously.

Some felt that Puel was given his marching orders because the club had already lined up a replacement, one of a Teutonic heritage as both former Borussia Dortmund boss Thomas Tuchel and former Bayer Leverkusen head coach Roger Schmidt were linked with the vacancy on the South Coast.

Saints fans were dealt a blow when Roger Schmidt was lured away to the Chinese Super League by Beijing Guoan and many questioned just what was going on behind the scenes at Southampton, thankfully for them they now have the answer with the appointment of Mauricio Pellegrino.

This is of course not the first time that Southampton have appointed an Argentine to lead the club with Pellegrino’s former international teammate Mauricio Pochettino taking charge of the club prior to his current stint in North London with Tottenham.

Bar a slightly forgettable stint in charge of former club Valencia the bulk of Pellegrino’s work has been based in his Argentinian homeland. That was however before this season just passed when he was in charge of La Liga club Alaves, a season that won him many plaudits as the newly promoted side finished 9th in the table.

The highlight of that impressive season would have been the shock win over Barcelona back in September of last year when they pulled off a miraculous 2-1 win at the Camp Nou. Luis Enrique’s men would get the revenge in the Copa Del Rey Final last month when they ran out 3-1 winners.

But that in itself is another tick in the positive column for Pellegrino as he took Alaves all the way to the Spanish Cup Final and had this side of relative minnows punching above their weight for the duration of last season. It is not quite the same task that he will be required to carry out with Southampton though.

The remit here will be to certainly use that eighth place finish as a benchmark for this coming season but to also try to close the gap of the seven clubs that finished above them, this will be the first season in three that there will be no European football at St Mary’s.

As always the main focus will be on making sure there is no more of a talent drain from the club and also trying to keep hold of Virgil Van Dijk will arguably be the Argentine’s first real piece of work now he has taken over the Southampton reigns.

Pellegrino and Southampton should be a good fit and he will have undoubtedly been on the phone to his colleague who is leading to Spurs to a season at Wembley this time around. Can Southampton get back to the football that they played under Ronald Koeman, that will certainly be the hope. Time will tell whether that is the case or not.

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