How Tonda Eckert Has Changed Saints Fans Opinion On Recruitment Policy Monday, 8th Dec 2025 10:02 Only 5 weeks ago Southampton supporters were bemoaning the club's summer transfer dealings with only Leo Scienza & Caspar Jander making much of an impression of the St Mary's faithful, but after 6 games Tonda Eckert has highlighted that the recruitment was fine, it was the tactics at fault. During the summer it was inevitable that there would be some departures, the likes of Tyler Dibling, Aaron Ramsdale and Matteus Fernandes were in big demand and always going to go and needed replacing. In came Joshua Quarshie, Damion Downes, Mads Roerslev, Tom Fellows, Finn Azaz, Elias Jelert & Tom Fellows all coming in with decent reputations at their former clubs.
Leo Scienza & Casper Jander established themselves in the team, but were not tearing things up, in what in hindsight was a team getting worse week by week under Will Still. I said back then that we had the best squad in the Championship in terms of both quality & quantity, but as things went downhill with each week, It was hard to find many people who agreed with me. Many Saints supporters pointed the finger at Johannes Spors & the club's recruitment policy and pointed the finger of blame for the poor start to the season on poor signings. I was not in agreement with this, I felt that all of these players had been signed after success at their former clubs, the club had done it's due diligence, they were not failing because they were poor players, they were failing because the team was not being managed properly & neither were they as individual players. For that matter they were not alone, they may have not been performing, but they were surrounded by those that had been at the club for longer who were also failing.
The likes of Adam Armstrong & Taylor Harwood-Bellis, stalwarts of our last promotion campaign were shadows of their former selves. In fairness the club dealt with what was going wrong a lot quicker than I thought they might, they gave Will Still a fair crack of the whip, but they also didn't sit on their hands too long when it was clear that he was failing badly. In came Tonda Eckert and you could see things had changed almost overnight, the win at Queens Park Rangers wasn't pretty & we had to ride out a tough spell at the end, but the shoots of recovery were there for all to see, not only in the fact that players were now square pegs in square holes & knew what they were doing, but in the spirit that saw us dig in and win the game.
But the biggest change was in the new signings, especially Finn Azaz & Tom Fellows who suddenly came good as well as Scienza & Jander who themselves stepped up a gear. Suddenly the team was a team again, we played well because of the manager and not in spite of him as it had been under every other manager since Ralph Hasenhuttl. In my opinion the reason Tonda Eckert succeeded where Will Still failed was that the German had not only faith in his own ability but faith in that of his players, the likes of Azaz & Fellows were suddenly not in and out of the side, if they were not on the bench but in the starting line up then they were certainties to be subbed off in the second half, that did not breed confidence in them or players and the same went for the rest of the squad. But the emergence of Tonda Eckert has not only restored faith & confidence in the players, but also in the stands, the Saints supporters have now realised what the root cause of the first third of the season and it wasn't the players ability.
At the start of October all the talk was of how we had wasted money in the summer and the recruitment was terrible, but now the mood has changed and we can all see what Azaz, Fellows, Jander & Scienza have brought to the team and how crucial they are now to it's success. Some though will not yet be convinced, they will point to Damion Downs, Elias Jelert, Mads Roerslev & Joshual Quarshie as evidence that the recruitment was flawed. In fairness to Roerslev & Jelert, they have not only had injury issues, but they now find themselves in a squad using wing backs at the moment & not full backs, both showed they had quality before being injured, but they are full backs & not wing backs and there is a difference, some can play both positions, but others only one or the other. Likewise Joshua Quarshie who so far has had little chance to shine under Eckert, but he did look good in the win against Leicester & his time will come. That leaves just Damion Downs, to be blunt the current whipping boy of many.
But if we accept that the failure of the rest his fellow new arrivals in the summer to shine was more about the way the team was managed than ability, then perhaps Downs himself might come good. That might not be as easy as it has been for the others though, Downs is a centre forward who thrives on getting the ball crossed into him the box, he didn't get much of that under Still and the six games played under Eckert has seen a different style that involves Adam Armstrong dropping deep and picking up the ball to hold up and then bring Azaz, Scienza, Manning & Fellows into the mix. That is not Downs game, it was sad to watch at Charlton in the last 15 minutes as Saints saw the game out, rather than piled forward seeking more goals, Downs did his best to drop deep and hold the ball up, but that is not his game. But I think his time will come, there will be occasions where we need his height and strength, all I say is that he has never given less than 100%, he has not hidden or sulked, it just isn't the right formation for him at present. He is a Southampton player, he needs supporting and his confidence restored, Tonda Eckert has done just that to his team mates & he will be trying his hardest to do the same for Downs. But as the title of this article says, suddenly our new signings are coming good, players that looked lost are now showing their quality, the recruitment policy was not flawed, the tactics were, if Tonda Eckert keeps the team going as he has done in his first six games, then this could well be a great season after all, we just need to keep the faith with the manager, the team and for that matter the club. All Photos Via Reuters Please report offensive, libellous or inappropriate posts by using the links provided.
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