At the end of last season Russell Martin headed to Cervinara, an hour outside Naples, with his eldest brother, Jamie, an actor. The town, on the edge of the Partenio mountains, is home to his uncle, great-uncle and great-aunt, and some of his cousins.
“It was an amazing place to be at that point,” Martin says, alluding to the atmosphere in the city after Napoli lifted their first Serie A title for 33 years. “It was only the third time they had won it and the other two were with Diego [Maradona], who is considered a saint there. There are murals of him on every street corner and every 30-year-old guy is called Diego.
“It’s an amazing city, culture; it’s chaotic, lively … I love going there and seeing family and speaking to them in very, very broken Italian.”
Martin, who considers Roberto De Zerbi a source of inspiration, hopes Southampton will be celebrating promotion from the Championship next May. On his return from the Neapolitan riviera there was a period of purgatory as Swansea dug in their heels over the compensation required to allow him to begin his three-year contract at St Mary’s. Martin spent many of those days walking his sprocker spaniel, Barney, along the Gower peninsula.
Since taking charge he has refused to hide his ambition to return the Saints to the Premier League at the first attempt. The same goes for Jason Wilcox, appointed director of football after 11 years at Manchester City. The challenge begins at Sheffield Wednesday on Friday night.
Martin, who started his managerial career in the League One relegation zone at MK Dons after finishing as a player there, and steered Swansea to the edge of the playoffs on modest resources, knows the expectations are higher in this campaign. “We finished three points off the playoffs, which I’ll be for ever frustrated about because I think if we had a little bit more help we could have really achieved something,” he says of last season.
“We’ve come here for that, to prove to ourselves we can be really successful and win something doing it this way. I’m pretty sure there will be lots of people watching and waiting for it to not work, wondering why we’ve got the job, because ‘we’ve achieved nothing’ and all that stuff. I love proving people wrong.”
That fuel, he says, has been there since he was overlooked to represent Sussex at county level. “I was fuming about that,” he says with a smile. “I remember my careers adviser at school telling me to join the army because the chance of me becoming a footballer was pretty much impossible.” At that point the top flight felt out of reach but leaving non-league Lewes for Wycombe in the fourth tier was the start of this ride.
“I love doing something I love and really believing in something. I am probably a bit of an idealist and people call me a bit stubborn. I’m going to really enjoy it, at a brilliant club with brilliant facilities and a brilliant fanbase. If we can do something special that will be amazing. If we don’t, then I’ll be the guy that pays for that and I’m really comfortable with that. That’s the job, isn’t it?”
On the day of this interview, James Ward-Prowse, the subject of bids from West Ham, signs autographs and poses for photos as he pulls out of Southampton’s sleek training base. Ward-Prowse, the last man standing on the day-one bleep test, heads a list of players who could leave in the coming weeks.
“He hasn’t expressed at any point that he is desperate to leave but you have to accept that someone of his quality will attract attention. Not one player has said: ‘I’m not going to play.’ There’s been no one not trying or no one too cool to try. A few of them were adamant they still wanted to be in the Premier League and I said: ‘No problem, as long as you’re back in training and you wait for that moment to come.’”
Before pre-season Martin held conversations with many of the squad, including Ward-Prowse, about where things went wrong. He also spoke to the former Saints players Fraser Forster and Nathan Redmond and former teammates at Norwich, where he was twice promoted to the Premier League – once as captain – only to be relegated straight back.
“When you’re a player not playing for the top six or seven [in the Premier League], your first thought process is: ‘How quickly can we get safe? How can we get to this number of points?’ It will sound crazy but it’s not overly enjoyable sometimes, the grind of it. It always becomes about survival. You look at the fixture list, you haven’t won in a few weeks, it’s tough. Which is madness because you sacrifice so much to get into the Premier League and then you don’t enjoy it while you’re there.
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“Our job is to get the club back to the Premier League, get the players enjoying themselves, enjoying trying to win – a lot, hopefully.”
Southampton’s first matchday squad will be an indicator of how the landscape may change between now and the transfer window closing. Ward-Prowse, Roméo Lavia and Kamaldeen Sulemana, a £22m club-record signing in January, are on a long list of players with admirers. Mohammed Salisu has left for Monaco, and a deal worth close to £40m has been agreed to sell Tino Livramento to Newcastle.
In recent weeks, Martin and his staff have accommodated as many as 28 players at training and there is a need to taper a bloated group, especially given the appetite to blood youngsters such as the 17-year-old forward Sam Amo-Ameyaw. “It needs to become about who is going to help us at Sheffield Wednesday and who is going to be part of the journey, and who is not,” Martin says.
One thing unlikely to happen at the team hotel on Thursday is a round of initiations for the new signings Shea Charles and Ryan Manning, the full-back who has followed Martin from Swansea. Martin, in his playing days, channelled the Proclaimers at Walsall, did a rendition of The Lady in Red at Peterborough and at Norwich it was Don’t Stop Believin’. “I had to regurgitate that a few times because Paul Lambert enjoyed it so much; me and Crofty [Andrew Crofts] did it together,” he says, smiling. “I’ve never asked my players to do it. The amount of nervous energy that was wasted the day before the first away game … it would occupy their whole thought process.”
For many supporters, a summer reset and evidence of an exciting possession-hungry style have whet the appetite. A chef at the hotel where Martin and his staff have been staying bought them a round of coffees after an encouraging friendly display at Reading.
“We had a joke: ‘Get it in now because after five games you’ll be tearing your hair out asking us to kick it forward a bit more,’” Martin says. “People were maybe expecting a really big name to come in – in general it’s what fans want – but since we’ve come in I’ve felt nothing but positivity. I can’t wait for it to get rocking and rolling now.”
