HAPPY NEW YEAR. After the disaster that was 2005, there are few Saints fans that won't be glad to see the back of it.

It's hard to imagine how it could have gone much worse, but now it's a case of looking to the future rather than the past.

That is the message that George Burley was hammering home after defeat at Cardiff on New Year's Eve.

A year that started with a loss, at Manchester City, and had plenty of defeats in between, ended with another setback.

In all, Saints won just 10 league games out of 44 in 2005.

And Saturday's loss made it three defeats from three games for Burley since taking over and slipped Saints further off the play-off pace.

They are now down to a season-low 15th, eight points off the play-off places. Sadly, they are nearer the relegation zone.

But Burley is in this for the long term plan, the vision of Sir Clive and Rupert he has bought into.

What Saints need more than anything is stability.

The problem with 2005, and the year before that set it all up to go so badly wrong, has stemmed from instability.

Strachan, Wigley, Sturrock, Redknapp and now Burley. All in the space of under two years.

How on earth could any club cope with such a turnover of managers?

History will record 2005 as one of the worst, if not the worst, in the club's history.

That is a fair old legacy for Rupert Lowe and his board. They will be remembered as overseeing this.

What they have tried to do now is set things up to be corrected.

That's not to say they will be, but at least people know what is going where.

The vision of the future is the youth, this wonderful academy system that so much money - £1m plus every year for the last seven years - has been spent on bearing fruit.

That means players playing in the first team, doing well for the club, but probably ultimately being sold for the continued financial well being of Saints the club and Saints the plc.

One concern over the long term plan is the short term, as bizarre as that sounds.

When Paul Sturrock took over, albeit at a later point in the season, he said he was going to sit back and assess the squad.

Coming in partway through the season he had no choice but to do what he said, and then he could build from there.

He had a long term vision as well. A five-year plan.

But the problem was that by saying he was going to sit back and assess, the team went into cruise mode. They started to wobble, and have wobbled ever since.

Burley is saying something similar and, with this season's promotion hopes fading fast, he needs to keep impetus in 2005/06 to build up some momentum for 2006/07.

There was little in the way of momentum at Cardiff, where Burley's tough start continued.

With an injury list as long as his arm, and with so many games in such a short space of time immediately after taking over, he could not have asked for a tougher start.

Cardiff were full value for their victory. Saints' young defence was less than certain and took a while before they really got into the game.

Unfortunately by then, Saints were already two goals behind.

After five minutes Cameron Jerome crossed from the right, Paul Parry knocked the ball back from the far post and Joe Ledley came in to finish from close range.

Just three minutes later it was 2-0 as Ledley cut open the Saints defence with a lovely pass and Jerome was set free and made no mistake with his finish.

Dexter Blackstock, whose absence from the first team squad this season under Harry Redknapp was been a mystery, showed his qualities by getting Saints back into the game on 24 minutes.

It was route one personifeid as Antti Niemi's pump up-field was flicked on by Kenwyne Jones for Blackstock to steal in front of Glenn Loovens and produce a deft touch to finish.

The ball didn't touch the ground between Niemi's boot and the back of the net.

It provided Saints and their travelling fans with some hope after the afternoon looked like being a torrid affair.

But Saints couldn't really push on in the second half and failed to create a single chance of any note.

In many ways the defeat summed up the year. It was terrible, but New Year has always been about having optimism for the future as well as reflecting on the past.

Even the most pessimistic person will struggle to believe that 2006 can be worse than 2005.

Happy New year to everybody.