CHRISTMAS has certainly been a good one for Saints fans.

After turning on the television to see if the Sky panel were working over the holidays I saw that Franny Benali had come in for Matt Le Tiss, both of whom I signed as schoolboys.

Saints of course were at Chelsea on Boxing Day. Listening to talksport in the car came the surprising news that one of the Premier League’s in-form goalscorers, Danny Ings, was not in the team.

I thought ‘oh dear, he must be injured’. Of course the pundits all said that manager Ralph Hasenhuttl had done this because, with three games coming up in a week, he knew Chelsea would be the most difficult so was saving Danny for the home games, against Crystal Palace today and Spurs on New Year’s Day.

Three of the panel were slightly critical of Ralph for leaving Ings out and of course predicted a comfortable Chelsea win.

Jeff Stelling said ‘come on, Franny, surely you have to agree’, but he was laughed at for predicting a draw.

There’s no way Franny and Matty are going to criticise the club, especially now they are ambassadors, but the impression given by TV and radio and presumably some supporters was that, of all our fixtures, this was the game we would find most difficult to win.

So well done to the manager and the team for putting on such a good performance and winning with two outstanding goals, one of which came from a build-up of probably more passes than have been seen from any team this season.

It has put everybody in a good mood, both in the dressing room and in the stands.

We now have one of the best away records but need to continue this momentum at St Mary’s, during the next three games.

Let’s hope the new year brings more points and we can start knocking on the door of the top six!

It has been good to see so many of my former Southampton apprentices still working in football over the Christmas period, with Alan Shearer another one doing well as a pundit. .

The Boxing Day game between Sheffield United and Watford in particular brought back a lot of memories. Watching the game on television, I saw Chris Wilder, last year’s manager of the year, alongside his longstanding number two Alan Knill, both of whom I signed, in the Sheffield United dugout.

I was also pleased to see one of our ex-managers, Nigel Pearson, making such a good start with Watford. I was on the board at Southampton when Nigel was appointed 11 years ago. After a brief spell in which he helped keep us in the Championship, he had spells with Leicester and Hull before working abroad. It’s good to see him back in the Premiership.

Watford, his new club, were bottom of the table and odds on to get relegated when he took over and his first home game couldn’t have been more difficult on paper. But he made an instant impression as Watford beat Manchester United 2-0, before getting draw at Bramall Lane.

Meanwhile, Garry Monk another former Saints apprentice, is doing is best to take Sheffield Wednesday back to the Premier League while Phil Parkinson has been at Sunderland for the last three months. I just hope he does better there than I did!

It’s very pleasing to see how well all these former Saints apprentices have done. As I used to say to them all ‘it’s a short career - work hard and get another job when you’ve finished’.

I didn’t mean in football necessarily but they’ve obviously stayed in the game so full marks to the role my staff played. I’m sure the likes of Lew Chatterley, John Mortimer and particularly Dave Merrington will be just as pleased as me.