The current Dutchman in charge at Southampton has already impressed, but really he had very little to do to make himself the club's best Dutch manager with his competition being the uninspiring Poortvliet and his former right hand man Mark Wotte. When Poortvliet became Southampton's first non-British manager his appointment was met with a round of non-plussed questions of "who?" from the club's fans. The new boss had been a regular in the defence of the PSV Eindhoven team of the 70s and 80s and a member of the Netherlands squad that made the 1978 World Cup final, but his managerial career had made no impact internationally. In fact, when the announcement of his appointment was made in May 2008 it transpired that he was still under contract with his previous club, Helmond Sport in the Dutch second division. Helmond had not given him permission to talk to another club and now demanded compensation. After all that, Poortvliet would only last seven months in the job. Losing his first two league games, Poortvliet's Southampton, including already regular starters Adam Lallana, Morgan Schneiderlin and Jack Cork, would never rise above 16th in the Championship and would also only win six league games under his management. Poortvliet resigned in January 2009 to be replaced by youth team director Wotte. By then, though, the club were already going into administration and headed for relegation, giving the latter little opportunity to do much at all.
