Southampton's Revival: Tonda Eckert Transforms St Mary's Atmosphere
At St Mary’s these days, you feel it before you see it.
The noise swells in the concourses, the flags go up, and by the time Southampton walk out, there’s a crackle in the air that simply wasn’t there a year ago. The league table tells one story about their revival; the stadium tells a louder one.
At the heart of it stands Tonda Eckert, a 33-year-old who was handed the job when the club looked broken and the bond with its supporters even more so.
From 21st and angry to a fortress reborn
When Eckert stepped up from coaching Saints’ U21s to replace the sacked Will Still in November 2025, Southampton were 21st in the Championship. The mood around the club was sour. St Mary’s felt tense, flat, almost resigned.
“You know the condition the club was in when I came in and you know the condition our supporters were in the moment I came in,” he told BBC Radio Solent, laying out the scale of the task. “It’s not easy to play home games if you don’t have that connection.”
It showed. The anger in the stands, the scepticism, the sense of drift – all of it fed into a home atmosphere that had lost its edge. The German coach knew he had to do more than fix a team. He had to repair a relationship.
“And rightly so, there was not that connection at that very moment for a variety of things going on,” he said. “Then you need to earn that right to connect again to the supporters, to the city, because it means so much more, the football, to the city of Southampton.”
He has done exactly that. Since his appointment, Southampton have taken 47 points at St Mary’s, the best home record in the Championship over that period. This season they have started with three wins from three on their own pitch, turning home games into events again, not chores.
St Mary’s, once edgy and unforgiving, now feels like a place where Southampton expect to win – and where the crowd expects to drive them there.
Spygate scars and stubborn loyalty
Eckert’s first full campaign in charge underlined his ability. He dragged Saints into the Championship play-offs, only for the club to be thrown out in the aftermath of the Spygate scandal that detonated their season and their reputation in one hit.
Supporters were furious. Some at the club. Some at the authorities. Some at the sheer stupidity of how it had all unravelled.
But they did not walk away.
Despite the fallout, attendances have stayed around the 30,000 mark heading into the new season, keeping Southampton among the top 20 crowds in the country. The numbers matter. So does what they represent: a fanbase that chose to stay and see whether this young coach could turn defiance into something more constructive.
Eckert insists there was no magic switch.
“It’s not one thing that you change. There are so many small steps that you need to take to earn the trust and build on a connection and build a relationship back up,” he said.
Training-ground tweaks. Open communication. A team that runs, presses, tackles as if every ball belongs to the city, not just the club. It all adds up.
“St Mary’s just feels completely different than it did a year ago and that is just many, many things coming together,” he added. “However, I do believe that to ‘win’ a season, you must play a successful season at home.”
For Eckert, the equation is simple: conquer your own ground, and the rest of the campaign bends in your favour.
Jander forced to wait as Bristol City loom
The next test of that home streak comes on Saturday against Bristol City. The form at St Mary’s suggests confidence. The squad news offers a reminder that the rebuild is still a work in progress.
Midfielder Caspar Jander will not be involved. The 23-year-old has yet to play this season after suffering a quad injury early in Southampton’s first pre-season game against National League side Eastleigh, and Eckert confirmed the visit of Bristol City has come “too early” for his return.
The plan is cautious but optimistic.
“We’re going to push, so hopefully it’s going to be some minutes against Wrexham (on 19 September). We had to delay a little bit, but I think he’s on a good way now,” Eckert said.
Jander’s absence has not derailed Southampton’s home charge, but his eventual return offers another gear in midfield, another option for a coach who has already squeezed so much from a squad that looked lost less than a year ago.
The numbers say St Mary’s has become the toughest ground in the division. The noise says something stronger: this is a club that has remembered who it is, and a fanbase that has decided to believe again.
