Eckert Transforms Southampton's St Mary's Atmosphere

At St Mary’s these days, the noise hits you before the teams even emerge from the tunnel. It wasn’t like that when Tonda Eckert walked into the job.

Back in November 2025, Southampton were 21st in the Championship, drained by poor results and a fanbase worn out by turbulence. A 33-year-old promoted from the club’s U21s, replacing the sacked Will Still, was hardly the romantic saviour narrative. It felt more like a gamble.

Now St Mary’s has become a fortress.

Since Eckert took charge, Southampton have collected 47 points at home – the best record in the Championship over that period – and have opened the new campaign with three straight wins on their own pitch. The numbers tell one story. The atmosphere tells a louder one.

“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,” Eckert told BBC Radio Solent, speaking with the kind of calm that comes from having already ridden out a storm.

He didn’t inherit a crowd ready to be charmed. He inherited a fracture.

“It’s not easy to play home games if you don’t have that connection. And rightly so, there was not that connection at that very moment for a variety of things going on.

“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.”

That word – earn – has underpinned his tenure. No shortcuts, no grand gestures, just a long list of small, deliberate steps.

The German coach guided Saints into the Championship play-offs last season, only for the club to be thrown out in the aftermath of the Spygate scandal. The fallout could have poisoned everything: the dressing room, the stands, the wider city. Anger was real, and loud.

Yet the turnstiles kept clicking.

Despite the bitterness and embarrassment of that episode, attendances have held at around the 30,000 mark heading into this season, keeping Southampton among the top 20 best-supported clubs in the country. The supporters might have been furious, but they did not walk away.

Eckert knows that loyalty can’t be taken for granted.

“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.

“St Mary’s just feels completely different than it did a year ago and that is just many, many things coming together.

“However, I do believe that to ‘win’ a season, you must play a successful season at home.”

That belief has seeped into the way Southampton play on their own turf: front-foot, assertive, with a clear intent to turn St Mary’s into a place opponents dread. The home record under Eckert isn’t an accident; it’s a strategy.

The transformation is not complete, and the margins remain thin, but the relationship between pitch and stands has shifted. Where there was suspicion, there is now patience. Where there was flatness, there is edge.

There are still setbacks to manage. One of them comes in midfield.

Eckert confirmed that Saturday’s game against Bristol City will come “too early” for 23-year-old Caspar Jander, who has yet to feature this season after suffering a quad injury early in the first pre-season fixture against National League side Eastleigh.

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.”

If Jander does return against Wrexham, it will add another option to a squad already thriving on clarity and connection. For Eckert, though, the real measure remains closer to home: the sound, the surge, and the points tally at St Mary’s.