Simon Gillett was a compact, tenacious midfielder who made good use of his lower-body strength and had a high work-rate.

As the club changed managers with alarming frequency, Simon made a number of loan-moves, the most successful of which came at Blackpool, for whom he featured regularly, in two loan-spells in 2006-07, and came on as sub as they beat Yeovil in the League One play-offs at Wembley.

He was back at Wembley in March 2010, again coming off the bench as the Saints lifted the Johnstone’s Paint Trophy. “It’s my lucky ground,” Simon jokes.

“We won both times.” But it had not been his lucky season. His only start had been in an early round of the JPT. A stark contrast to 2008-09, when he had started exactly half the League fixtures, under that season’s Dutch managers – helped, he reckoned, by the backing of chairman Lowe, who “took a liking to my year of Youth-team players.” Having had a loan-spell at Championship Doncaster during that set-back season of 2009-10, Simon joined them permanently, come the summer, his second trip to Wembley having been his last hurrah for Southampton, as his contract expired. Ever-present during Rovers’ 2011-12 relegation season, Simon remained in the Championship by rejoining his former Doncaster boss, Sean O’Driscoll, at Nottingham Forest in the close season of 2012 Simon was ever-present for Forest in 2012-13, until O’Driscoll departed in December.

He hardly featured after that but then, in October 2013, he joined O’Driscoll for a third time, on loan at League One Bristol City. Released at the end of 2015-16 by Yeovil, because of a persistent injury Simon retired and took up scouting first with Bournemouth and more recently at Chelsea where he is responsible for an area covering Holland and Belgium.