It is time that Saints and the Echo get together and stop the animosity.

There shouldnt be too much to worry about at St Mary's at the moment as the Club heads to a Wembley final, however the fact is the dispute between the club and the local newspaper, The Daily Echo is showing no signs of ending and that cannot be a good thing.

At the moment many Saints supporters do not feel the inclination to back the local paper, it is being seen as the bad boy of the situation, some Saints supporters feel that it backed Rupert Lowe last year whilst others feel that it didnt back Rupert Lowe last year, that is the diachotomy of the situation for any local paper, everyone will make what they want of the reporting.

With regard to Saints, ask anyone in the media and they will tell you the same thing, rule 1 of football club PR is "dont fall out with the local paper" yes it can be a thorn in your side but it can also do a lot more good than bad, yes 10% of the time it can be printing stuff about you that you dont want printed, but 90% of the time its all good publicity.

After all in what other business could you get three pages of the local paper dedicated to you, plus more on a Friday and a supplement at the weekend, go and ask the manager of West Quay shopping centre and ask him how much he would pay for that if he had the budget.

The Club doesnt need the paper as much as the paer needs the club is one comment i have heard often, this is not quite true, the paper of course sells many copies on the back of Saints, one reason for this is that despite the internet, the majority of Saints supporters still get their news from the Echo regarding the club, so from that point of view yes the paper does need the club, but it doesnt need the co operation of the club as has been proved over the past three months.

But the club also needs the paper, it keeps the club in the spotlight and gives it a high profile, yes the club has its own website, but that only allows it to get the message to those that choose to log on, whereas the Echo will get to a far wider audience, that helps the club in its bid to atteact sponsors and of course bigger crowds, in short they both need each other in differing ways.

The supporters also need to take a step back and realise that you always have to have an alternative view, by the very nature of things the Club website is not going to say much that is negative, when do you ever read a match report which is critical of a player even whenit is deserved, whereas the local media can take a more objective viewpoint and is therefore needed for that alone     

Im not going to go into the ins and outs of what has gone on between club and paper, however in the great scheme of things its fairly trivial and its time to heal that rift, the Club has to accept, as it has done for the past 125 years that sometimes the local paper will pring stuff that they dont like, when it does they have to remember that 90/10% rule and bite the bullet, if they do that then the paper also has to accept that if the Club gives it a few exclusives then some things dont go out into the public domain as early as they should.

Its all about co operation, with a big Wembley final coming up, the local paper will sell a lot of copies, it will also aid the club in getting out ticket information etc and drumming up support.

So time for both sides to get around the table and talk about how they can both be mutually beneficial to each other, work together to make the good times better, because if they dont there will come a time when the club will be under fire from the fansand the Echo will then suddenly become the voice of the people and then the bad times will get worse.

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