Opinion | Axe poised to fall on Saints' Adkins

Who would want to be Southampton manager Nigel Adkins this weekend? Down on the south coast of England and ahead of a must-win game against Swansea today, the boss of the EPL basement club is, to coin a term (and borrow heavily from the 1995 Sean Penn Hollywood hit Dead Man Walking), a sacked manager working.

Adkins, 47, has been in crisis talks with executive chairman Nicola Cortese, who is said to be furious with the club's horrendous start to the season, underscored by last Monday's dismal 2-0 defeat away by West Brom. You would think that the final straw was already broken with the sieve masquerading as a defence leaking 28 goals in 10 league outings and losing eight of them.

Even the perpetually optimistic Adkins has, in his most recent interviews, admitted he believes he will be the first for the chop this season. The manager is liked for his glass half-full, cheery nature, but his wilful admission about his team's hopeless start is a metaphorical undoing of his top button in anticipation of the pending guillotine strike.

It's been reported Cortese wants a replacement in place before he jettisons Adkins and has been sounding out two colourful fellow Italians to shed hope and light on St Mary's foreboding gloom. Paolo Di Canio, the boss of League One Swindon, and Gianluca Vialli, the former Chelsea manager, are both believed to have been approached by Cortese.

Even-ex Saints bosses Gordon Strachan and Harry Rednapp are said to be under consideration, though the former would need a lot of persuading to return after leaving the club acrimoniously in 2004 - plus he is also heavily linked with the Scotland job. The latter, serial trouble-shooter Rednapp, is also an unlikely replacement given his acrimonious and brief tenure, which ended by him driving the few, treacherous kilometres down the coast to Portsmouth.

But it is perhaps too early to chime the tolling bell for Adkins. Despite the appalling goals-against stats, he still has the backing of the board and the worshipping fans, who loudly sang his name even after the humiliating defeat at the Hawthorns on Monday, albeit reluctantly. He will then be served a few more times in the Last Chance Saloon given all that he has done for the club. And despite the disappointing start, Adkins has stuck to the brief demanded of him by his employer.

Cortese set out his ambitious five-year plan for the club way back in 2009 when Southampton were scrapping away in the third tier. He said he expected the club to be in the EPL by the end of 2014 and playing spell-binding winning football with the cult of youth reviving glory days of old - sparkling young footballers, many drawn from the banks of Southampton Water and moulded at the club's celebrated academy.