THE decline and fall of Portsmouth from FA Cup winners to Premier League penury will trigger a powerful sense of deja vu for Saints fans.

The total financial implosion at their bitter south coast rival would, on the surface, appear to have many parallels with Saints’ own painful brush with bank account oblivion.

But, if anything, Pompey’s circumstances are even grimmer than those faced on this side of the Solent in those dark days last spring.

That’s quite an achievement when you recall that not only did administration beckon, but the drop to League One yawned uninvitingly where, as if that weren’t tough enough, they faced the prospect of starting the old third division on minus ten points. But Saints then debts of £27.5m look positively puny compared to Pompey’s imposing Premiership grade pile of £70-odd million.

The club endured a tumultuous tussle for ownership, with various factions vying for control, but the shenanigans at St Mary’s look like something quaint out of the Archers compared to the Dallas-style goings on down the round.

The pride of Portsmouth has been the hapless prize in a bizarre pass-the-parcel style game between mysterious international money men for reasons known only to themselves. It’s seen the club lose control of its ground – one of Saints’ biggest advantages throughout its own annus horriblis – its land and holdings split up among previous owners and a Rolex-sporting squad urgently needing payment to stop them leaving as free agents due to breach of contract.

The blue shirt now owes money to not one, or two but three recent owners, is haemorrhaging cash at the rate of £15m a year and is marooned in a sea of debt without its key assets.

Its biggest allure is a place in the Championship, a strong fan base and two years of £16m parachute payments, but any incoming wallet is going to have sort out a hideously tangled mess of competing interests in order to take control.

The talk is of four potential buyers, but Saints fans will shudder as they recall the line-up of clowns and fantasists that flattered to deceive with their plans to snap-up a cut price St Mary’s.

Despite the catastrophic state of their books, Pompey, like Saints before them, are unlikely to disappear off the face of football. They have been bust before and soldiered on somehow.

But what price a Markus Liebherr, pictured right, who bleeds blue and gold rather than the red and white so cheerfully sported by the carefree crowds now packing out St Mary’s?