IT was the year when the St Mary's faithful might have sung 'Oh when the Saints managers, go marching out (the exit door), oh when the Saints managers go marching out ...'

This year will go down in the Saints history books as a sensational 12 months which saw the last remaining vestiges of a feel-good factor brought about by the FA Cup final appearance the previous May totally wiped out.

It was a year which started badly - Saints crashing out of the FA Cup at home to Newcastle in the third round - and progressively got worse and worse.

The facts and statistics make grim reading for anyone who holds Saints dear to their hearts, but as we head into 2005 there is renewed optimism that Harry Redknapp - yes, the same Harry Redknapp who until recently was boss of rivals Pompey - could preserve the club's proud record of having been in the top flight of English football since 1978.

In January, manager Gordon Strachan, widely regarded as the club's best boss since the legendary Lawrie McMenemy two decades earlier, announced he was leaving at the end of the season.

In February, and with Saints having won just once since Strachan's bombshell - and that against soon-to-be-relegated Leeds - Strachan quit on Friday, February 13.

Reserve-team boss and academy guru Steve Wigley was promoted as caretaker manager - after two draws he stepped down admitting he was happy to relinquish control to someone else.

And though speculation had reached fever pitch with regards to ex-boss Glenn Hoddle's possible return to the club he walked out on in March 2001 to join Tottenham, it was to Plymouth that chairman Rupert Lowe turned in March to prise Strachan's former Scottish international colleague Paul Sturrock from the Second Division high-fliers.

Saints defeated Liverpool 2-0 in Sturrock's first match but, for the fans who craved a more high-profile appointment than the man nicknamed Luggy, the alarm bells were ringing as his second resulted in a miserable derby defeat at FrattonPark.

The close season was marred by the airing in several national papers of potential dressing room dissent towards Sturrock, but Lowe still allowed Luggy to spend around £6m in the transfer market.

After Saints had won their second league game of the season at home to Blackburn courtesy of a last-minute penalty from James Beattie, and with rumours surrounding Luggy's future refusing to go away, Lowe insisted "the media didn't run the club, the board of directors did".

Therefore it was surprising when Sturrock departed "by mutual consent" two days later, with Lowe blaming the media for helping to usher Luggy out of the door.

With supporters again clamouring for a manager with proven Premiership experience, Lowe produced another shock move, promoting Wigley again to the position of head coach.

It was a move which mirrored the one Lowe made three years earlier when he promoted Stuart Gray from a coach to manager - an appointment which backfired spectacularly with Gray only in charge for 17 matches and four wins (including his caretaker period) before he was sacked and Strachan brought in.

Wigley's appointment backfired even more spectacularly on the chairman, though while Sturrock was in charge for a mere 13 Premiership matches, Wigley managed longer - just.

His 14th and last top-flight match was the 3-0 surrender at Old Trafford in early December, a result which on the face of it

wasn't that horrific but was the culmination of three months of torture for Wigley, his players and the fans.

Of those 14 matches, only one saw Saints win. Ironically enough, a 2-1 derby success at home to a Pompey side managed by Harry Redknapp.

While Wigley will forever wonder whether the story would have had a different ending had Saints not conceded a last-minute leveller at Arsenal at the end of October, his short reign will also be tainted by the horrific 5-2 Carling Cup loss at lower division Watford in early November.

With Saints having slipped into the relegation zone(the constant managerial instability overshadowing some dire league form stretching back to Boxing Day 2003), Lowe finally decided that drastic action was required.

Out went the inexperienced Wigley, in came a man who was the polar opposite of the majority of Lowe's previous managerial appointments, the experienced Redknapp.

Just a fortnight earlier he had quit Pompey following the arrival at Fratton Park of executive director Velimir Zajec.

He had told Pompey chairman Milan Mandaric he would not decamp to St Mary's, but Redknapp was adamant the first he heard of Saints' interest in him was two days before he was unveiled to a stunned south coast soccer world.

Saints conspired to leak two goals in the last two minutes of Redknapp's debut match at home to Middlesbrough and then crashed woefully 5-1 at Tottenham in his second - Saints' worst league result of 2004.

In the aftermath of that beating Redknapp said the squad wasn't up to Premiership standard and admitted he needed to bring at least five new players to St Mary's during the January transfer window.

With Saints second-from-bottom going into tomorrow's clash at Manchester City, the transfer window is seen as a potentially defining moment in utlimately deciding where the club ends up in 2005/06, be it the promised land of the Premiership or the nomansland of the Coca-Cola Championship.

One thing is certain. With Harry at the helm 2005 should be interesting. 2004 definitely WAS interesting - but for all the wrong reasons.

Rupert Lowe will be thankful this year is almost over.

'In Harry we trust' is his motto for 2005. He won't be the only one praying it works out in the next five months.