I'll not beat around the bush. Saracens is in a mess. A globally-renonwed coach resignes. A dozen or more players shown the door. A possible move to alongside the Thames on the cards. Everything from the accent of the new coach to the short-changing of season ticket holders is annoying a lot of people. It's not a good time to be assocated with a club that is, once again, a laughing stock.

Eddie Jones said in the post-match press conference following the Sale game that this was his "worst ever" week in rugby. Jones was, of course, referring to his successor Brendan Venter's culling - there is no other word more appropriate, if you ask me -in one fell swoop of the professional squad.

I'll go along with Jones as I can't remember anything quite like this in my 13 seasons of association with Sarries. Sure, the 2004 release of a dozen players was quite a big move but, frankly, the players who left the club at that time are not in the same league as many of those whose names have been mentioned to me by two, independent sources during the past week.

Some of these players are not on the fringes of the squad, and a good few were brought in by Eddie Jones or by Alan Gaffney with Jones's consultation. Ergo, Jones was part of their reason to join a club that many would not, ordinarily have come to for anything other than a boost to their pensions.

I listened to the forum at Vicarage Road chaired by new Chief Executive Edward Griffiths and I was mightily disappointed with what I heard.

Not only for the totally predictable answers to what were, bluntly, quite a lame set of qustions (apart from the opening salvo from Farmfez about the "professional" handling of Jones's departure) about local press advertising and such like and no real pressure about the lack of commitment on the part of the club about its future beyond 2009-10.

I know what you're thinking: I should have been there to ask, and you are right. Unfortunately, I had family commitments and couldn't make it.

Where will Saracens be the season after next? Will there be a Saracens that we can recognise the season after next? Will there be a Saracens at all given Griffiths's comment that he wants a club that has been haemorrhaging money for a decade to break even in two years and that in itself is a nigh-on impossible task?

These are fundamental questions that remain unanswered and until they are, then a lot of existing supporters will either disappear or wait and see what they will do next season.

Another topic that was discussed was Brendan Venter's appointment and how he stacks up as a coach next to Jones. The response was the expected unequivocal support for the new man and that he "will do a fantastic job." Yeah, we've heard that a dozen times in the past dozen years so change the record.

Venter, according to London Irish supporters who have posted on their message board and those to whom I have spoken, is a hard task master whose carrot-and-stick approach to coaching is completely devoid of carrots.

Great. Buck Shelford and Steve Diamond did the same and in a matter of months they were resented by the players and the results suffered as a consequence. Not only that, but they lasted about as long a job vacancies in a recession and Saracens was back to square one. Again.

It is my opinion that Venter is just an assistant coach who has been promoted to recruit, coach and mentor a new squad of players under the chief criterion of cutting cost, with the second being an instruction to bring in players from the Currie Cup or Super 14 to entice some of the apparently hundreds of thousands of South Africans in the Greater London area to come and watch a team that Venter is selling to his countrymen as "home from home"

And it is this "home from home" message from the incoming Directo of Rugby that seems to be at odds with the CEO's notion that players will be brought in on a "bang-per-buck" basis, irrespective of nationality. 

So it seems that one of them is either misinforming we, the supporters, or is misinformed himself. We need to know from the club who's right and who needs to button it, because it doesn't add up.

To be fair to Griffiths, he has already tried to get more bums on the Vicarage Road seats with special offers, yet this has annoyed season ticket holders who question the value of their purchases when individual ticket purchases can be bought at less cost.

I can empathise with those of you who have south stand season tickets, as your unreserved seat could well have cost you more, but those of you who sit in reserved seats in the Rous stand will have paid a premium to get those seats every match, so I don't buy into your argument that you are being short-changed, I'm afraid.

The future is still unclear. When asked on the message board about what happens if his plan for financial viability within 24 months fails, Edward Griffiths said that he was confident that it would not.

Mark Sinderberry said as much when he arrived in 2003, albeit with a more realistic three-year target and we know what happend on and off the field between then and the night of the long knives last week.

I hope that Saracens remains Saracens. Does not morph into a South African club, full of South African players, catering for an ex-pat South African audience. Frankly, I don't like 'em. Then again, I don't like many people, but to become a predominently South African club appeals to me as much as paying for a Wasps season ticket.

To you, Edward, there are some fundamental things you need to know about this great club, some of which you are actively seeking out and addressing, and for which I commend you. However, the one thing that you need to bear mind above everything else, and that is that we've seen it all before. No, really. We have.

Put simply, our trust needs to be earned, and there is a long, long way to go before you will get that and farther still before that trust is converted into a continuation of support from many of us. Until that happens, the supporters, and I, will remain cyincal.

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