[goldenHuddlestone]

Leon Crouch has lifted the lid on the deep divisions in the Southampton boardroom after being sacked as acting chairman.

Local businessman Crouch has been removed from the football board after a meeting of Southampton Leisure Holdings PLC, of which the Coca-Cola Championship club a subsidiary.

Crouch's departure is likely to increase the tension between Saints' executive directors and their non-executive ones, and Crouch - who owns just fewer than 10% of the club's shares - said he felt "betrayed, angry and saddened".

In a statement, Crouch continued: "My predecessor Michael Wilde and I have both, as the largest shareholders, invested more than £4million of our own money.

"My untimely departure as acting chairman is hardly a model for attracting new investment that the club needs so much.

"The role of a non-executive director, in companies big and small, is to exercise a steadying influence on executive board decisions.

"That is what I, along with non-executive directors Patrick Trant and Keith Wiseman, have tried to do."

Crouch criticised the club's decision to sell left-back Gareth Bale to Tottenham this summer.

He also expressed concern at the growing power he believes the Saints' executive directors are wielding at St Mary's.

Crouch said: "The divisions in the boardroom between the executives and non-executives are well documented now. However, I could not stand by quietly.

"The sale of the brilliant Gareth Bale was a classic case of selling off the family silver. How are we to gain promotion if the skilful players are sold off?

"I too would love to see a wealthy business magnate take over the club, buying the firepower to take us back to our 'home' in the Premiership.

"Yet life is not that simple. There are few fairytale endings.

"All we can do is do what we believe is best for the Saints.

"If that means challenging powerful men in highly paid salaried positions, who are answerable to shareholders and customers alike but who have no emotional ties to our great club, then so be it."

Saints announced Crouch's departure in a short statement to the Stock Exchange.

It read: "Following a board meeting of the company, Mr Leon Crouch has ceased with immediate effect to be a director of the company's subsidiary, Southampton Football Club."