Llalana Wiki:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adam_Lallana
He has been a exceptionally promising player since his late teens, broke into the SCBC team at 19 or 20, was one of the best players in the Championship, getting in Team of Season for 2 seasons running, then started in PL when they were promoted in 11/12, where he impressed just as much under both Adkins and then Poch.
Rodriguez Wiki:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jay_Rodriguez
So, another highly thought of player who Adkins/SCBC spotted, paid decent money for at the time, and Rod went on to be what they hoped he was - a very good young player.
Lambert:
He is a 1 in 2 stiker over his entire Southampton career of 206 games since 2009:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rickie_Lambert
Schneiderlin has been at Southampton since 2008, and a regular there since he was 20.
Stephen Davis has 64 full International caps.
Cork was on Chelsea's books for 5 years up to his mid 20's, so the talent has always been there, and he's repped England at every level from U16 to U21.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Cork
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morgan_Schneiderlin
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rickie_Lambert
........................................
Every single one of these 6 players was at Southampton before Poch arrived and were the core of Adkins's squad.
Not for 1 second am I denigrating what Poch has done with them, nor am I saying he hasn't got them all to improve. Also, many of the performances mentioned above happened in Tier 2, not the PL.
But let's be very, very careful with this idea that they were ordinary players until Poch came along.