Mauricio Pellegrino sees positives from Southampton’s draw with Swansea
By Chris Hughes
Southampton boss Mauricio Pellegrino has remained positive despite an opening-day draw with Swansea.
Despite being without Gylfi Sigurdsson or Fernando Llorente, Paul Clement’s Swansea held on for a point after a goalless draw at St. Mary’s.
Southampton attempted over 30 crosses and had 29 shots on goal, yet failed to end their miserable goal drought at home.
The Swans only had two clear-cut chances across the whole 90 minutes, with the on-loan Tammy Abraham proving early on that he has the potential to be a solid addition to his team’s ranks.
However Southampton’s shambolic finishing will be the headline grabber, with Maya Yoshida, Manolo Gabbiadini, Charlie Austin and Dusan Tadic all having multiple opportunities to break the deadlock.
The result went against what most fans were expecting, with contributor Nikos Lemanis predicting a 3-1 result in favour of the home team. Naturally, Pellegrino isn’t fully satisfied with the performance, as he relayed to the Southampton media team.
"“I’m a little bit disappointed, because we did everything to win the game. We couldn’t, because football is like this – sometimes with a couple of chances you can score, but today we couldn’t.” – Pellegrino"
The Saints now haven’t scored in nearly 550 minutes of football at home, something which makes for bleak viewing with their upcoming game against West Ham United set to also be played at St. Mary’s.
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But it wasn’t all doom and gloom for the supporters, as Southampton played football with much more energy and intensity than they did last time around under Claude Puel.
Cedric Soares – a surprise inclusion – and Ryan Bertrand both thrived in attacking roles down their respective wings, whilst Manolo Gabbiadini was sharp up front. He only lacked his shooting boots for what would’ve otherwise been an impressive performance leading the line.
Although Southampton fans didn’t get the chance to see Mario Lemina make his debut both them and the manager can be happy with the result.
"“It’s something that we have to continue working on, and keep going, but in parallel I am really happy with the performance. As a first game I think the level of the team was really high.” – Pellegrino"
Whilst the result will have pretty much zero impact on the final standings, the draw sees the Saints occupy eighth, with the game at St. Mary’s being the only goalless match-up since the Premier League returned.