Southampton: Saints need to claim clean sheet against Cardiff City
By Marc Walker
Southampton face yet another crucial game in their fight for Premier League survival as they host Cardiff City at St Mary’s this weekend.
Last Saturday’s 1-1 draw with Burnley saw Saints go five league games unbeaten under Ralph Hasenhuttl and continue a positive upturn in form to climb away from relegation zone.
However, Cardiff’s 2-0 victory against Bournemouth then saw the gap between Burnley, Saints and Newcastle reduced to two points, meaning that there is still a long way to go in this year’s fight for survival.
It also means that a win for either Saints or Cardiff on Saturday could see a major momentum swing going into the final 13 games of the season.
One thing that will help Saints massively is tightening up further at the back, and this could help them hugely against the Bluebirds.
Next. Saints must tie key men down to longer contracts. dark
Just one of Hasenhuttl’s 12 games in charge (in all competitions) so far have seen his side claim a clean sheet – a 0-0 draw against Chelsea at Stamford Bridge.
In fact, the last league clean sheet before that came in a 0-0 draw with Newcastle United back in October when Mark Hughes was still in the St Mary’s dugout.
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Whilst a win of any scoreline is vital this weekend, shutting the Cardiff attack out would certainly give the Saints defence a boost. After some great displays recently, they continue to make it tricky for themselves by conceding and letting the opposition back into matches.
On paper, a shutout certainly seems achievable on Saturday. Neil Warnock’s side have scored just 22 league goal during the campaign so far; the third lowest in the top-flight.
Their attackers have struggled to add the much-needed goals they need to fight the drop, although they did try to rectify that with the signing of Emiliano Sala – missing and presumed dead after a private jet he was travelling in tragically crashed into the channel recently.
Whilst Saints themselves have only found the net 27 times, they have been in much better scoring form that Cardiff of late.
They have only failed to score in one of their last 11 games, whilst the Bluebirds had netted just twice in seven games before beating Bournemouth thanks to Bobby Reid’s brace.
A comfortable victory at St Mary’s would see Saints laying down a marker and showing the teams around them that they have what it takes to avoid relegation, so let’s hope that this is the case come full-time on Saturday.