The first pictures of Southampton returning to pre-season have been released on social media.
Indeed, the likes of Daniel Peretz have been pictured hard at work preparing for the brand-new Championship season, with the ex-Bayern Munich goalkeeper speaking of how "buzzing" he is for second tier action to get going again.
While Peretz will head into the fresh campaign as the Saints' outright number one stopper, there were other players pictured who remain on the fringes of Tonda Eckert's first team currently, with pre-season even more important to them.
If they have a positive pre-season, a way back into the Saints first team possibly opens up.
Juan Larios will hope that's the case, as the constantly injury-stricken full-back was pictured alongside Samuel Edozie, with the Spaniard a forgotten face among the St. Mary's masses.
Larios' troubled Southampton stay
Larios will, of course, know Edozie from their days together in the Manchester City youth system.
Now Saints teammates, it's fair to say Edozie has had a better time of things on the South Coast lately than his 22-year-old counterpart, as he has been in and around the first team picture, while Larios has become a forgotten presence.
Amazingly, Larios' last moments of senior action for Southampton came in August of 2024, as he was utilised as a late substitute in the EFL Cup against Cardiff City.
Since then, he has been pushed to the wayside, with U21s football on the South Coast his only chance to impress.
He has struggled out on loan too back in his native Spain, as he has attempted to bounce back from his myriad of injury issues, and failed.
Despite all this being against him, pre-season does offer a clean slate for neglected individuals, with Damion Downs also pictured as another flop going through extensive drills, like Larios.
For Larios, he will be looking to get minutes into his legs, as Southampton's pre-season fixture schedule kicks off against Eastleigh this approaching weekend.
At 22 years of age still, though, the time does feel right for the one-time Barcelona academy product to leave St. Mary's behind.
He will likely be moved on
Larios will use pre-season as a way to build up his fitness again, with Eckert perhaps using him against Eastleigh to see what he's made of.
He has already been offered out to Cadiz CF this off-season, as a way to finally forge an exit route away from the South Coast.
But, the second tier Spanish side turned down the chance to snap up the injury-prone defender, who has only featured six times for Southampton across four mainly dire years.
Hopefully, a new club is willing to take a chance on Larios down the line, but it will be a tough sell, with so little football coming his way across recent years, and when he has played, he's hardly set the world alight.
Looking back now, Southampton shouldn't have forked out £6m for the Spaniard's services in 2022, considering he had only ever tasted youth football with the ten-time Premier League champions.
You live and you learn, though, as Larios tries to knuckle down this pre-season to prove himself, but it does feel as if the ship has already sailed on his senior Southampton career.
Awkwardly for the 5-foot-7 full-back, he doesn't exactly have another club lined up...
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