Premier League promotion winning manager talks about facing Russell Martin's side

The international break will be over in a few days and Southampton will again turn their attention to their Premier League campaign. While the Saints are currently in the relegation zone at the nineteenth place in the league table, their recent displays against Ipswich Town and Arsenal have been much encouraging. Moreover, Southampton will now face three important matches against Leicester City, Wolves and Everton in the next four fixtures and some good results in these games will provide a much needed boost to Southampton for the remainder of the Premier League season.

Among them, Southampton will first play Leicester City at home aiming to better their performance from their previous home match against Ipswich Town to take the three points from the match. However, that in itself is a significant task as Leicester City recently took their first league win in a 1-0 home win over Bournemouth heading into the international break. Under the guidance of their new manager Steve Cooper, the former Premier League Champions have started the season well with one win alongside three draws from their first seven matches.

Premier League promotion winning manager talks about facing Russell Martin's side

Similar to Southampton manager Russell Martin, Leicester City manager Steve Cooper is also a promotion winning manager as he guided Nottingham Forest to the Premier League after 23 years in 2022. Further, Cooper also led Nottingham Forest to avoid relegation on their return to the English top flight but was replaced midway through the next season after an underwhelming first half of the 2023/24 season. Thus, Cooper knows the expectations while managing a newly promoted side and talked about the importance of taking a win against Southampton in the upcoming match at the St. Mary's Stadium, saying,

"It was always going to be important to get the first win back in the Premier League. I've seen many wins here, I would have loved for it to be sooner, we know that.

It’s an international break and the work continues and now we need to be completely obsessed with beating Southampton in a couple of weeks."

- Steve Cooper

While Leicester City have a good momentum as compared to Southampton, Steve Cooper's side have conceded a lot of early first half goals in the new Premier League season. This is an area where Southampton needs to improve and if they can take an early lead similar to the Ipswich Town match, their chances of registering a first league win will increase towards the second half of the game. However, unlike the Ipswich Town match, Southampton need to avoid making any defensive mistakes to give Steve Cooper's side a chance of making a comeback in the match.

Now it remains to be seen whether manager Russell Martin inspires the Saints to a huge home win against Championship winners Leicester City.