Saints could face some familiar old opponents in the recently announced pre season tournament at St Mary's with Athletico Bilbao & Wigan being touted as two of the names to be announced, ironically enough Saints have played the Spanish side more times than the Lancashire side from the Premiership.
Saints were drawn against Athletico Bilbao in the 1st round of the UEFA Cup in the 1971/72 season beating them at the Dell 2-1 in the first leg before going down 2-0 to two late goals in the return in Spain.
Wigan who only joined the Football League in 1978 co incidentally the same year that Saints won promotion back to the top flight have met us only the once, that in the 4th round of the FA Cup in 1985/86then they went down 3-0 as new manager Chris Nicholl lead us to an eventual semi final defeat to Liverpool.
This remains our only competitve meeting as ironically after we left the top flight after our 27 year sojourn back in 2005, they went past us in the other direction and have remained their ever since despite a couple of last day scares in recent years.