Saints travel up to North London hoping to get their first win at Arsenal in 26 years as well as erasing the memory of last year's debacle.
Ironically enough it was exactly 26 years ago yesterday (Thursday) Saints last won at Arsenal when on 21st November 1987 Saints won at Highbury 1-0 thanks to a 78th minute Danny Wallace goal, a win that sent us up to 9th in the table.
Since then its been mainly doom and gloom, in the 18 occasions since then that we have met them in the top flight up at their place and have been defeated 13 times with 5 draws dotted about the place, in fact since we got promoted to the top flight in 1965/66 and played them for the first time in League competition we have so far met them in 36 seasons, in that time we have won their on only one other occasion, that being a 3-0 win in 1967/68, indeed out of our 72 league meetings so far both home and away we have won only 16 with 20 draws and 36 defeats, its fair to say that they are not our most charitable opponents.
So we go to the Emirates looking to show that a new era has dawned at Southampton Football Club in terms of our Premier League standing and a big step forward will b putting the debacle of last season well and truly behind us and erasing the memory of that nightmare afternoon.
For Mauriccio Pochettino, assuming that he has no injury worries it should be quite simple in the team that he puts out, it is picking itself after the last few games, however he might prefer to put in Steven Davis ahead of Jamie Ward Prowse to give a bit more bite in midfield, JWP has been superb in the last few games, but we have to remember that he is still only young and sometimes its a case of horses for courses and a good manager will know just where the little tweaks are sometimes needed and I do mean little tweaks, don't get me wrong I think JWP is a brilliant player, I just think we might go for the extra bite that Davis could offer.
Apart from that though its a case of putting out the same team and capitalising on our confidence of late, the 5 who were off on England duty will be keen to show Roy Hodgson that they are worthy of their places and more and that has to be a big plus.
All Saints eyes before the game though will be on Merseyside when at 12.45 Everton host Liverpool, if Liverpool fail to win at Goodison then Saints will run out at the Emirates knowing that a win by two clear goals will send them top of the Premier League, what a thought ! a thought made even more strange by the proposition of leaving the Emirates on Saturday gutted because we have only won by one goal and Arsenal have clung on to top spot, that's progress for you.
I think the key area though will be both benches, on ours it will be a case of Pochettino making the right selections and not only that but the right changes at the right time, in truth about half the bench will be up to the task, Davis/JWP, Cork, Osvaldo & Chambers I have faith in but where we could get caught out is if there are injuries to key players, I dread what would happen if Lovren or Boruc got injured and had to go off.
Arsenal's bench is a lot stronger, it looks like Theo Walcott might well be on it, he has been out for 2 months and hasn't played as much as a reserve team game since then, however he will be raring to go and a test for our back four in the final quarter of the game if he indeed does come off the bench.
Arsenal has never been one of our happy hunting grounds, however every defeat or draw means we are a step nearer our next win there, I have a sneaking feeling that Saints might be able to cause a shock, but the trick will be to concentrate on what we do well and stick to our formula, make them worry about us and not the other way round, if we do that then at 5pm on Saturday football the World over might just be turning their heads towards North London and saying "What the ****"