Saints go to Molyneux looking to avoid a fourth Premier League defeat in a row, can they do it and what changes will Ralph Hasenhuttl make.
Ralph Hasenhuttl needs to be decisive as he picks his team for the trip to Wolverhampton Wanders on Saturday, as mentioned in articles earlier in the week he does not seem to be getting too much help from an inexperienced coaching staff, but he himself is strong enough to trust his own judgement.
Therefore I think he needs to bring in two players to the team, in goal I think Alex McCarthy should play, I do not think he is the long term option and I go into the reasons in more detail in the article linked below.
https://www.fansnetwork.co.uk/football/southampton/news/51075/gunn-or-mccarthy-
But although I do not think he is the solution going forward, I think in the short term he can do a job and that job is needed now, with a ramshackle centre of defence in front of our keeper, Gunn needs to be out of the firing line and a more experienced man who can perhaps organise a bit more brought in.
As also stated earlier in the week Kevin Danso needs to be brought into the centre of defence, Ralph spoke glowingly of his attributes both as a central defender and also as a holding midfielder, he has been used as neither.
The fact that he hasn't suggests that on the training ground our coaches Kelvin Davis, Dave Watson & Craig Fleming are pushing towards the players they know and trust, hence it has been 2 or 3 out of Bednarek, Vestergaard, Yoshida & Stephens in every game and it hasn't worked.
Even Jan Bednarek a player who like Angus Gunn should be learning his trade and benefitting from the experience of the likes of Yoshida and Vestergaard is finding that he is getting no help or leadership from this direction and is now starting to see a drop in form.
Danso will not add experience or leadership, but he will add pace and strength and we are greatly lacking in that.
In simple terms at the back we need to do something different, we have shipped 9 goals in 3 games, play the same players we will ship another 3 at Molyneux.
We are not a bad team, we all know the problems, we just need Ralph to fix it as he did last season, I'm sure he will do.
Wolves fans are saying that they are a team who like us struggle to break down the opposition when they have the lions share of possession, they like to sit back a little and go on the break, on Saturday as the home side the onus is on them to attack and perhaps that will suit us a little more.
We have to keep things tight, in our last three games we have been murdered on the counter attack by all three sides, hopefully the pace of Danso will at least give us a chance of stopping that.
We can start to turn things around, only a month ago we ooked to have had a solid start to the season, three straight defeats have changed all that, now we need to get back to winning ways or at least not losing ones.
I would go for the following line up.
McCarthy
Valery, Bednarek, Danso, Bertrand
Boufal, Romeu, Hojbjerg Redmond
JWP
Ings.
Subs
Gunn
Armstrong
Yoshida
Vestergaard
Adams
Long
Obafemi
A line up that gives us pace down the flanks and a strong centre sitting in front of our centre of defence, but it also restores Ward Prowse to a role more suited to him where he can get his foot on the ball and play the it around, bringing others into play, something he has not been able to do this season as he has had to play out wide too often.
This is a difficult time, the whole club has to pull together, the past cannot be dragged up anymore, the old guard behind the scenes has gone as so many wanted, we now have to back the new one.