There is something in the air around St Mary's these days and its called expectation as Saints await the Capital One Cup draw later today.
Last season some Saints fans thought they were watching the best football they had ever seen Saints play, personally I though that was slightly over the top, but with the arrival of Sadio Mane I think that soon Saints supporters might be making that claim again and this time they will have a case.
But there is a little more in the air now and unlike last season when we knew that Mauriccio Pochettino was going to throw our cup chances out of the window with barely a whimper, this season it is clear that Ronald Koeman wants to deliver trophy's.
In all good cup runs there is a sense of expectation, the supporters can feel it, in 1976 it was there, it was there in 1984, but Saints would fall just short of the final, in 1992 and the Zenith Data Cup final it was clear from the early rounds that Ian Branfoot was taking it seriously and again in 2003 with the run to Cardiff for the FA Cup, even back in 2009/10 the JPT cup run was focused.
Now we seem to be prioritising cups again and that has to be good, the reality is that the top of the Premier league is for a privileged few, those clubs that can truly afford to throw big big money to buy their way to the top four season after season and the rest of the Premier League are slowly starting to realise that the only chance of real glory is in one of the cups.
The past decade has seen their popularity wane, mainly due to the focus on the Premier league,but now for club's like Saints it is a chance to actually win something and get into Europe and if football is to prosper then the supporters of clubs outside the big 5 have to have something to look forward too other than just making up the numbers.
So after the great win at Arsenal last night there is a feeling around Saints that this could be the year we will have a decent crack at reaching a Wembley Cup Final again and first up is the Capital One Cup and a good draw tonight for us along with a few Premier Clubs meeting each other could just open out the competition for us.
We go forward with confidence that we can beat anybody, but personally I would prefer we do it the easy way rather than the hard and if that means a few beneficial draws in our favour then so be it.
The whiff of glory is in the air, we have a team that can play football lets enjoy the ride.