Saints travel to West London on Sunday to take on Fulham in a state of limbo, it is expected that Ivan Juric will have been announced as the new manager at St Mary's but it is unlikely he will take over sole charge of the team for this game.

As it stands on Saturday morning it seems likely that Simon Rusk will be in charge for his second game as interim manager, however it could be that Ivan Juric does play some part in the pre match preparations.

But assuming that it will be Rusk selecting the side, although we can assume from Wednesday night's game that he will not rock the boat too much and that he will stick to the tried and perhaps trusted.

One player who is likely to be in the side who missed the game against Liverpool is Kyle Walker-Peters who was back in training after feeling tightness in his legs after the Spurs game the interim manager had this to say.

"Kyle trained today, he had a bit of tightness before the game against Liverpool and we opted to err on the side of caution on that one," Rusk clarified.

"It's good to see him back out there and I'm hopeful he's in contention for Sunday.

"We gave the players a day off after the Liverpool game so we've reconvened as a group today, I'm still waiting for the fall out of the training session today to see exactly where we're at with that.

"We're hopeful that we'll have one or two available that we didn't have the other day."

That will offer a fast paced attacking option on the right should Rusk use the same formation as he did against Liverpool.

Rusk though was a little more coy about who will be in goal, although he confirmed that Aaron Ramsdale is back in training, he would not confirm that he was ready to play against Fulham.

"Aaron Ramsdale's been back involved, he's definitely not far away but whether he's involved and available is probably still a conversation."

But whoever is fit and injured, Saints can go into this game with a lot more hope than they went into the game against Spurs, although ultimately it was a defeat against Liverpool, they played as if a weight had been taken off their shoulders, yes they started a little shakily, but that was to be expected after the car crash start to the Premier League season, but they grew into the game as it went on and you could see the confidence returning.

Fulham are having a good season so far, sitting in 8th with 24 points, but they have faltered a little of late, there last 5 games have seen them win only once, with 3 draws and a defeat in the other 4 games.

That defeat came against Wolves, so it shows that they are not impregnable and Saints will be hoping to match Wolves and get the 3 points.

We go into the Xmas period rock bottom, knowing that even if our relegation rivals were to lose all 3 of the games over the festive period and we were to win all 3 of ours, then we would still be in the bottom 3, that is the gravity of the situation and the task facing the new manager.

It is a forlorn hope, at least at the moment and by the turn of the year it could be an impossible one, but in the meantime we can play without fear, we have nothing to lose and sometimes that can be an advantage, we just have to keep plugging away.

One thing that we can hope for is that we will not play in the same way as we did under Russell Martin where he stubbornly made his players stick to his full on possession football game without any lessening of it, leaving them no leeway to play according to the situation, our strikers have failed because they had been constantly making runs, only to see the ball constantly recycled backwards or sideways, Cameron Archer for one will be a player who will benefit from seeing more balls played forward for him to run onto.

Ivan Duric has a reputation for building defensively solid teams that are physically intense and tough to break down aligned with a pressing style, this is more Pochettino than Guardiola whom Russell martin seemed determined to emulate at any cost.

So the trip to Craven Cottage marks the start of a new era, you would think that even if he is not in the dug out then Duric will chat to Simon Rusk and the players and communicate his way of doing things going forward.

So as I have said the start of a new era, but in 3 games time we will know whether we have a chance of staying up or we are just planning for next season in the Championship.

All Photos Via Reuters

templarinexile added 09:24 - Dec 21 The key to our very remote chance of survival rests on any positive transfer activity. The regular players in the team have mostly shown that they are ill equipped for the PL, and while a fresh manager may be able to get some improved performances, and maybe reduce the propensity for humiliating defeats, without a striker or two who can and will score goals at this level we will continue to flounder in the depths.

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highfield49 added 12:41 - Dec 21 Templarinexile,rightly or wrongly I'm not convinced that the majority of the players are necessarily ill equipped for the PL. I would say that the players were certainly ill equipped to play the game RM envisaged in his dreams, or fantasies. Let's give the new manager, presuming Juric is now at the club, the opportunity to use the players strengths and see if they can compete with other teams on a level playing field?

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JoeEgg added 13:18 - Dec 21 Fair point highfield - but do we honestly think that our new manager has actually seen any of our players in action in order to judge them and be aware of their relative strengths? And the masses that make up the non playing section of our largzly anonymous squad - will he have a clue where the extra potential lies? Ross Stewart was to be the striker we needed - can the new manager do anything about that, Sports Republic have managed to create such a mess that even if the talent is actually there that it will be months before the new Boss can get to grips with the real situation at St Marys - and we dont have 'months' if we are still looking to stay in the Premier League. The one consolation Martin has gone!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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