It was a feeling of deja vu at St Mary's with the early sending off of Jannik Vestergaard, but Saints showed how far they have come as a team and instead of collapsing stayed solid to earn a deserved draw, it felt like a win !
The team news from St Mary's drew a few gasps even from people like myself who are firmly in the pro Ralph Hasenhuttl camp, Minamino suddenly back in from the cold, Jack Stephens in at left back and Diallo & Walcott dropped.
But from the start Saints looked a balanced side and one that was clearly focused on the task ahead, but after only 9 minutes things went wrong and it was a feeling of deja vu in the TV watching Saints support.
Even the pundits were in total agreement on this one, Jannik Vestergaard had played the ball although he caught Jamie Vardy in the follow through it was not intended, it was not a red card, referee Rob Jones let his inexperience show and flashed a red card without thinking about it.
Jan Bednarek calmed his team down, he knew the ball had been played and was confident that the red card would be overturned, but whoever was on VAR did not overturn it and even more inexplicably they confirmed that the sending off was for preventing a goal scoring opportunity, but Vestergaard had played the ball cleanly and Vardy even if he had not been hit by the challenge would never have reached it.
I have been and remain an advocate of VAR, but only when it is used properly and last night made me think that the problem is the referee's themselves, it is almost as if they see VAR as something that undermines their authority and exposes their mistakes, it is almost as if they are deliberately sabotaging it in order to get it scrapped.
Harsh words but I can see no other reason as to why so many wrong decisions are given by VAR.
Vestergaard's troubles were of his own making though, his mis control of a simple pass put him in the situation.
So it was deja vu both from Leicester's last visit to St Mary's and also our game earlier this year at Old Trafford and both those games had a terrible ending.
But this time it didn't decimate the team spirit, it seemed to stir it up and Saints had a dogged determination that was not going to be broken.
The traffic was always going to be one way and with Nathan Tella who had looked lively early doors having to be sacrificed to bring on Mohamed Salisu, Saints had to regroup.
But although Leicester pushed forward with an arrogance that suggested they now saw the result as a formality , they found it wasn't going to be easy, they would have to fight for every ball.
Saints knew they had an uphill struggle on their hands and it seemed for a while that they were playing the ref as well, he let a foul on Nathan Redmond go without a yellow card, yet moments later booked Minamino for a similar challenge .
But Saints stayed firm until the break, they had a chance of their own and although Alex McCarthy had a couple of saves to make they were all routing and the red & white wall held firm.
After weathering the early second half bluster Saints took a shock lead when VAR spotted a handball and James Ward Prowse converted the penalty, suddenly with less than 30 minutes left the home side had something to hold.
But they didn't hold it for long and 7 minutes later Leicester were level and with 22 minutes left surely they could put the game to bed.
But more resolute defending boosted by the tiring legs of Minamino being replaced by Ibrahimo Diallo meant that Leicester for all their pressure, for all their attempts on goal, rarely actually created a chance of note, on one occasion when they did with Jamie Vardy turning and getting n a shot from close range Alex McCarthy saved well with his legs.
The final minutes were not the tension filled ones we thought they would be and whilst there was that nagging thought that Saints would give it away in the final minutes they didn't and a draw felt like a win.
This game encompasses all that has been going wrong in the last few months, Ralph Hasenhuttl has taken some flak from some supporters, but if Saints had lost this one it would have been to events beyond the control of the manager, the sending off was ultimately down to both Vestergaard's poor control and poor refereeing decisions again both on the pitch and in the VAR control room.
A manager no matter how good he is cannot prevent these things and to be blunt they have happened too often for comfort and Ralph must be tearing his hair out both at his players for these rash moments of play and referee's whether on the pitch or on VAR.
This season has petered out, but on Friday night against Leicester we showed that we have a good foundation to move forward, we showed that we have made progress, not only from when Hasenhuttl arrived in December 2018, not only from when Leicester last arrived in October 2019, not only from our trip to Old Trafford earlier in the year, but continuously and are making sure that we are becoming stronger through adversity.
There will be changes in the summer, Ralph knows now who he can count on and who he can't, he will have noted that when Mohamed Salisu replaced Jannik Vestergaard we became stronger at the back and had a central partnership that complimented each other , Jan Bednarek being the stopped and Salisu with a calm reading of the game that got his side out of trouble on several occasions.
Ironically although we got a good point we could drop down to 4th from bottom and that will bring some wailing if we do, but we turned a corner against Leicester and can build on it.
This was truly a team display and hard to pick a man of the match, literally every player on there for us could make a claim, but for me I would perhaps go for Mohamed Salisu, he made things look simple, he made last ditch tackles etc when needed, but on a lot of occasions he didn't need to because he had read the game and could simply step in and get the ball without needing to make a challenge.
I saw that when he first came into the side and I saw it again last night, all he lacks now is experience at this level, hopefully he will get it in the final games, whether Jannik Vestergaard is suspended or not I would play Salisu give him that experience and we might just find we have a player on our hands.
It is perhaps a sign of the the last few months that a draw like this should get me excited, God knows we have had little to cheer, but when we do we should do so, we need to get our pride in Southampton FC back, the players did last night and we as supporters need to as well, if we want to move forward we have to realise we can only play the hand we have got, we need to lose the cynicism towards our own team and support it, this has not been the worst season we have ever had, far from it.