Saints take on relegation threatened Hull City at St Mary's with both clubs desperate for all three points.
By 5pm on Saturday evening the Premier League will be becoming a lot clearer, all three points for Saints would propel them into 6th place at least with Liverpool not playing till Monday and if Spurs were to fail to win against Aston Villa at White Hart Lane then it could be 5th.
For Hull it is also vital defeat for them could see them drop into the bottom three and as any seasoned relegation fighter will tell you this is the time that those that have spent most of the season in the relegation zone start to pick up and drag the clubs above them into the dog fight.
So this game is just as important to Hull as it is to Saints, in fact given the stakes it is probably of higher importance to the visitors.
For Saints the task is simple, it is games like this they need to win and win well and we need to get a run of wins going that will ultimately cement 7th place and then ensure that we finish higher. Indeed it could be said that after our relatively poor spell of late we are coming in on the rails and that a return to form for us could be timely with both Liverpool and Spurs facing a tough run of fixtures after this weekend.
Team wise the question will be what line up Ronald Koeman puts out, will he keep faith with Pelle or will he opt for a either Shane Long or Sadio Mane as the central striker, certainly both would seem favourite to start the game in one position or other, Koeman faces a dilemma here, on one hand he will want to show faith to Pelle who although is struggling to score, is still creating chances for others and on the other he has to consider whether starting him will be counter productive and effect the atmosphere if the game remains goal less.
Certainly Hull are a side who are hard to break down on their travels, although they have only two wins they have six draws out of their 16 games on the road so far, 23 goals against is lower than most in the bottom half of the table, but what lets them down is their scoring, only 12 goals for is the 4th worst in the Premier.
So it seems their stall is set from the start, they will dig in deep and try to get a goal on the break and then defend it, in many respects just the sort of team that Saints hate to play against at St Mary's.
Hull are not exactly in form though, they have not won since beating QPR six games ago and that has seen them dragged right into the relegation battle, they are struggling to keep the goals out at present having been beaten last time out at Swansea 3-1 and before that 3-2 at home to Chelsea meaning that keeper Alan McGregor has been under fire from the fans and that Steve Bruce is considering dropping him for this game.
One man who definitely won't be playing for the Tigers is Gaston Ramirez who cannot face his parent club.
Saints only injury concern is Filipe Djuricic who is out, other than that Steven Davis and Florin Gardos will be available again after injury.
Saints ideally will look to get an early goal to relieve the pressure and then build on that, if they dont then it goes without saying that they need the crowd to stay with them and not get on their backs, against Palace recently the crowd were magnificent and kept with the team meaning that we put ourselves in the position where we could win the game, we need to remember that tomorrow.
Saints have to win this, in as much as all we can do now is win games and keep winning them and then hope a few other games go our way as well, if we do our bit then we can do no more.
I believe we will win and i think we will win well, we have been due to put a few past a side after some frsutrating games of late and i think this could be the one, we have the players we have the spirit we just now need the goals to flow and the points will come.