The situation is a lot different than when Aston Villa arrived at St Mary's last year in terms of League position for Saints, however like last season this year see's them arrive with Saints smarting from back to back defeats.
After a great start to the season Saints have suddenly found themselves in a mini crisis, after losing only one game in the opening 11, they have lost the last 2, albeit to the top two sides in the Premier League, to cap all that they have been hit with injuries to two of the key players in the side in Artur Boruc and Morgan Schneiderlin.
So Mauricio Pochettino has a dilemma, in his first 13 games he has relied on the same core of 13 players who have started most of the games and/or came off the bench, now he finds he must dip into the fringe second XI, most of whom have had little game time on the pitch this season.
In goal its a simple choice, Kelvin Davis is injured so Paulo Gazzaniga starts his first game in over a year, the Argentinian looked confident though in his 30 minute stint at Chelsea and of course made his debut in the corresponding game last season so will be hoping to repeat his performance back then. The only real question is whether Cody Cropper is named as the sub keeper or we gamble and include another outfield player.
In midfield its a little more difficult, if Pochettino sticks with his first choice 13 then Steve Davis will come in for Schneiderlin, assuming of course the Frenchman is unfit, though this will mean that Pochettino would then have just about every fit and able player of his 13 on the pitch and on the bench there would be very little personel with playing time, in fact Callum Chambers who hasnt played since the first four games, Jos Hooiveld with a game at Arsenal and Jack Cork with a total of 12 minutes off of the bench would be about it, after then its Tadanari Lee and a few youngsters none of whom have had any Premier league experience this season.
Another option would be to put in Jack Cork, this would be the obvious choice given Cork was so good in one of the holding roles last year, but clearly Pochettino has an issue with Cork given how little he has played him after him being an ever present under the Saints boss last term.
One thing I do hope is that the manager resists the temptation to play both Lambert & Osvaldo, he has to make the choice and then keep the same formation that has suited us fine up until recently, when you have injury problems the trick is to keep the shape of the side as intact as possible, not further complicate things by playing people out of position.
So its backs against the wall for Saints in a game where suddenly after two defeats and a run of three tough games to follow this one really need to be picking up maximum points to ensure that they keep up with the leading pack and dont put themselves into a situation where they could feasibly find themselves dropping out of the top ten in a few weeks if they are not careful.
On a plus point though Saints do have the core of the side that has seen them so admirably rise to the top six in place, the issues we have are not with the players on the pitch but on our options from the bench which will rely mainly on untried players this season.
So this is a game Saints must win, not a must win game though because lets face it wherever we are at Xmas it will probably have exceeded our expectations, however from the point of view of keeping things going, its vital that we get three points in the bag and get our confidence back rather than denting it further.
We can win it, but it is a game where we need the crowd to be the 12th man and get behind the team, "ALL" the team, if we want three points then there has to be total support and then we can have the inquests after.