With seven games left to play, four of them are against the top six sides in the Premier League and so far Saints have not fared well against those teams, it has to change !
Last season Saints did well against the so called Big Six, so much so that they managed to push one of them, Liverpool out of the top six and sneak into that last position ourselves.
In the 12 games against those clubs last season we won 6, drew 3 and lost only 3, scoring 22 goals, conceding 13 and in doing so gaining 21 points and average of 1.31 per game.
This season it has been the complete opposite, in the 8 games played so far we have taken only two solitary points at an average of .25 per game, a draw at Manchester City away and another at home to Liverpool, losing the other six games, we have scored only 4 times and conceded 16 and that perhaps tells you why although we are comfortably mid table, why we are not pushing Everton for 7th spot and another season of European football.
Given that over half of our 7 remaining fixtures are against top six sides, it is plain to see that either we improve our ratios against them or we struggle to finish in the top ten.
At the moment Saints season is in the balance, we are capable of overtaking West Bromwich Albion and securing 8th place, but failing that we should be able to finish in the top 10, however unless we take a few more points against the top sides than we have been doing then we could find ourselves drop down the table.
Burnley in 16th are only four points behind us in 9th and sandwiched in between them and us are another six sides.
The good news is that we have games in hand on all of them the bad news is that they are against Chelsea away and Arsenal and Manchester United at home.
This means there is a lot to play for the difference in prize money between finishing 16th and 8th is around £16 million pounds in prize money, so those that say there is nothing to play for could not be more wrong, we are playing for a sizable addition to our transfer kitty and a big whole in it if we slip down the table.
We really need to take points from these three games in hand, four points would be ideal as it would almost certainly secure us top ten and would give us a good chance of taking on West Brom for that 8th place spot.
Sadly I dont thnk he first of those points will be at Chelsea tomorrow night, they have too much to play for, if they drop points to us and Spurs win at Palace on Wednesday the title race would be wide open, Chelsea will be focused on the task and will put out their strongest side.
But we can get those points in the home games against Arsenal and Manchester United, both have fixture pile ups of their own and neither are infallible.
These are the two crucial games in the run in, we have to remain unbeaten in them and preferably win at least one.
But first we need to get points in other games, anything at Chelsea would be a bonus, Liverpool at Anfield tend to struggle against the mid table sides and then we need to dispatch Hull at home.
That too has been our problem, our ability to win games we really should have, Hull away, Swansea away, Palace away, Burnley away all four of which were defeats that really should have been avoided but for lapses in concentration in defending and poor finishing.
If we had taken just four points from those games then the League table would look far different this morning.
But having failed to dispatch the bottom clubs, we have to do it the hard way.
Our final position is in our own hands, yes the three games in hand are against the top clubs, but in affect they are free hits, anything we get is better than nothing and even if we lost all three it would then be a case of just polishing off the other four games.
But we don't want that for several reasons, not least a 4th consecutive top ten finish makes a big statement as where we have come as a club and where we are now, the prize money is important, but most important is the manager himself, how he puts out the team and how it performs will go a long way as to telling us if he is the man to take us forward.