Saints have been handed a big advantage ahead of the visit of Swansea City with the Wlsh club's key man unable to play through injury.
Swansea's leading goalscorer last season Fernando Llorente will miss the game at St Mary's after breaking his arm in a cycling accident whilst on holiday in the summer.
Swansea Head Coach Paul Clement spoke on the club's official website to update fans.
"Fernando's rehabilitating individually - he has not joined the team training yet.
"But assuming all goes well, we anticipate that happening in the next 10 days."
"I think it is unlikely he will be involved in the first couple of games, but his return will not be long after that."
"The most important thing is that we get the arm right."
"You don't want him to re-fracture it and then end up with Fernando needing surgery, because a six-week injury can then become a six-month injury."
This will be a big blow to the Swans with Llorente top scoring last season with 15 of the club's 45 Premier League goals and with Swansea being the second leakiest defence in the Premier League this could be a big problem.
Second top scorer Gylfi Sigurdsson with 9 is already rumoured to be off before the start of the season meaning that when they arrive at St Mary's in 11 days time they could be without two players who between them scored well over half of their total goals last term.
Also missing will be former Saint Jack Cork who joined another former club Burnley for £10 million in July, meaning that with only one major signing through the doors in Roque Mesa a midfielder from Las Palmas, the swans are going to either have to enter the transfer market quickly or put out a very weakend side against Saints.
The key will be how quickly they can persuade everton to part with £50 million for Sigurdsson, in truth that is probably double what the player is worth, but Swnasea need the money fast to fund their squad rebuilding or as their fans seem to be fearing on social media face a long hard season.