Regugal contributor Dan gives us his thoughts ahead of the trip to Selhurst Park to take on Crystal Palace.
On Saturday, Saints travel to Selhurst Park to take on Crystal Palace who are now under new management. Palace hired Roy Hodgson earlier this week after unfairly sacking Frank De Boer after four losses from four in the league with zero goals scored. Many eyebrows would’ve been raised when it was announced that De Boer was to be replaced by Hodgson but the new appointment could be a disadvantage for us or prove to be a huge advantage; only time will tell.
Saints aren’t in the best of form with no goals scored in four of their five competitive games this season and the run gets worse when going back to the end of last season. So far, we have three league goals to our name and they all came from one game; furthermore, two were penalties.
After a dismal home defeat to Watford ended our short unbeaten start to the league season last time out, we have five points from four league games which, in my opinion, is pretty poor when you look at the fixtures. However, we have a good chance to pick up three points on Saturday when we visit a struggling Crystal Palace side.
Like I’ve said before, we won’t know whether Palace’s change in management will be a benefit or not for Saints but we do know that if there is any bad record held by an opposition, we are likely to help them break it! Obviously, we have to be positive and see it as a great opportunity to win a football match which may help confidence going into next weekend’s test against United but it is never easy to know what to expect when a team changes their manager mid-season.
Virgil Van Dijk may be in contention after playing his first competitive football match in eight months this week, albeit it was a 4-0 defeat for the under-23s. He did look rusty and was at fault for three of the goals but the main thing was that he needs to regain match fitness fast so we can have him back in the team. I would imagine that Wesley Hoedt will start and whether he will have Maya Yoshida, Jack Stephens or Virgil Van Dijk alongside him I don’t know but I would assume that it will be Stephens again; I doubt that Van Dijk is ready.
Prediction: Palace are having goal scoring issues like us but are still yet to score in the league this season. It would be very typical of Saints to help them break this record but I do think that in most games our defence is pretty solid and I can see us getting opportunities so I think a 2-0 win isn’t too much to ask for!