With our trip to White Hart Lane to take on Spurs now being played on a Sunday, Saints must sit and watch how their rivals do on the Saturday.

Saints season is approaching the business end with only 8 games remaining, the first aim is to keep ahead of the chasing pack headed by Aston Villa in 10th, then to keep ahead of Newcastle in 9th and after that we can concentrate on trying to chase down the teams in front of us, with Manchester United sitting directly above 3 points ahead with a game in hand.

If we take those tasks in order then ironically Aston Villa are also sitting out Saturday, they play on Sunday when they host Stoke City who start the weekend on the same number of points as Villa although they have like Saints played a game more than the Villa Park club, ideally a draw would be the best result from our point of view, or a Stoke win.

Next up is Newcastle and they have a very winnable home game against Crystal Palace who travel to the North East for the second week running, Palace after a good run have fallen down of late and will be keen to get back on track and drag themseves clear of the bottom four, perhaps this desire aligned with the turmoil at St James Park that sees Alan Pardew not even allowed into the ground for this one might give Palace a fighting chance of at least a draw, anything other than a Newcastle win would suit Saints as it would keep them in 8th place whatever happens at Spurs, it would also give them a great incentive to nick all three points and create a buffer zone before the Toon Army arrive at St Mary's for the big game the following weekend.

But can Saints overcome Manchester United ? David Moyes beleagured men face a trip to West Ham, on paper it should be a win for them but Upton Park has often been their undoing as it was in 1995 when they lost the Premier league title there on the final day by drawing with the Hammers and allowing Blackburn to sneak in to be crowned Champions.

If United lose in East London then a win in North London for us the following day would see us even on points with the Red Devils although to overtake them we would need to overturn a 6 goal deficit to them in goal difference, but the incentive is there if we can turn over Spurs.

After that its hard to see us catching anyone above United, although beating Spurs would bring us within 5 points of them and an outside chance of catching them, sandwiched in between United and Spurs are Everton, they quietly keep grinding out results and now look favourites for that 5th position, they start the weekend only six points ahead of us, but they do have two games in hand, how they would love us to beat Spurs as they have Swansea at home on the Saturday, if they win that they leapfrog Spurs and even a draw for us at WHL would see them hold that spot on goal difference that being the case.

This weekend will perhaps see a few more things become clearer in the Premier League, for Saints there is a good chance to see 10th place virtually guaranteed, that is one good incentive, but we want to go better than that and after we have sat out Saturday we can focus on keeping taking steps forward.

Photo: Action Images

Jesus_02 added 12:19 - Mar 18 I can see us getting a result at WHL ...they will have been knocked out of Europe two days previously and have L'pool after us. We have less to lose and a style of play that suites counter attack. 3-2 Saints :)
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