Saints continued their winning ways with another win, but it was still mix and match for Claude Puel.

There was no real answers to what Claude Puel sees as his best starting line up in the game at Groningen, although Shane Long and Fraser Forster returned to the side Steven Davis and Ryan Bertrand did not feature and the French manager utilised his whole available squad with only Forster playing the whole 90 minutes.

The starting XI did at least look more of a first team in terms of names though, all having played plenty of first team games in the past couple of seasons apart from new signing Nathan Redmond, however that changed on 5 minutes when Matt Targett was forced to go off and winger Sam McQueen slotted in to the left back spot to replace him.

The game changed in the 37th minute though when Gronigen's defender Hans Hateboer was booked for the second time for fouling Nathan Redmond and left the field.

Half time saw a few changes with Hojberg, Austin & Hesketh coming on and on the hour mark more changes were made that meant the team on the pitch resembled the academy side especially when five minutes later Jack Stephens replaced Romeu leaving Fraser Forster, Charlie Austin and Virgil Van Dijk as the only players left on the pitch with a lot of Premier League experience although of course Hojberg will soon have judging by his pre season form.

The only goal of the game came from Charlie Austin who glanced in a header in the 75th minute from a good Jake Hesketh cross to seal what was a comfortable win.

Of course it wasn't as comfortable as last seasons 3-0 scoreline, but the new manager used the game in a different context, still preferring to use the squad and give the youngsters a chance rather than put out any clues as to what his starting line up will be on the opening day against Watford.

So there have been no real conclusions to be drawn from this game apart from the fact that our youngsters seem capable of holding a Dutch Eridivisie team and then win the game and that has to be one good point.

Saints: Forster, Martina (Valery, 62), Targett (McQueen, 5), Van Dijk (Jones, 82), Yoshida (Hojberg, 45), Romeu (Stephens, 67), Ward-Prowse (Isgrove, 62), Clasie (Reed, 62), Tadic (Hesketh, 45), Long (Austin, 45), Redmond (Gallagher, 62).

Photo: Action Images

highfield49 added 11:46 - Jul 31 Hojbjerg is already looking like the Premiership bargain buy of the summer. If he continues to play the way he is, and even improve once he's fully settled, then it's already time to put up the Not for Sale signs. On the other hand Yoshi doesn't look any less bewildered by events on the pitch. No complaints about his genuine effort but we seriously need another central defender.

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the_saint added 13:30 - Jul 31 With Ryan cedric and fonte to come in I have no worries defence wise but we need to strengthen Our attacking options, even though the kids done well they are not ready for the prem the good news is we have a manager that will help intergrate them in, but that takes time. So with j rod out of sorts and Gallagher not good enough we are relying on long and Austin to stay fit for a long season ahead. Would like us to buy two quality attacking players that our budget will allow to really lift all us supporters and players alike .

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SanMarco added 19:20 - Jul 31 Yes - we need to buy goals but I would still say a good quality back-up centre half too - because highfield is dead right about Yosh.
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