Saints make the short trip across the New Forest to visit in form Bournemouth, knowing that a win or even a draw would lift them out of the bottom 3, but a defeat would be a major setback.

Saints go into the game missing three of their best young players, Tino Livramento who has been out since April, Romeo Lavia who has missed the last five games with a hamstring injury and now Armel Bella-Kotchap who is out after dislocating his shoulder in the draw against West Ham.

Bu Ralph Hasenhuttl still has a strong squad to pick from and should be able to put out a strong team, the draw against West Ham was not good watching from a footballing point of view, but it did show that the squad has fight in it and can put a string of results together.

Since losing at Liverpool 9-0 the Cherries have not lost a game, winning two and drawing 3 of their 5 games, but it could be said the fixture list has been kind to them, a win over Nottingham Forest was scraped, a draw at Newcastle was decent, but games against Brentford, Fulham & Leicester were not the hardest, it gave them a foundation to build on but Saints should go there without fear.

Ralph has to do what he did against West Ham, put out a solid side that knows the task and more importantly knows the formation they will play.

Duje Caleta-Car looks likely to step in for Bella-Kotchap in a back line that otherwise will be unchanged and the only other real decisions that the manager has to make is in the centre of the park, Moi Elyounoussi could be replaced as could Maitland-Niles with Ibrahima Diallo coming in, but otherwise I don't expect too many changes.

Now is the time for Ralph Hasenhuttl, and also time his team have to stand up and be counted, the potential is there, but as of yet it has rarely reached it's peak, now it has to.

It will be a tense night at the Viality Stadium, but it is one that we can come through and in doing so take ourselves clear of the drop zone.

It won't be easy, but we have been in worse positions before and come through, we need to do so again.

Photo: Action Images

highfield49 added 09:54 - Oct 19 It's no coincidence that the games Lavia has missed have also been games where we've been outplayed in midfield, AMN and Diallo haven't been able to reach his level of performance. Maybe Lyanco should be given game time as he's more in the Romeu style of presence? With Arsenal, Palace and Newcastle games coming up losing tonight is going to leave the team in deep trouble. Winning and winning well is going to provide a springboard and dropping points is going to shatter any remaining confidence. Defeat will indeed be a major setback.

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SaintPaulVW added 10:54 - Oct 19 Ideally need 3 points tonight. Although a draw away isn't the end of the world. To get something out of this game we need goals, full backs not leaving space behind them and a solid performance in central midfield. If Ralph can't get that out of the players available may be getting close to someone else having the chance. Sad but true. COYR
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Ifonly added 11:42 - Oct 19 "...it did show that the squad has fight in it and can put a string of results together." String of results? We've lost 4 and drawn 1 of the last 5 games. There was a bit of fight on show but not many signs of being able to win games. I expect a dull game tonight without much quality on show, where Ralph concentrates on extending his "string of results".
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