Saints take on Stoke City at St Mary's just a day short of a year since the Potters visited St Mary's in the Championship, last season, who says that fixture lists are different every season, one man who remembers the day well is Davin Mubama.

Loan signing Davin Mubama might forget who he made his debut against on loan to Stoke City last season, but he won't forget his third Championship game for them, it was almost exactly a year ago at St Mary's when he was sent off at St Mary's on the hour mark for a second yellow card, it didn't help Saints much though, already 1-0 down, they conceded a second on 75 minutes and although Taylor Harwood-Bellis reduced the deficit, Stoke hung on for the victory.

Of the starting XI a year ago, only Harwood-Bellis Flynn Downes & Jack Stephens, look likely to start in this one with 5 of the outfield 10 no longer at the club either permanently or in the case of Jay Robinson on loan, although of the other 3 Nathan Wood, Welington will be on the bench and Gavin Bazunu looks likely to leave within a week or so.

That emphasises just how much the squad has changed in the past 12 months and hopefully that will include the result changing too.

The loss at Watford wasn't great, but essentially we are only a point worse off in the corresponding fixture last season, so a win against Stoke will see us 2 points better off if we achieve the win, if we want promotion then we have to better our results last season, do that and we won't be far off.

But there was something lacking last week, part of the problem was that we shuffled the midfield around due to injury, we didn't stick to the tried and trusted formula of last season, we made changes to accommodate players and that didn't work out.

The good news is that we can rectify it this week and if we cut out the individual errors that cost us dearly at Vicarage Road then we can prosper.

I don't expect too many changes in the goalkeeper and defence, a little part of me says that we might throw in Arron Ramsdale between the sticks, he is the best keeper we have, but I think it would upset the moral in the squad, so I think he will stick with Peretz, although if we can't shift Ramsdale this window then there truly is a decision to be made.

The back four might see a change though, could we see Jack Stephens out and either Nathan Wood or Joshua Quarshie come in as a replacement, it would be harsh on Stephens but sometimes managers need to shake things up.

In the centre of midfield Flynn Downes is nailed on and I would also think that Cameron Bragg will start, the best that we can hope from Caspar Jander is a place on the bench, in front of them Finn Azaz will hopefully be ready to start.

Out wide keep Leo Scienza where he is most effective and that is on the left wing, but on the right it's a little trickier, I didn't think Kuryu Matsuki really impressed at Watford and so I would put Lewis Dobbin out wide on the right.

Up front it will be interesting to see if Tonda Eckert keeps rotating the striker, last season he has to and it gave us impetus, but this season we have two centre forwards who can play 90 minutes, so who will get the nod this week.

On form it has to be Cyle Larin, goals at both Colchester & Watford show he still has the knack for goals and has come back into the side after the World Cup and carried on where he left off last season.

But Divin Mubama will be keen to get his season kick started, in the final 20minutes at Watford, we seemed to try and play to his strengths putting a lot of crosses into the box, but the truth was we were also playing to Watford's who had plenty of big men to head the ball out of the box.

The one time we played through the centre we scored and that is where we went wrong last weekend, just as we brought on Finn Azaz who can play those clever through balls, we took off Cyle Larin who thrived on them last season and changed tactics to feeding the ball pout wide for crosses.

All managers get it wrong sometimes and Tonda Eckert did last week, but it doesn't mean it is terminal, he got things wrong last season and we showed that we could still get wins, we almost got something at Watford and didn't get slaughtered, so that fight is still there.

Again the bench will be crucial for Saints, if my starting XI is in place then we would still have the likes of Welington, Stephens, Quarshie, Matsuki, Fellows, Mubama, Archer, Edozie, Jander, Brereton Diaz & even Damion Downs to pick from and that is a strong list to select from.

The thing is that we have to do as we did last season, take every game as it comes, in one respect we have got the burden of a long unbeaten run off our shoulders, now we need to build a new one.

Like we did under when Will Still departed and Tonda was appointed, we have to get that siege mentality going again, we cannot afford to get on the teams back and especially not get on individual players backs.

Now is the time to get behind the team from the start of the game till the finish and then worry about what has gone right or wrong in the pub afterwards, every player who pulls on the shirt needs to be supported and not abused.

When asked what team they support all of our fans would say they are Southampton supporters and not Southampton Abusers and that is the key element here.

All Photos Via Reuters

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