After a pretty positive pre-season campaign for Southampton, our Premier League opener against Burnley was incredibly disappointing as we fell to a lacklustre 3-0 defeat at Turf Moor. This weekend, things don’t get any easier as manager Ralph Hasenhuttl prepares the side for Champions League (and Super Cup) winners Liverpool.
With the Austrian gaffer knowing that the side can perform far better than they did in the last one, as he spoke to saintsfc when he met with the media to preview the game, he admitted the players had certainly been put through their paces this week.
“We had an intense week, a busy week. I think everybody knows we can do it much better than we did after 60 minutes in Burnley. Until that moment, it was a similar game to the season before, where it was tight and with chances for both sides, and we scored then. This time, the opponent scored, and this time we didn’t do what we were supposed to do. We were very critical of ourselves and will try to show we can do it much better, and I am sure we will show a reaction.”
With Burnley having some positives before we fell off the pace as the game came to a close, we can certainly hope for a better showing and it should go without saying that we are still bedding our new signings in, so they should naturally improve in time. Our gaffer sounded positive about small improvements that he’d seen, but whether we can take something from this game or not, we’ll soon see.
As long as we can see clear improvements again, I think most will be happy as 2019/20 has barely got going yet.
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