Judge me at season’s end
SOUTHAMPTON will achieve an unwanted club record if they fail to win at West Brom today.
It will be the first time in their Premier League history they have gone 13 games without a victory.
But do not for one moment think manager Mauricio Pellegrino’s heart and soul is not in trying to turn it around.
And he wants disgruntled Saints fans now calling for his head to wait until the end of the season before deciding whether he has been a success or a failure.
“I feel alive in this job,” said Pellegrino. “But who wants to be a loser? Nobody. Sometimes you have to lose but you smile better when you win.”
The Argentine is hoping he has a smile on his face and three more points on the board as his team face the bottom-of-the-table Baggies, with Daniel Sturridge set to make his home debut after a loan move from Liverpool this week.
Saints have won just four league games, only one more than West Brom, since Pellegrino replaced Claude Puel last summer.
Pellegrino knows he must turn things round quickly but said: “At the end of the season we can analyse things better. When you are not in the right moment you have to be careful with your analysis. The feeling people get about the manager, the players, the club and the board is not the best. Football is something I have done all my life. I like the adrenaline, I like the pressure and like to talk to my players, even in difficult situations.
“This is an important game for us. We need to win games against all the teams at the bottom. West Brom are really strong in direct play and have players who can create problems. One action can make a difference. We are ready to compete well.”
As Pellegrino looks for a change of fortune he is ready to put his faith in Shane Long and record signing Guido Carrillo to save Saints from their slump and help rescue his job. Defeat would surely nudge Pellegrino closer to the sack but he believes misfiring Long and £19million buy Carrillo could be his secret weapons. Sturridge, too, will be carrying expectations, and West Brom will wrap him in cotton wool to protect him for their relegation scrap. The injury-prone England striker was a surprise arrival and has just 12 matches to try to make the difference. Manager Alan Pardew said: “We will be managing him a bit more carefully. “In the short term he won’t be pushed in training. We will protect him and make sure he gets to the games. He will slowly build his stamina. If I can keep him fit for every league game I cannot imagine that is not going to be significant come the end of the season. I’ve already seen little flashes that have not just lifted me but everyone at the training ground because he can do things with the ball that are special.
“He showed a couple of flashes at Man City in midweek, but we have seen more than that on the training ground. If we can see that on the pitch our fans are going to be very excited by him.”
Sturridge has not made a league start since the end of November and scored only two league goals this season.
Pardew believes his kid-gloves treatment could even work for England manager Gareth Southgate at the World Cup.
“Daniel is fresh and he hasn’t had a lot of game time,” said Pardew. “So he could be a rare player Gareth has who is fresh for the World Cup.”