Southampton vs Norwich City

St Mary’s Stadium is the venue as resurgent Southampton take on rock-bottom Norwich City in the Premier League Matchday 27 curtain-raiser.

The Serbian-led takeover back in January has inspired a renaissance at Southampton, who will take the field unbeaten in five of their six Premier League matches under the new ownership (W3, D2). Yet, even though a comfortable 2-0 home win over Everton last time out extended Southampton’s unbeaten Premier League streak at St Mary’s to nine games (W4, D5), it could be too little too late for a European push. The ‘Saints’ have alternated between victories (2) and draws (2) across their last four top-flight outings since a 3-1 defeat away to Wolverhampton in mid-January and could make it five successive league matches without losing for the first time this season. Standing in Southampton’s way will be a Norwich side that dispatched them 2-1 in the reverse fixture in November.

Seeking their first league double over the ‘Saints’ since the 2007/08 Championship season, Norwich City go into this round on the back of consecutive Premier League losses. Nailed to the bottom of the table, five points adrift of 17th-placed Newcastle United, the ‘Canaries’ will have to defy their underwhelming five-game away form (W1, L4) to bolster their hopes of securing survival. But in addition to being the only side in the Premier League yet to hit a 20-goal milestone this season (15 scored so far), the visitors have attempted the fewest shots on target (70), highlighting their immense difficulties in the front third. That’s not the kind of statistics Norwich would want to look up to ahead of this trip as they hope to end a three-game losing top-flight run at St Mary’s.