Football League World
·25 April 2024
Southampton FC latest: Celtic battle for Patrick Pentz, Russell Martin fuming, Joe Rothwell concern
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·25 April 2024
Southampton endured a night to forget on Tuesday, as they were heavily beaten 5-0 by Leicester City at The King Power Stadium.
Goals from Wilfried Ndidi and Jamie Vardy, as well as a hat-trick from Abdul Fatawu, secured an emphatic victory for the Foxes.
As a result of that, the Saints remain fourth in the Championship table, with their hopes of securing automatic promotion back to the Premier League now all but over.
They are however, now guaranteed to have a shot at securing a return to the top-flight of English football via the play-offs.
But given the somewhat inconsistent form they have produced since their record unbeaten run, there will be plenty of scrutiny on whether they are able to succeed with that, especially after Tuesday's performance.
So with that in mind, we've taken a look at all the latest news to have emerged from Southampton recently, right here.
Much like the result, the performance at Leicester on Tuesday was notable for all the wrong reasons from a Southampton perspective.
Despite needing a positive result to keep any hopes of automatic promotion alive, the Saints instead folded against the league leaders, who were ultimately allowed to run riot on their home turf, against a side who not that long ago had been seen as genuine challengers to the Foxes for a place in the top two.
It is perhaps not surprising therefore, to see that Southampton manager Russell Martin did not hold back with his assessment of his squad, following that defeat. Speaking after the game, Martin described his side's performance as "pathetic", while speaking to Sky Sports.
Although he was pleased with the way his side started, the Saints boss was left disappointed with the way his side did not regroup after conceding the second goal, suggesting his side went into "self-preservation mode" rather than looking to help each other, before concluding: "I don't like that trait in my team one bit, and that really hurts."
Southampton had already been dealt one injury blow ahead of the trip to Leicester, with the news that Stuart Armstrong will be out for the rest of the season, and now they may have been handed another one.
Having come into the starting XI for the Saints against Leicester, on-loan Bournemouth midfielder Joe Rothwell managed to last just 40 minutes of that match, before being forced off with an injury problem of his own.
Now it seems as though the club face a nervous wait to discover the severity of the injury. Speaking about the blow Rothwell suffered after the game, Martin said: "He’s tweaked his hamstring so we will assess that. He was able to play on for a bit but then he became a bit tired so we will have a look."
Away from the disappointment of Tuesday night's defeat, there are also some transfer links to have emerged around Southampton recently.
According to a report from Football Insider earlier this week, Southampton, along with Celtic and PSV Eindhoven, are interested in signing Bayer Leverkusen goalkeeper Patrick Pentz.
The Austrian has yet to make his debut for Leverkusen after joining in January last year, but is currently impressing while on loan in Denmark with Brondby, to attract that interest from elsewhere.
Pentz is due to enter the final year of his contract with Leverkusen in the summer. Meanwhile, Southampton may need to add to their options in goal before next season, with Gavin Bazunu set to be out for several months through injury, and Alex McCarthy out of contract at the end of the current campaign.