Manchester United take on Southampton at Old Trafford on Saturday afternoon, with the home side looking to increase their top four chances with a second straight win.
Advertisement
While Austin has insisted that England played no part in his move to Southampton, he must surely fancy his chances of making the squad. I think that if we want to bet, taking the under 2.5 goals is the way to go since United play that kind of game.
On Saturday they head to Manchester United, the scene of a memorable 1-0 win last season which was their first success at the Theatre of Dreams in 27 years.
When asked if he had been impressed by United’s recent revival – Van Gaal’s side are unbeaten since the turn of the year, reducing the chances of his dismissal before the summer – Koeman said: “Not impressed, because I expect Manchester United to fight for the title”.
Adnan Januzaj was with the squad following his return from a loan spell at Borussia Dortmund, with Louis van Gaal telling MUTV the Belgian could be involved against the Saints.
Last weekend’s 3-0 victory over West Bromwich Albion moved Southampton back into the top half of the table and helped draw a line under a testing period last month.
He is now hoping for more of the same as Ronald Koeman’s side seek to make it three wins on the bounce.
“We can’t make stupid mistakes, because they are quality players, a quality team, they will punish you for those kind of mistakes and we need a flawless game to win on Saturday”, he said to the club’s official website. “We know we can beat them, but we have to perform at a high level”.
Pelle has scored three goals in three league appearances against the Red Devils.
Advertisement
Bastian Schweinsteiger remains sidelined with a knee injury and Phil Jones (ankle), Antonio Valencia (foot), Luke Shaw (leg), Marcos Rojo (shoulder) and Michael Carrick (knee) are also still out. He has not scored in five successive matches across all competitions for Man Utd since March 2010 (six matches). Maybe they have a little bit of difficulty to score goals, but they don’t concede a lot and it’s hard to beat them, and for them it’s hard to win the game.
