Southampton

Southampton are hoping for a sixth successive win in all competitions having reached the FA Cup semi-finals with a victory over Arsenal last weekend and won 5-1 at Wrexham on Tuesday to move into the Championship play-off places.

Derby have won as many games away as they have at home this season (9) but were beaten at Coventry on their last road trip.

• Southampton have lost just one of their past 10 league games against Derby (W3 D6), going down 1-0 at home in February 2007.

• This is Derby's first away league game against Southampton since February 2012, when they lost 4-0 under Nigel Clough.

• Since Tonda Eckert's first game in charge of Southampton on 5 November, the Saints have picked up the most points (54) and scored the most goals (55) of any Championship side.

• John Eustace has picked up 84 points in 55 Championship games with Derby County (W24 D12 L19), the fifth-most of any side since his first game in charge last February.

• Finn Azaz has been involved in eight goals in his past 12 home league starts for Southampton (5 goals, 3 assists), including three in his last three (2 goals, 1 assist).

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Oxford United's Matt Bloomfield, Tonda Eckert of Southampton, West Brom interim boss James Morrison and Coventry's Frank Lampard have all been nominated for the March Championship manager of the month award.

Bloomfield led Oxford to seven points from their four games last month to give them hope of avoiding relegation from the Championship, while Eckert's Southampton went unbeaten in March - and won at leaders Coventry.

Morrison was handed the task of lifting West Brom clear of the bottom three and took eight points from an unbeaten four-game run.

Coventry have continued their charge towards the Premier League, with Lampard overseeing three wins and just that one blemish in the defeat by Southampton.

Southampton goalkeeper Daniel Peretz and West Brom defender George Campbell are nominated for the player of the month award along with Millwall striker Josh Coburn and Derby defender Matt Clarke.

The winners of both awards will be announced on Friday morning.

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Southampton striker Cyle Larin believes that his side are "becoming stronger" with every game they play.

Saints added to the success of Saturday's FA Cup win over Arsenal with a thumping victory over Wrexham on Tuesday, when they scored five goals to jump back into the play-off positions.

Larin was on the scoresheet for his fifth goal of the season at At Stok Cae Ras, picking up the ball on halfway before driving towards goal and finishing across the keeper with his right foot.

He arrived at Saints on deadline day in the January transfer window with an option to make the deal permanent in the summer.

"There's a lot of belief in the squad and trust in each other," he told BBC Radio Solent.

"I think you see it on the pitch where the guys are really connecting and I think it's just game-by-game we are getting better and becoming stronger.

"You can smile for a bit with the win, but we're going to have to go again this weekend and the next game is the most important game and the team knows that.

"It was a great game against Arsenal and we knew Wrexham was very important, probably more important than the last game but everyone knows we take it game-by-game."

Saints are next in action on Saturday when they host Derby County before playing Blackburn Rovers in midweek.

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Southampton boss Tonda Eckert has praised "outstanding" Wrexham manager Phil Parkinson before their Championship tie in Wales on Tuesday night (20:00 BST).

While Wrexham's Hollywood ownership and big spending often takes the limelight, the German believes the buck stops with Parkinson when it comes to the Welsh side's success.

"I think he's doing an outstanding job," Eckert told BBC Radio Solent.

"It does come down to the manager to put those pieces together and it's a very tough place to go to.

"It's so clear what they do, it's a very clear identity, a very clear style of playing and not an easy one to come up against."

The two sides are both pursuing a place in the play-offs, with the Saints aiming to leapfrog the Red Dragons into sixth spot.

Southampton will have momentum in their favour following a four-match winning run that includes victories over Championship leaders Coventry City and an FA Cup upset against Premier League leaders Arsenal.

But Eckert believes there are limits to what the side can draw from such big wins.

"The games have nothing to do with each other," Eckert added. "What you can take is the confidence to win games but that's it.

"I think the game and the way it unfolds has nothing to with Coventry because it's a completely different set-up."

Dan George
BBC Sport at St Mary's

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Southampton were superb tonight in a performance that had St Mary's absolutely bouncing at full-time.

This Saints team are more than doing justice to the 50th anniversary celebrations since they last won the FA Cup, and have now booked their place at Wembley for the semi-finals.

Tonda Eckert deserves plenty of praise for the job he has done with this group in what has to be the biggest night and achievement of his short coaching career so far.

They made Arsenal pay and were incredibly sharp in attack, the likes of Tom Fellows, Leo Scienza and Finn Azaz had brilliant games, causing the Arsenal defence all kinds of problems from early on.

The pace of their wide players seemed to catch the Arsenal defence out as they sprung forward, threatening on the counter-attack numerous times.

Even when the visitors managed to find an equaliser in the second half, they stayed calm and rallied again before finding a late winner.

When the full-time whistle blew the home fans descended into scenes of song and dance, embracing and jumping for joy to mark what will be remembered as a famous night for the club.

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Southampton boss Tonda Eckert believes his side have found a couple of areas where they can "hurt" Arsenal as they look to cause an upset in their FA Cup quarter-final.

Mikel Arteta's Premier League leaders will be looking to keep their Treble hopes alive at St Mary's on Saturday night, but it will be the first time the team have been in action since their Carabao Cup final loss to Manchester City two weeks ago.

A Champions League quarter-final at Sporting and Premier League clash with Bournemouth quickly follow the trip to Southampton, where the Gunners are favourites to progress despite their injury concerns after 11 players withdrew from international duty during the break.

Arsenal have only lost four matches this season but Championship play-off hopefuls Southampton are also in a rich vein of form, having gone 14 unbeaten in all competition and winning 1-0 at Fulham in the previous round.

"It is a great team," Saints boss Eckert said. "I think rightfully every single manager in a press conference praises what Arsenal does and I can only continue that praise.

"It's a fantastic team with many, many answers to problems that you give them, so the preparation was fun this week because there's many more iterations of what you could potentially do.

"You see that they do have answers to many possible solutions, but I think we have found a couple of bits where we are able to hurt them and we just need to make sure we bring that on the pitch."

Listen to the latest episode of Saints Social from BBC Radio Solent.

Jono Holmes and Lewis Coombes are joined by Southampton legend Rickie Lambert to reflect on the Saints legends match against Manchester United, and to look forward to Saturday's FA Cup quarter-final against Arsenal.

There is also a top 10 countdown of the best Rickie Lambert and Matt Le Tissier Saints goals.

Click here to find more Southampton content on BBC Sounds.

Glen de la Cour
Southampton FC fan writer

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I was seven years old in 1976 when Southampton won, what is still, our only major honour with an FA Cup win.

That was courtesy of a Bobby Stokes goal against Manchester United, when the whole of my part of the world turned yellow and blue.

Back then, like now, we were a second division club and this is, of course, the 50th anniversary of that win.

The distance between the top two divisions is much bigger than it was in 1976, so to get to a Wembley semi-final (let's not think about the final just yet) in this anniversary year, would be absolutely huge, both for nostalgic reasons but also for the momentum it would give us for the Championship games to come.

Saints have rightly been commemorating the 50th anniversary this year, playing in yellow in every round (including Saturday I assume), so it was probably more important than usual to have a good cup run when we started back in January.

Doncaster away in the third round was negotiated more comfortably than the 3-2 final score suggests, before a 2-1 home win against Leicester after extra time.

At this point, I thought we had at least done justice to the 50th anniversary but then came a very impressive 1-0 away win at Fulham in the fifth round.

And here we are with Arsenal at home - let's just say that the draw could have been kinder.

At least we're at home against an Arsenal side that will have one eye on the Champions League game they have on Tuesday.

Southampton, of course, have a massive game on Tuesday themselves against play-off rivals Wrexham, and usually I would expect Saints to fully prioritise the league game.

However, with the club being on a 14-game unbeaten run, the 50th anniversary and Tonda Eckert's insistence that we are here to win on Saturday - we will certainly be giving this game a right go.

Should the game start slipping away from us, then I can see thoughts turning towards Wrexham and beyond in the Championship, but until that point the Wembley dream lives on.

Click here to watch more from Glen and the Total Saints Podcast., external