Charlie Nicholas thinks Southampton should leave Che Adams out of Tottenham Hotspur game

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Ralph Hasenhuttl and the Saints head to the Tottenham Hotspur Arena this weekend to lock horns with Mauricio Pochettino’s Spurs.

Sky Sports pundit Charlie Nicholas has given his opinion on Southampton ahead of their Premier League trip to Tottenham Hotspur and he believes that Ralph Hasenhuttl should leave one particular player out of the Saints starting XI (Sky Sports News).

Southampton make the trip up to the Tottenham Hotspur Arena on Saturday to lock horns with Spurs – who are managed by one-time Saints boss Mauricio Pochettino – on the back of a superb 4-0 win over bitter south coast rivals Portsmouth in the League Cup.

While their Premier League form remains a bit shaky – their last game was a 3-1 loss to Bournemouth at St Mary’s – they will be coming up against a side with problems of their own, having been eliminated by Colchester United in the cup in midweek and bottled two leads in the two games before that (Olympiacos and Leicester City).

Nicholas believes that Hasenhuttl will want to utilise Che Adams against Spurs but he has suggested against this, instead claiming that the Austrian should leave the summer signing out and instead push Nathan Redmond higher up – though the retired footballer ultimately believes that the North Londoners will triumph nonetheless.

“Che Adams is struggling and Ralph Hasenhuttl will want to play him, but I would leave him out and play Nathan Redmond higher up, flooding the midfield in the process,” Nicholas told Sky Sports News. “There will be moaning and groaning but Tottenham will get the result. They could do with a goal in the first 20 minutes to calm things down.”

Adams made the switch to St Mary’s Stadium from Championship side Birmingham City on a five-year-deal for a reported £15million fee after three years at St Andrew’s, where he scored 38 goals in 123 appearances (BBC Sport).

The 24-year-old, who has previously been compared to Ronaldo and Jermain Defoe by former teammates (The Guardian), had a bright pre-season in which he claimed three goals and three assists in four friendlies, but he is yet to get off the mark in competitive action this season.