At the beginning of the 2020/21 Premier League season few people would have predicted that just four points would separate Southampton and Manchester City at the one-third mark. Nobody would have predicted Ralph Hasenhuttl’s side would be the ones on top.

This Saturday’s clash at St Mary’s is quietly one of the most important Premier League games of the festive season. City, having been badly hit by fatigue, cannot afford to enter the most hectic period of the campaign on the back of three consecutive winless games. As for Southampton, if they collect three points this weekend there’s a possibility Hasenhuttl’s side will top the table at Christmas.

Tactical analysis of the fixture points to a Saints win.

What formation does Hasenhuttl use?

Southampton look to play explosive vertical football, with Hasenhuttl instructing his players to make good use of counter-attacks and transitions. The aim is to defend and attack via disruptions – in the speed of play and in the style – by suddenly switching up their pressing game and their possession style.

On the ball, some low-tempo possession is mixed with bursts of line-breaking, often targeted at getting the two wingers – who dip infield, forming a 4-2-2-2 – on the ball unexpectedly between the lines, receiving it on the half-turn to feed Danny Ings in behind.

Like so many of the best German-inspired sides in the modern game, Southampton explode forward in high numbers from seemingly innocuous positions, catching the other team off guard.

The attacking lines themselves are highly choreographed in training, with moves etched into muscle memory to form what are known as ‘automatisms’; American Football-style set plays that allow Southampton to arrive in the final third in a flurry of activity.

With the full-backs overlapping to provide width, the general structure of these explosive attacks sees the wingers cut inside to join Che Adams and Danny Ings in what Hasenhuttl refers to as the ‘red zone’: the attacking midfield area of the pitch just outside the box and in front of the opposition back four.

As with the likes of Jurgen Klopp, this is seen as the most creatively fertile area, hence why two of Stuart Armstrong, Nathan Redmond, Moussa Djenepo and Theo Walcott will roam across the width of the ‘red zone’ to join the two strikers.

Southampton’s pressing is the foundation for those attacks. Rather than press frantically throughout, again it is a case of unexpected disruptions; of sitting in a compressed midblock that limits space, before choosing moments to engage en masse or set a pressing trap.

These change quite considerably depending on the opposition, but whatever the strategy the goal is to counter-press, meaning to nab the ball and quickly move forward, making use of the chaos that occurs in the transitions.