Bet365 Betting On Southampton
Southampton F.C. started life in 1885 as Southampton St Mary`s, and it`s that original link with the church that earned them their nickname of "The Saints". Fittingly, after leaving their old ground, The Dell, in 2001, they moved to a new ground called St Mary`s Stadium. However, their success throughout their history has been quite limited – so let’s look at some of the ways you might consider betting on Southampton.
The Premier League
Southampton enjoyed a pre-longed spell in the top-division of English Football between 1979 and 2005, but then spent 7-years in either The Championship or League One before returning to the top-flight in 2012. They finished 14th in their first-season back and, having avoided relegation, they rapidly progressed to 8th the following season under the now Tottenham Manager Mauricio Pochettino. However, when Pochettino left in 2014, Ronald Koeman took over and steered them to further progression by finishing 7th and then 6th in his two seasons in charge. In those 4 seasons, they accumulated point-totals of 41, 56, 60 and 63, however, despite looking like finishing a respectable 8th or 9th in 2017, they will probably only have accumulated around 50-points in doing so. The chances are that they will finish 8th to 10th again in the 2017/18 season, especially as manager Claude Puel will have learned a few things about Premier League Football in his first season in charge.
The FA Cup
Southampton made two FA Cup finals early in their history in 1900 and 1902, but had to wait to lift the FA Cup Trophy until 1976, when they beat Manchester 1-0 in front of over 100,000 people at Wembley. However, they then had to wait until 2003 to reach the final again, when they made it 3 defeats in 4 finals as Arsenal beat them 1-0.
The EFL Cup
A solitary final defeat in 1976 was their only final appearance in the EFL Cup until the 2016 season, when they took some notable scalps on their way to yet another final defeat at the hands of Manchester United. They showed admirable battling qualities though, which offers some hope for Southampton fans for the future, but that`s 5 final defeats in 6 for The Saints in the two major cup competitions, suggesting they may not offer great value to win the EFL Cup or the FA Cup.
The FA Community Shield
It was a similar scenario when the FA Cup winning team of 1976 played in the following season`s FA Community Shield, again coming out second-best.
Europe
Southampton have made several forays into Europe in the last few decades, though their success has been very limited. They qualified for the UEFA Cup or Europa League in 1971/72, 1981/82, 1982/83, 1984/85, 2003/4 and 2016/17, but they exited at the Round 1 Stage four-times, the round 2 Stage one, and failed to make it out of the Play-off Round last season. However, they did reach the quarter-final stage of the European Cup Winners` Cup in 1976/77. Southampton look unlikely to qualify for Europe for the 2017/18 season but, even if they do, it would be hard to recommend a bet on them.
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