With one game remaining in the regular season, Southampton must win the play-offs to be promoted back to the Premier League. At the start of the season, the Saints were one of the favourites to get automatics, but what happened in their season where they broke records but found themself sitting fourth with one game to play.
Rewind to the start of the season, hope was flying high around St Mary's, Russell Martin had joined from Swansea to take over Saints, with Swansea missing out by four points for play-offs.
Martin had brought in Ryan Fraser, Flynn Downes, and Taylor Hardwood-Bellis all on loan but the likes of James Ward-Prowse, Romeo Lavia, and Armel Bella-Kotchap all left, the squad that Martin had built up was a team that would be fighting for automatic promotion, and this looked likely at the start of the season but it all came crashing down.
To kick off the 2023/24 Championship season, the Saints travelled down to Sheffield Wednesday to play football under the lights. With it being on Sky Sports, Southampton made their mark for the team that will be at the top by the end of the season, winning 1-2 with a dominant display showing off Russell Martin's type of style of play. Saints made a total of 987 passes with possession of 79.9%.
This was the only time the Saints were top of the championship table.
After the opening day of the season, Saints went unbeaten for four games, until they travelled up north to face Sunderland. Mason Holgate had just signed on loan from Everton for the season and was put in the starting 11 straight away but had a debut to forget after Sunderland put five past Southampton.
There were questions after this, was Martin the right man for the job, can Saints come back from this, it took them a while to do so, after losing 5-0 away to Sunderland they lost three more games in a row. They lost 1-4 at home to Leicester, 0-1 at home to Ipswich and 2-1 away to Middlesbrough with their next game being Leeds at home.
Leeds travelled down to Saints for a 12:30 kick-off, Saints had lost to two of their promotion rivals before this, so Leeds were the favourites.
Adam Armstrong stopped the critics in just two minutes after opening the scoring for Saints, with Saints then going onto display a 3-1 win at home starting their 25 unbeaten run.
Russell Martin went back to face his old team throughout the middle of January after shipping five past them at home at the end of December but now Saints need to avoid defeat to set a new club record of going 21 undefeated. Martin's first return back to Swansea went smooth sailing though and Southampton set the record after beating Swansea 1-3 away from home.
In recent years Southampton have loved going up to Swansea, 2017 they secured their place in the Premier League after fighting relegation after winning 0-1 away to Swansea with a Manolo Gabbadini winner and now they have set a record on their turf with their recent ex-manager.
All good things come to an end though, after getting to 25 unbeaten Southampton lost their unbeaten record away to Bristol City on a cold Tuesday night in February after losing 3-1. A game Flynn Downes did not feature in, is Downes the missing piece to the side?
With Leicester being 17 points clear at one point the Championship fight for the title had opened up wide with Ipswich right on their heels and Leeds clawing their way back to the top, Saints are still fourth. If someone said at the start of the season a team went 25 unbeaten you'd think they'd be top of the league but with Saints having missed chances, they have only ruined it for themselves.
Fast forward to the end of the season, Saints could have still been fighting for automatic promotion after winning the 99th minute at home to Watford and with a game in hand on other teams - after teams around them had been dropping points -, they could have been sitting second going to the last game of the season away to Leeds but losing to Cardiff away and losing 5-0 away to Leicester they sit fourth with a missed opportunity seven points away for an automatic promotion spot.
There are ifs and buts in Southampton's season, dropping points at home to relegated Rotherham scored a goal in the 74th minute after Saints had 22 shots but couldn't double their lead to 2-0 at home, another 'if', if they didn't drop points at home to Middlesbrough but the Saints conceded in the 90th minute to only pick up one point again.
What if Flynn Downes wasn't injured as much as he was during the season, it was like Saints and the fans relied on him. With one game left, Saints have only won two of the last eleven games Downes hasn't started in.
The biggest worry is that Southampton have conceded three or more in nine games this season, seven of these coming in the championship and two of these times coming against promoted Leicester, it's the difference between a promoted team and a team that has to go through the playoffs to get back to the Premier League.
Southampton will need to get back into winning ways against Leeds if they want the momentum going into the playoffs.
Nobody ever said getting out of the Championship was easy, it is one of the hardest leagues in the world.