Southampton boss Nathan Jones says home fans will be key tonight against Newcastle United.
Jones has issued a rallying cry for both his players and the St Mary's crowd ahead of Tuesday night's huge EFL Cup semi-final first-leg clash with Newcastle United.
It's a cup game, it's a semi-final here at St Mary'sit's going to be massive," the 49-year-old told the Daily Echo. "They'll travel well, just flip it to a week's time when there will be 50-odd thousand. The atmosphere will be key.
And it will be if we can give them (the fans) a performance to get behind. If we're passive, if we sit off, if we're not aggressive then I understand. But I want them to respond to the energy we give them and then they will lift that and add confidence and give us that little bit of edge we're definitely going to need tomorrow."
Jones is approaching the tie with excitement.
You've got to be excited with these things. If you're fearful, then you're in the wrong job," Jones added.
We were in a poor run of form and had just come off of a good win at Crystal Palace and then we faced probably the toughest challenge you can face (against Man City). If you're fearful on those nights and not bold and brave then you're in the wrong job. So no no no, we're really excited about it.
It's a semi-final of the Carabao Cup. With the greatest respect, if I didn't leave my previous club and come here, then I wouldn't have had this opportunity. So all over we're excited. As a team, we're excited and we have to realise it's a semi-final.
It's a wonderful wonderful game for the fans and we're going to need a lot of things to go right. The fans will help us. We have to have good energy and we will, we'll pick a team with good energy and good quality and we'll try to win the game."
