José Fonte says Southampton’s trip to Norwich City marks a fresh start as Ronald Koeman’s men look to climb the Barclays Premier League table.
Saints sit 12th at the half-way stage of the season, with 24 points from their opening 19 games of the campaign – a position Fonte is confident the team can improve on.
Speaking ahead of the trip to Carrow Road for their opening game of 2016, Fonte says a new year and the 19-game mark offers a chance for Saints to start again.
“19 games have gone now and it’s the start of the second round,” Fonte told youtube.com/southamptonfc. “It’s a new start, a new beginning – that’s exactly how we should look at it.
“We need to have a clear mind and be better than we’ve been. We need to look at it as a new season. We want to do better than we’ve been doing.
“What better way to start than with a good win. We need to prepare ourselves. We know it’s going to be a very tough game because Norwich is a hard team – especially at home.
“We need to prepare ourselves and go there to try and get the three points and set us off for a good 2016.”
The Saints skipper, who made his 250th appearance for the club in the defeat to West Ham United last time out, is confident of a return to winning ways on the road against the Canaries.
“They are a tough team, especially at home,” he added. “We know it’s going to be a tough game as we’ve played there many times before.
“We expect a difficult game but we are 100 per cent focused to go there and get a good result.
“We have the qualities – we showed we have quality when we beat Arsenal and other games like Chelsea away.
“It’s a question of working hard. We’re going to try and get points away from home like we were doing in the beginning of the season.”
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