Shearer says: “It was surprising Southampton didn’t sack Pellegrino sooner.”

Former Saints striker discusses club’s latest move

I was not surprised that my former club Southampton sacked Mauricio Pellegrino. He had only won one game in 17 so it was actually just surprising they didn’t do it sooner.

As I know only too well, when you look at history sides in the relegation zone that change their manager with eight games to go, rarely improve their position.

The big plus for Mark Hughes is that they are not in the bottom three currently and they are still in the FA Cup.

Having said that, they have a tough run-in so it is not going to be easy to turn them around, regardless of whether you are a novice (like I was when I stepped in at Newcastle) or experienced as Mark Hughes is.

They have only won six games all season and they are probably going to need to win three out of eight to stay up.

Looking at the squad at the start of the season, nobody predicted Southampton would be down there, so it suggests they should have the players to get out of trouble.