Saints midfielder Jack Cork says the players have responded to manager Ronald Koeman’s serious approach to the Capital One Cup.

Koeman has named a strong team for both of the club’s victories in the competition so far this season, with a 2-0 win at Millwall followed by a famous 2-1 success away to Arsenal.

Saints will face another stern test tonight, as they travel to the Britannia Stadium to take on Stoke in a fourth-round tie.

Once again, Koeman is expected to make few changes to his team, and Cork believes his desire to take a real shot at winning the trophy has filtered down to the players.

“As you’ve seen from the last two games, he’s put out the strongest team that he can really put out and he’s had a right go,” said the midfielder.

From back page “It’s good for us knowing that he’s taking it so seriously, because sometimes you go into cup games thinking ‘Oh, it doesn’t really matter what happens, it doesn’t really affect us’ but it’s good to know that he’s confident that we’ve got a good chance of doing well in it and he wants us to do well in it.”

Koeman’s declaration that Saints will do everything they can to win the season’s first major trophy has been a refreshing one.

But Cork knows there is significant work to be done if they are to achieve that goal, starting with an incredibly tough test at Stoke this evening.

“It is still quite early in the competition,” said the 25-year-old.

“There’s still this one and the quarters, so there’s still a good three or four games you’ve got to win, and obviously we’ve got to win at Stoke first.

“It doesn’t seem that many, but it’s still a big task, because the further you get the more competitive the games are going to get and the more competitive the players are going to be.

“It’s one that we want to win and we’ll try and go as far in the competition as we can do, because it’s one of the big aims that we had at the start of the season.”

Saints faced Stoke on Saturday in the Premier League, winning 1-0 at St Mary’s, and Cork believes that encounter will add a bit of extra intrigue to this evening’s match.

“It will be a different game,” he said. “It feels like it’s two legs of an old-school cup game really.

“It’s strange. I’ve never experienced it in my career, so it will be nice to see how both teams approach it. It will be interesting.”

  • We'll have live updates from tonight's match between Stoke and Saints on the website from 7pm tonight.