Saints will be hoping to avoid another replay when they return to FA Cup action against Crystal Palace this weekend.

With Ronald Koeman getting players back fit and ready for a real tilt at finishing off an amazing Premier League season, the last thing he will want is an extra game that could be avoided.

That feeling will have only been heightened by the FA Cup third round replay against Ipswich felt like the most pointless game of football you could wish for.

It was the match that nobody wanted, and rather emphasised a major problem that the famous old competition has these days.

It is surely time to modernise it, or else watch it drift further into the wilderness.

Football is built on history and tradition, but that doesn’t mean that change is a bad thing. Change, done correctly, can protect an old competition like this and help it thrive in a modern world.

If you don’t adapt to your surroundings, time and circumstances, you have no chance.

Time was that the FA Cup was a pinnacle for all teams. Those days have gone.

There is too much at stake in the domestic leagues now, the money too vast for moving through the divisions.

We heard prophets of doom for the FA Cup when the very top teams started to field weakened sides or make a raft of changes to protect players for league action.

They seem like heady days indeed now.

It’s now not only a Chelsea or Manchester City resting players as they chase the title, it’s not only those chasing European qualification, or even those battling relegation.

It drops down in the Championship where weakened sides are fielded for those chasing automatic promotion, the play-offs, relegation.

It goes down even further with the League One promotion race a priority.

It pretty much seems to continue forever and a day.

And what are people most scared about?

It’s a not a run through to the final for extra matches – there are plenty of blank weekends for the FA Cup this season.

It is replays.

Saints proved to their cost why as they travelled to Portman Road, played a Championship team who made a batch of changes to protect their league side, won the dullest of games and got a key player injured for a month or so.

Ronald Koeman was right in his post-match assessment – it is time to scrap replays.

Some will say that is destroying history and tradition, but, in fact, it might just be the only thing that can protect this famous competition from drifting into obscurity.