Jesus Perez was delighted to see Saints finally put a packed festive schedule behind them with a 4-3 FA Cup third round win over Burnley.

It’s been a tough period for Saints, who have had five games in two weeks whilst struggling with injuries and suspensions.

Mauricio Pochettino fielded a fairly strong side against Burnley, and it paid off as Saints got the win.

Now the club have a full week to regroup before going again in the Premier League when they host West Brom.

“It was a strange game but you know in the cup everything is possible because the teams are playing without pressure,” said assistant manager Perez.

“Sometimes one of the sides is clinical and the other not so much, and I think that was the case.

“The most important thing is stay in the next round, especially when you play a cup game at the end of a tough period like Christmas was for us.”

The fixture did prove a chance for Pochettino to get game time for some of his fringe players, but he juggled that with putting out a team to win.

“Staying in the next round and giving some minutes for the players who sometimes are not playing too much,” said Perez of what pleased him most about the game.

“We will have more players for the next Premier League game, and we had two little problems with Rickie and Gaston but it’s not serious.”

He added: “It was strange because we didn’t play clinical and we scored two great goals.

“Burnley started the game better than us and the second half they started again better than us and they scored the goal when they couldn’t in the first half.

“We woke up after Burnley equalised.”