CLAUDE Puel will get a crucial first look at Saints in match action today in a behind-closed-doors pre-season friendly at the club’s training camp in Baltimore.

In the two weeks since the Frenchman’s appointment as manager at St Mary’s, he and his backroom staff have mainly concentrated on building the squad’s fitness for the coming Premier League season, with ball work and tactical approach featuring less prominently.

But Puel will finally get his chance to begin implementing – albeit in its embryonic stages – his vision for the coming season as he takes the 24-man squad that he took to the United States into a private pre-season match.

It is not expected that the Saints squad, which is made up of a mix of senior and academy players, will face an opposition of any calibre, but it will nonetheless provide Puel with the perfect opportunity to roll out his ideas for what will form the basis of Saints’ tactics for next term.

The former Nice boss believes that he will begin to know his players better once he has seen them in match action, while knowing that today’s match holds little in terms of importance result-wise.

It is, however, a clear chance to start laying the foundations of what he expects of his team come 13 August when Saints begin the Premier League season at home to Watford.

With a large chunk of his first team, including Euro 2016 winners Jose Fonte and Cedric Soares, not present at the week-long training camp, the club’s young players will be keen to take this pre-season game seriously, as they look to impress their new manager.

Puel takes a keen interest in academy players and believes that the club’s youngsters are “very important”. He reckons that taking them on the Baltimore trip is massively important for their development.

For the more junior of the academy players at the training camp, it is just great experience to work alongside the likes of established first-teamers Oriol Romeu, Jordy Clasie, Virgil van Dijk, Charlie Austin and Jay Rodriguez.

But for those, like midfielder Harrison Reed, striker Sam Gallagher and Jake Hesketh, who have been on the periphery of the senior ranks for a while, the pre-season game could be the start of a breakthrough campaign into first team.

Left-back Matt Targett is another that may feel that every chance to impress is an important one, with the excellent England international Ryan Bertrand ahead of him in the pecking order.

It might also be one of a few chances for the youngsters to make a first-hand impression on Puel, with a large chunk of Saints’ key senior players, who have been competing for their countries at Euro 2016, yet to link-up for pre-season.

On top of that, new summer signings Pierre-Emile Hojbjerg and Nathan Redmond will get a first flavour of match action in Saints colours.

Redmond, the £10m signing from Norwich City, was already in place when Puel arrived at the club at the end of June, while Hobjberg became the first transfer of his St Mary’s office.

Puel has been impressed by the Denmark international, who signed for £12m from Bayern Munich, while he was also pleased with the news that Bertrand had signed a fresh five-year contract at Saints this week.