SAINTS are bidding to avoid adding a new name to the list of shame printed on the right.

Incredibly, they have lost SEVENTEEN times to non top-flight opposition in the last 25 years in both FA Cup and League Cup action.

But only once, at Shrewsbury in 1993/94, have they been dumped out of a cup by a basement division club.

That arch embarrassment saw Kevin Summerfield, who parted company with Saints when boss Paul Sturrock left St Mary's last month, score as the Shrews overturned a 1-0 first leg deficit to win 2-0 at Gay Meadow.

That remains the only occasion in which Saints have lost to a club from the old Fourth Division in the last 40 years.

Saints were beaten 2-0 at Fourth Division Tranmere in the 1963/64 League Cup and again 1-0 at basement division side Watford in the FA Cup in January 1960 - but on both occasions Ted Bates' men were in the old second division.

Saints have been on the receiving end of some famous cup upsets in the last quarter of a century.

Lawrie McMenemy's side lost a 4-0 first leg lead to crash 7-1 at then Second Division Watford in 1980/81.

And in the season which saw Saints finish runners-up in the old First Division and reach the semi-finals of the FA Cup in 1983/84, that same term saw them lose 2-1 at Third Division Rotherham in the League Cup.

Gordon Strachan will be forever remembered by Saints fans as the man who led them to the FA Cup final in 2003 - but how many recall his first FA Cup tie as manager, a 2-1 reverse at First Division Rotherham in January 2002?

In 1996/97 Dave Jones masterminded a 2-1 League Cup win at The Dell for Second Division Stockport - a result which helped land him the Saints job a few months later.

But whenever Saints fans talk of infamous cup losses, one result stands out above all others - the time at Prenton Park in March 2001 when Glenn Hoddle's side let a 3-0 half-time lead slip to lose 4-3 at First Division Tranmere in the FA Cup.