Nigel Adkins believes Jack Cork and Morgan Schneiderlin have the potential to be a central midfield powerhouse pairing for Saints.

Cork’s return to the team after injury has resulted in four points from the last two games as Saints start to show the kind of form that could drag them to Premier League safety.

It should hardly be surprising when you consider that Cork has lost just 11 of the 52 games he has started since making a permanent move to the club from Chelsea just over a year ago.

More than that Adkins has been desperate to pair Cork and Schneiderlin together in a new look midfield that sees the 23-year-olds sitting in front of the back four.

With Cork’s energy and dynamism and Schneiderlin’s fantastic passing ability they look every inch a Premier League partnership.

“He (Cork) was yet again outstanding – him and Morgan Schneiderlin together,” raved Adkins.

“I played Jack Cork in every game after I signed him last season.

“He was called up for the Great Britain team for the Olympics which is a great honour obviously but we didn’t have him for pre-season.

“He came back and in his first game he got injured, he came back after that and got injured straightaway in his comeback game.

“We’ve not had an opportunity to have Jack Cork and Morgan Schneiderlin together until now.

“They are two young 23-year-olds who I believe have got so much potential and we can get a good partnership going with them.“We also have young James Ward-Prowse who is going to be phenomenal for us and Steven Davis we have brought in and is still very young in footballling terms but has a wealth of experience he can help the players with.”

Schneiderlin and Cork also have enviable statistics in games they have started together over the past season and a bit.

In that time they have been on the losing side on just six out of 21 occasions.