Ralph Hasenhüttl explains why Kevin Danso has been absent | OneFootball

There were high expectations that when Southampton secured promising young Austrian centre-back Kevin Danso on a season-long loan from Augsburg that the Saints backline would be much stronger.

Unfortunately for Southampton and Danso, it hasn’t worked out that way, as the Saints are currently in the bottom three having given up a league-high 35 goals this season.

As for Danso himself, he’s only made six Premier League appearances and hasn’t touched the pitch in six weeks, and manager Ralph Hasenhüttl has now explained why.

“It’s difficult, the Premier League has a very high level. He’s a young player still improving his game,” he said in his pre-match press conference.

“He came in in a very difficult situation, the team was not really well balanced in that moment.

“It was struggling in defence and not easy for him to come in. He has potential, good basic fundamentals and physical strength.

“He must develop his game and we will help him. He would like to play more but we have now found a first 11 that has played the last four games.

“The automatism they are building is the reason we didn’t rotate even though we had three games in a week.

“They did it well three times, so we stayed with the same squad and did it well three times.”

Danso has earned six caps for Austria’s national side but has since went back to the U-21 side, where he has made 18 appearances.

Southampton host West Ham on Saturday in another critical early-season six-pointer.