{"id":346491,"date":"2026-03-19T01:12:12","date_gmt":"2026-03-19T01:12:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/346491\/"},"modified":"2026-03-19T01:12:12","modified_gmt":"2026-03-19T01:12:12","slug":"finn-azaz-goal-moves-southampton-into-championship-play-off-places","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/346491\/","title":{"rendered":"Finn Azaz goal moves Southampton into Championship play-off places"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>IRELAND MIDFIELDER FINN Azaz\u2019s first-half strike was enough to secure a 1-0 victory over Norwich and send Southampton into the Championship play-off places for the first time since the opening weekend.<\/p>\n<p>Forward Azaz pounced on a quickly taken throw-in during the first half to slam home the only goal of the match at St Mary\u2019s.<\/p>\n<p>But Saints had goalkeeper Daniel Peretz to thank for the three points \u2013 and a 13th game without defeat \u2013 after a season-best seven saves, including a sensational double-stop in the second half.<\/p>\n<p>The Canaries are now nine points adrift of the top six as their promotion hopes hang by a thread, despite 11 wins in their last 14 matches.<\/p>\n<p>Southampton nearly went in front when Sam Edozie put in a rebound in, only to see the offside flag go up against Azaz but less than a minute later Saints had the ball in the back of the net for real.<\/p>\n<p>Bree quickly took a throw-in before the Canaries could reset, Kyle Larin nodded on before Azaz latched on to crash into the roof of the net in the 24th minute.<\/p>\n<p>The Ireland international celebrated his 10th goal of the season, the first goal the visitors had shipped away from Carrow Road since the end of January.<\/p>\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\" xml:lang=\"en\">24: Finn&#8217;s TENTH of the season \ud83d\udc4f<\/p>\n<p>James Bree&#8217;s throw is flicked on by Cyle Larin and Finn Azaz finds the far corner with a clever flick! [1-0] <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/lZ7jUIM7vx\" rel=\"nofollow\">https:\/\/t.co\/lZ7jUIM7vx<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Southampton FC (@SouthamptonFC) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/SouthamptonFC\/status\/2034362302380577156?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">March 18, 2026<\/a> <\/p>\n<p>Southampton goalkeeper Peretz was forced into another save 12 minutes into the second half when he denied a snapshot from Slimane. If that had been a regulation save, his low dive to keep out Kenny McLean\u2019s stinging drive was far from it, as the visitors looked the more likely to score the second goal of the match.<\/p>\n<p>The on-loan Bayern Munich goalkeeper outdid himself again with a double save to deny Ali Ahmed and then Kellen Fisher from point-blank range.<\/p>\n<p>Peretz now has more clean sheets than Southampton goalkeepers before his arrival \u2013 Gavin Bazunu and Alex McCarthy combined \u2013 this was his fifth in 12 appearances in the league.<\/p>\n<p>Substitute Shea Charles almost killed off the match, but his low bottom-corner-bound shot was push away by Kovacevic.<\/p>\n<p>Norwich almost had a 98th-minute equaliser but Jack Stephens\u2019 inadvertent foot towards his own goal came back off the crossbar, before Peretz made one last stunning save to keep out Ruairi McConville.<\/p>\n<p>                <script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"IRELAND MIDFIELDER FINN Azaz\u2019s first-half strike was enough to secure a 1-0 victory over Norwich and send Southampton&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":346492,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[36038,139124,85,46,169187,31239,105],"class_list":["post-346491","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-championship","tag-finn-azaz","tag-il","tag-israel","tag-match-winner","tag-southampton","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/346491","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=346491"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/346491\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/346492"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=346491"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=346491"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=346491"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}