BILLY JONES admits October’s eight-goal humiliation at the hands of Southampton will be at the forefront of Sunderland players’ minds when they line up against the Saints again this afternoon.

With last weekend’s 1-1 draw at Stoke City having plunged Sunderland into the relegation zone with just five more matches to play, today’s home game is the club’s biggest of the season so far.

A failure to take all three points would make the Black Cats’ survival mission all the more difficult, but even if there was not so much riding on this afternoon’s assignment in terms of the league table, it would still be a hugely significant occasion because of the need to right the wrongs of mid-October.

Back then, Sunderland suffered the joint-heaviest defeat of their history as they crashed to an 8-0 annihilation at St Mary’s, and while Jones was not directly involved in the blackest day of the season, it did not take him long to appreciate the extent of his team-mates’ embarrassment.

There have been other difficult moments since then – most notably the heavy home defeats to Aston Villa and Crystal Palace – but none have come close to matching the Southampton away game for complete embarrassment and, as a consequence, today’s game has been highlighted on the calendar for a number of months.

“We could be sitting here on 50 points and playing Southampton this weekend wanting to get revenge, to be honest,” said Jones, who has been preferred to Anthony Reveillere at right-back in Dick Advocaat’s last three matches. “That’s the way we think.

“We know how hurtful it was to lose that game down at St Mary’s, so we’re looking to get revenge for that, and it’s a great opportunity, at home.

“Revenge is a strong word to use, maybe too strong. But you remember those games. A lot of the time, when you look back at your career, you remember the bad times more than the good things.

“Unfortunately, I wasn’t there to take part, but I know that was one game I’m sure the lads remember and want to rectify by getting three points.”

With Leicester entertaining Newcastle in the lunch-time game, Sunderland could be two points adrift of safety when they kick off this afternoon and, to make matters worse, they also have the worst goal difference of all the sides involved in the relegation battle.

Time is running out, and with the final two games of the season taking the Black Cats to Arsenal and Chelsea, it would be hard to imagine a repeat of last year’s ‘Great Escape’ if today’s game was not to result in a much-needed victory.

That brings its own pressure of course, and Sunderland have hardly been adept at producing top-class performances on home soil this season.

Southampton’s slick, swift counter-attacking style is similar to that of Villa and Palace, the two sides that have cut the Black Cats to ribbons at the Stadium of Light in the last month and a half.

Nevertheless, with so much riding on the outcome of today’s encounter, Jones remains confident his team-mates will rise to the challenge.

“It’s do or die now really,” he said. “We really need those points so, first and foremost, we’ve just got to put everything into the game, and do all the ugly side of it, then hope quality will get us through to the win.

“It’s obviously that point in the season when you’ve got to take every game as it comes but, if you win this one, this weekend, you start to feel more positive and hopefully you can go on a run. We need to do that now. We need to produce our best run of form to give ourselves a chance.

“If you win your next game, the whole mood changes again. You convince yourself that if you’ve won that one, that’s it now, you’re going to go on and win some more and avoid being relegated.

“Obviously, if that’s not to happen (today), you’ve got to pick yourself back up again, try and remain positive and try and do it in the remaining four games. But we’re going into this game knowing that a win would massively help our cause.”