Tottenham got to feel what Newcastle did on that horrendous day at St James Park two seasons ago. That afternoon Eddie Howe's men raced away with early goal after goal and left Spurs embarrassed and eventually managerless as Cristian Stellini was handed his marching orders by Daniel Levy.

On this occasion it was Southampton left humiliated, their fans furious and the manager facing the exit was Russell Martin, relieved of his duties just over an hour after the final whistle on Sunday night.

Ange Postecoglou will feel sympathy for his young counterpart, who shares similar beliefs about the game, but ultimately football is about the victor getting the spoils and the Australian and his team needed this win and the manner of it.

It was so convincing that it allowed Postecoglou to take off his captain at half-time, while the team stepped off the gas in the second half to conserve their energy for a big Carabao Cup quarter-final in midweek against Manchester United.

While he plays down the need for it, Postecoglou will also have been heartened to hear his name sang loudly throughout the contest by the travelling Tottenham fans, as they did a couple of times in Glasgow in midweek.

There was a juxtaposition between the backing for Postecoglou and the chanting against Levy.

It's rare at Spurs to be in a position where the manager still has the fans mostly behind him while the chairman is getting those chants that come around every 18 months or so. Normally the manager is wrapped up in that, which allows Levy to make a change that deflects and produces a period of serenity with the hope that the new man will make everything right.

This time the Tottenham fans in the main can see what Postecoglou is trying to do as he goes about attempting to create a different version of the club, because the previous iteration hasn't worked for decades.

Postecoglou's Spurs are a goal off being the top scorers in the Premier League, only two teams have conceded fewer than them in the competition and they have the third best goal difference in the division. Yet the inconsistency of the results, particularly during this injury-hit spell, have meant those numbers have not translated into their league position.

It will be fascinating to see what Levy does in this situation. For once there's no usual out with a manager whose time at the club is clearly at its end, certainly not at this point anyway, and the noises coming out of Spurs only support that as well as it being clear that the players are behind Postecoglou.

On Sunday night, the only negative chants from the away fans were about Levy, the travelling Tottenham faithful competing off the pitch with the home supporters who were singing for Martin's exit.

A couple of proactive fan campaign groups that have been trying to improve the atmosphere at Spurs' home games through songs and more coordinated efforts announced this week that they have ended their attempts to work with the club due to having different views on the way forward.

On Sunday night, the songs were instead aimed towards those at the top of the north London club. There was a chant about Levy that was sung by the entire away support throughout the evening, stating that they cared more about Dejan Kulusevski than the chairman due to what they believe is an antipathy towards them from the club's hierarchy.

That brought the slightly awkward sight of Kulusevski applauding the fans after the game as they began singing the chant towards him and the chairman.

This was the stadium where Antonio Conte launched his rant towards the club and his players. Two seasons later and Postecoglou played down the chants backing him as he did the post-match criticism he got at Bournemouth from the fans.

"I’m trying to separate me and my feelings from what we’re trying to do here. Like I said after the Bournemouth game, the ones that travel are obviously very hardcore. They support this club and they were disappointed with that," he said. "They made the trip tonight and would have enjoyed particularly the first 45. They didn't get to see any goals close up in the second half unfortunately.

"I said on Friday that nothing changes in me. I still have the same resolve and determination to make sure that we become the football club and football team we want to be. Tonight was about the players and I thought their efforts were unbelievable."

While it was a contest off the pitch between the two sets of fans to sing the loudest about their gripes and concerns, there was no such contest on the turf.

Southampton were buried in a flood of goals in the first half, the first coming just 36 seconds in.

Djed Spence wriggled away to embark on a powerful run through the middle of the pitch before prodding a perfect pass behind a defender into the path of James Maddison. The midfielder fired it through the keeper's legs and into the net.

Then on 12 minutes Son Heung-min doubled the visitors' lead when he smashed home a deep, curling Maddison cross that was headed on into his path. It was his 125th Premier League goal.

Two minutes later and it was 3-0 when Kulusevski, on his 100th Premier League appearance, tapped home a loose ball after a Son cross deflected back into his path.

A fourth arrived 10 minutes later when Destiny Udogie won the ball back in his own half, sprinted up the pitch and found Son. The skipper picked out the run of Pape Matar Sarr and the young midfielder dribbled around a defender and fired home expertly on the slide.

Postecoglou then took off Udogie as the young Italian began to feel a familiar muscle tighten.

"We'll see how he is. He felt a bit tight in his quad," Postecoglou told football.london. "To be fair, he wanted to continue but we can't take any risks at the moment. So we took him off with Sonny. I don't think it's anything significant at this stage and more precautionary."

There was a fifth and final goal to come just before the break. Son played in Maddison with a clever ball with the outside of his foot and the midfielder turned on a sixpence on the touchline and managed to squeeze in a curling effort from a tight angle into the top right corner.

It was the first time Spurs have scored five goals in a Premier League first half and the hosts were shell-shocked. Their fans were furious, around a quarter of them having seen enough and began filing out of the ground.

Son, now Tottenham's record assists provider in the Premier League era with 68 to eclipse Darren Anderton, went over at the half-time whistle to console his former team-mate and Spurs academy product Kyle Walker-Peters.

The Tottenham captain did not return for the second period, given a rest ahead of that Thursday cup quarter-final and replaced by Brennan Johnson.

The second half brought an inevitable stepping down through the gears by Tottenham as they looked to conserve energy and Lucas Bergvall and Spence naturally tired on their first Premier League starts.

Southampton managed to carve out a couple of opportunities but mostly Tottenham kept them at bay or played them offside, 18-year-old Archie Gray again adapting well alongside 22-year-old Radu Dragusin.

"Really proud of the players. We obviously had a tough away European fixture on Thursday night," Postecoglou told football.london. "We had 10 first-team players unavailable for a number of reasons today in a squad of 25, and we asked a lot of them to go out there again and dig into their wells of energy.

"A couple we put out there hadn’t played in ages, haven't started games, so the fact the boys could play with such energy and quality was just outstanding. Really pleased that they get the rewards for it because they deserve it."

With Sergio Reguilon absent from the bench on Sunday that would suggest some kind of issue ensured the Spaniard took Spurs into double figures for unavailable players.

This was a game in which both the young players and the senior players played their part together.

Postecoglou didn't just have two 18-year-olds in the spine of his team in Gray and Bergvall. He also had the relatively inexperienced Spence making his first Premier League start and in the second half academy graduate Alfie Dorrington made his debut for the club.

When Will Lankshear joined the fray in the final 10 minutes it meant that Tottenham became the first club this season to have four teenagers on the pitch at the same time in the Premier League.

Gray put in another impressive display in the centre of defence, helping to nullify much of what the Saints did. He had the ball more than any other player on the pitch with 101 touches of it.

The 18-year-old then showed his ridiculous energy levels late on by switching to left-back and making raiding runs up and down the flank before executing a perfect last-gasp tackle in front of his own goal to ensure the clean sheet.

For Bergvall, this was an important next step in his development over the weeks since his tough evening in Istanbul, showing what a learning experience that noisy night was for him.

The teenager's recent substitute appearances as a calm head in the number six role earned the reward of this first Premier League start. The young Swede was composed on the ball and brave enough to twist and turn under pressure or play the first time passes to the flanks that Postecoglou requires from those in the role.

Initial suggestions were that Gray and Bergvall would develop into a six and an eight/10 respectively, but there's as much chance they end up swapping around based on this recent evidence.

Sarr only turned 22 a couple of months ago yet he was dominant throughout. The Senegal international's composed run and finish meant it's now four goals and two assists for the young midfielder already at this stage of the season. He also won the ball back to set Spurs away for their fifth goal.

He was like a rash that consumed Southampton, winning all three of his tackles while making four interceptions and six ball recoveries. He also made two successful dribbles, had a 95% pass success rate, created two chances and played seven passes into the final third, while winning five of his seven ground duels.

Then there was Spence. This was exactly what the 24-year-old needed to show that he can bring to the table as he finally made his first start for Tottenham 881 days after arriving through the Hotspur Way doors.

The right-back set the tone from the first whistle with that instant strong run up the pitch and he was tidy in what he did defensively with all of his three tackles successful and he made one interception and one recovery as well as two clearances with his feet and two with his head.

He grabbed an assist and technically two pre-assists - if you're into that kind of thing - for his involvement in Tottenham's second and fifth goals.

football.london asked Postecoglou what he made of his two starters after their full Premier League debuts.

"They were great. Lucas is growing all the time, but he's 18. Archie is 18 and how many Premier League clubs are going to start two 18-year-olds in their line-up?" he asked

"Djed has had to bide his time. To be fair, it's the one area of the pitch where we've had cover this year with Archie playing at right-back, so he's had to be patient. It's a testament to him and the coaches who have worked with him in training that he could come on today.

"We needed him for sure, not just to play but to make an impact and he did. Great reward for his patience and perseverance."

Both players showed the signs of their exertions as the game wore on with Bergvall cramping up in the final 10 minutes and Spence taken off 77 minutes and clearly limping heavily away from applauding the fans after the match. Hopefully it was just cramp and the stiffness that will come after so long without playing that much football in one go.

Maddison could be seen having a long chat with Bergvall on the pitch after the victory and he admitted speaking to Spence before kick-off.

"He's been patient and he's a great lad. I said to him before, Djed is quite a laid back character anyway, so I don't think he needed too much of a pep talk. I just told him before, go and do what you do," said the midfielder.

"I think he got the ball and managed to wriggle away like he does, which he's very good at, and that's a run that I've been working on for years. You know that left pocket running behind the defence. To be fair to Djed, it was a brilliant weighted pass, perfect, and I just had to finish it off. So big credit to Djed for that one."

After the game, Maddison posed for a photo with his starting midfield colleagues Sarr and Bergvall, putting up the caption 'father and his two sons'.

This was the kind of Maddison that Tottenham need, leading the young players both on and off the pitch.

After a quiet display at Rangers, with Postecoglou's Timo Werner criticism aimed at the senior players like Maddison and Son as much as at the German, the midfielder was a gamechanger this time around.

Maddison's two finishes were clinical, the second curled into the smallest of gaps inside the right-hand post. He pulled out a sniper celebration with Radu Dragusin - the Romanian himself impressive again - that was inspired by the most recent iteration of The Day of the Jackal starring Oscar-winner Eddie Redmayne.

Maddison was also involved in both the second and third goals. He battled on the pitch and won seven of his nine ground duels, recovered the ball twice and had an 85% pass success rate with six of them into the final third.

Son, who called Gray, Bergvall and Spence "incredible" after the game, was back to his old self with an excellent 45 minutes that brought a confident goal and two inch-perfect assists. The relief on the captain's face when he scored was clear to see and it was another goal against a club he seems to just love scoring against.

"They were brilliant. I think they sensed they needed to [step up] tonight. We are just spread so thin that we’re asking young players and players who haven't played a lot and others who have been playing all the time to go out there and still try to play to our identity, play the football we want to," said Postecoglou of his captain and vice-captain.

"I thought they both were the catalyst for that tonight, with both the football but also their mindset just going out there.

"We had to start strong today, we knew we would probably run out of gas at the end of the game considering the line-up we had out there, coming off Europe on Thursday night. I think the players sensed that and credit to them that they started the game in that way."

It was the second successive Premier League game in which Tottenham have scored twice within the opening 10 minutes.

However, on a night when Spurs scored five goals and kept a clean sheet, if there was one note of improvement required, it continues to be the lack of opportunities created for Dominic Solanke.

The 27-year-old battled away up front with his running and hassling but of Tottenham's 18 shots - with nine on target - none came from Solanke. The closest he came was when Son's ball across the six yard box was cut out just in front of him only to bounce back towards Kulusevski to score in his third consecutive game.

Solanke has seven goal involvements in 13 Premier League games for Spurs this season and four in six Europa League matches yet could have so many more if his team-mates could pick out his runs.

Otherwise though, for the visitors this was just what the doctor ordered and thankfully the medic wasn't Dr Tottenham on this occasion.

A big week continues with the arrival of Manchester United for that cup quarter-final on Thursday night and most of the same Tottenham players must go again, while their visitors will likely make changes aplenty to freshen up.

Spurs will need the crowd roaring them on at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium to create an uncomfortable atmosphere for a United side that will be buoyant after their derby win at the Etihad Stadium.

The new chant about Levy and Kulusevski will undoubtedly be heard on a bigger scale but it's essential that there's also plenty of backing for the tired Tottenham players as they continue to push themselves to the limit and beyond.

This was a step in the right direction for Postecoglou and his players but it needs to be the start of something rather than a blip. For if Spurs can build some momentum as those 10 players start to finally return in the weeks ahead, it's going to make for a bright 2025.

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