A narrow defeat at the Emirates, but the fight in the side suggested that we can get the wins to stay up, the soft goals conceded suggest that we might not.

There were officially 59,374 in attendance at the Emirates on Sunday afternoon, but some parts of the stands were not even half full and the real figure could be anywhere between 15-20,000 less, if the stands above us were as empty as the other three sides.

This was a game that gave us plenty of hope with a gutsy performance that saw us opening the scoring and a fight back that seemed to have earned us at least a point and at that stage possibly more, but then we shot ourselves in the foot yet again with poor marking in the penalty area to concede another soft goal and this was a step too far.

Mark Hughes changed formation and went with three central defenders with Bertrand and Soares to the side of them, we came to do what I felt we should have done at West Ham a week earlier and that was to get a grip of the game and then try to push home our advantage.

We seemed to be well on course when Shane Long put us ahead on 17 minutes, but we then did what we have done too often this season and that is switch off at key moments. All three goals could really have been prevented especially the winner which was very much a case of deja vu.

Hughes formation might have looked defensive, but it had the ability to attack, indeed we had more attempts on goal and on target than the hosts, but sadly they rarely gave us the slack marking that we did to mean we scored as many as them.

The performance owed much to the hard graft of Shane Long and James Ward Prowse both of whom had been out of favour for recent games, JWP covering more ground and making more sprints than anyone else according to the stats .

But it wasn't to be and Saints remain stranded in the bottom three, however this game showed hope something that was in short display a week earlier a few miles us the road, the spirited display giving grounds for optimism that we can turn the season around.

But on the pessimistic side there is that penchant for giving too many easy and unmarked chances in the penalty area, if we do go down the seeds of this season were sown in January last year where we failed to sign a replacement for Jose Fonte, Wesley Hoedt came in last summer, but in the last two transfer windows we needed to sign a replacement for Van Dijk and didn't, every club know our weakness is marking in the penalty area and it is no coincidence that we have conceded more goals from headers than any other team and more goals from set pieces.

Alex McCarthy made several top stops and was arguably the man of the match on either side, but he was left exposed too often and that has to stop.

What we need now is one last push where everyone digs in and gives 110% effort, we had that at the Emirates, if we can do that for the final run in then we can pull clear.

Photo: Action Images

saintjf added 12:41 - Apr 10 Anybody still believe in the Southampton way? Only buy young players that can learn and be sold on at a profit whilst completely ignoring older more experienced pros who they could learn from. An older more experienced centre half can steady the ship and would have been a lot more use than not signing anybody at all. Seems so obvious now we look back on it. Some of these youngsters have talent but Saints wont benefit. As an aside. How did Puel and Pelegrino get through a job interview? Neither make much sense too me.

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BoondockSaint added 01:31 - Apr 11 saintjf-They probably said: "I'll just make do with the players Les gives me. I'll only give vague answers to the press. I won't complain to the press about the board not addressing the needs on the field. I don't care what this does to my reputation, I just want my name known in England so after you sack me, every time there is a job opening, the press will put forward my name on the famous "Short List". You know, like ah......who's that bloke currently out of work.......ah! Mark Hughes!"

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