This was not a great result not a great performance, but it was not the sign that Saints are heading towards freefall either.

All football teams have poor results, indeed Manchester City after beating Barcelona could not despatch Middlesbrough on Saturday and it would be a similar case for Saints at Hull City.

But this was not a bad Saints performance overall it was a case of a few minutes of madness where Hull City turned a game around that they seemed to have no chance of winning and made Saints pay dearly.

Up to that moment Saints had looked comfortable and that was perhaps the problem, we had plenty of chances, in fairness most had been taken well but the Hull keeper did his job, but perhaps complacency crept in.

The warning sign was there with a shot flashed across goal and the Saints defence seemed to lack concentration, Hull then scored with literally there first effort on goal and then 125 seconds later made it two.

They would not look like scoring again but now the damage was done and although Saints would have well over half an hour to turn the game around, inspired form by Marshall in the Hull goal as well as more than a little luck kept the score at 2-1.

Indeed with virtually the last kick of the game Hull had to hack of their own line Jay Rodriguez was rushing in, the ball hit him, there was nothing else he could do but try and block, it could have gone anywhere but it went over the bar.

That perhaps summed up Saints day.

But it was one where lessons were learn't by both Claude Puel and his team.

The manager disappointed me a little bu his substitutions, given the possession we were enjoying and the little trouble that Hull were causing after they scored , we went like for like which was a little disappointing, on 66 minutes Boufal for Tadic was a like for like, but at that stage we could have sacrificed Jordy Clasie and gone for the jugular.

The double substitution with 13 minutes remaining was again one that lacked a little bit of daring, Ward Prowse for Clasie made sense, but at that stage Hull were penned back, I would have taken Yoshida off at this stage and gone three at the back, Yoshida did not have a bad game, but he had plenty of room on the right, but he is not an attacking player, so he did not exploit this room either by beating his man not putting in meaningful crosses, not the Japanese defenders fault, he is a defender not an attacking one at that.

If we had gone for it in the final 15 minutes by keeping on Redmond and employing him in the space Yoshida had we might have created more than we did.

But this is an observation rather than a moan at Puel, he is new to the Premier League he will make mistakes.

That is the thing to be taken from this game, teams lose games they really should have won, indeed we had a run like that last season in December and early January, but it did not stop us finishing in sixth.

We have had a lot of transition this season and we are also having to play so many more games, that is the price of success, we will have results like this from time to time, we have to take them on the chin for what they are, temporary setbacks and not fatal blows.

Saints will bounce back, we win as a team and we lose as a team, this defeat was not about a lack of strikers nor just about the defence switching off for a awful three minute spell, it was about not doing the job as a team.

Photo: Action Images

Redrum added 19:16 - Nov 7 Most important part of success are your strikers.Look at Liverpool now,think of how important Aguero is etc.We NEED one or two brilliant strikers to be a great team
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zonehead added 21:26 - Nov 7 Stop going on about Pelle and Marne and move on, Austin is a goal scorer the focus of the team should be to make sure the ball gets in the six yard box and for him to be there, that's what he does, it's his main skill ie right place etc. How long to we have to carry Classie, and for the rest of the midfield stop eating crab!
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bstokesaint added 21:59 - Nov 7 No need to apologise to me Mark. Everyone is entitled to their opinion. I've supported Saints for nearly 30 years and I've seen the best football from us these past few seasons. For that reason I personally find it hard to lay into the people that have brought me that enjoyment. You can spin his however you like but we are now a regular top 10 side Premier league side and have broken record after record and have had back to back European seasons, with one of the most memorable games on our history just 4 nights ago! Like I said we're not perfect (we need a striker) but if our biggest complaint is every now and then we're forced to sell world class players to keep that dream going then I accept that. It'd be lovely to take, take, take, but that would be a luxury. And the reason I don't like laying into players is because anyone wearing the shirt gets my support. Some players need more time. In fact just this time last year I remember getting behind Mane when he was getting some stick. No one was saying then he was world class and a £35m player back then. He was just "s***" according to a broad section of fans and yet now Redmond is getting similar flak. It's like some fans have grown so used to a bit of success that they just expect it all the time. If I was Kat I'd sell tomorrow.

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TeamCortese added 22:43 - Nov 7 bstokesaint: "If I was Kat I'd sell tomorrow." Only part of your comment that made sense to me. If you can convince her to sell to an owner who is actually going to invest money into our transfer funds and make us more competitive as a football club that would be great! ;) I can assure you if Markus was still alive we won't have sold so many of our best players. Any football club with ambitions for success doesn't sell their best players to immediate opposition...that's just stupid. I hope this Hull defeat is a wake-up call to the board to get off their high horse and start spending some f'ing money! For crying out we have the TV rights money. DO WE FANS NOT MATTER?! ONE OF MY MATES WHO SUPPORTS LIVERPOOL CASUALLY ASKED IF WE'RE SELLING VVD TO LIVERPOOL NEXT SUMMER. WHAT IS THIS? IT'S BLOODY EMBARRASSING!

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saintmark1976 added 23:44 - Nov 7 Thanks for the reply bstokesaint. That is the very pleasant thing about this site in that we can disagree without resorting to insults which does not appear to be the case in regard to the Southampton Echo football site on occasions. We certainly can agree on Kat selling the club. If not in whole then at least in part in the hope that some additional investment comes in to make us more competitive with the "Big Boys"

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bstokesaint added 00:14 - Nov 8 Would love to see some additional investment provided it's from the right people. It still scares me to think how close we were to becoming Coventry City. TeamCortese we all have friends who claim to be Liverpool "fans". Don't let them get the better of you. At least all of your in-laws aren't diehard Scousers. S*** if I can live with that..!! You're probably right under Markus and Cortese we wouldn't have sold as many players, but we'll never know. One thing I do know is much of our success can be attributed to the proceeds from sales to Liverpool and as things stand only Mane, and more recently Lallana, have had any real impact.

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BoondockSaint added 02:59 - Nov 8 The galling thing is the continual selling to the Scouse (who I loathe). If Citehad or Arsenal come in with big money, oh well, we need to work our way up to their level so we can convince players to stay. However, selling your best players year after year to a team right next to you on the table is insane!! One of the main tenets of sports is don't help your competition! You never see players in other sports sold or traded to local rivals or teams in same division for two reasons: Don't help your rival. and make sure the player doesn't come back and embarrass you. In fact, if your cross-town rival is in another division, make deals to help their division rivals. And always, take a bow everyone for your civility! It's the "Ugly Inside Way"!

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PezzaSaint added 06:56 - Nov 8 An extremely disappointing result. Personally I think the players were to complacent. After beating Inter Milan and then bossing the 1st half against Hull I think they thought the remainder of the match would be easy. This attitude coupled with tiredness for a few (Tadic amongst them maybe) meant that we lost a game that we never should have. Relying on Charlie Austin to get us goals is a risky business because he is proving inconsistent and maybe he has become complacent because realistically we haven't got a replacement for him for games in the Premier League fixtures. A striker purchase pre-season would have kept the others on their toes!

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A1079 added 08:53 - Nov 8 Saintmark1976. Excellent and well balanced post. I also agree that the comments have been mild and generally well considered by the supporters. These guys are not shrinking violets and most of us care about our team, our club and just as they take the plaudits when things go well they need to take the bricks and bats when things did not go so well.
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bstokesaint added 08:56 - Nov 8 It winds me up no end too. I don't understand this connection with Liverpool. It used to be Arsenal, but now they seem to be the only club interested in our players. I do look forward to the day we snub them. I'm certainly not a fan of them.
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sidsaint added 10:08 - Nov 8 Agree with many of the comments. Our next 2 league games are at home to Liverpool and Everton. If we don't get anything from them we could be in the bottom 6, the league is very tight, and I hate to think what the comments on the Ugly Inside will be like. Lets keep the faith when the Scoucers come visiting.
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aceofthebase added 11:32 - Nov 8 History is a funny thing. I can remembe so many matches when Mane was nowhere to be seen, easily dispossesed and never looked like scoring. I can remember the great run of victories we had whilst Pelle was injured and i had my fingers crossed we would not pick him for the rest of the season. Pelle has gone and Mane is in a rather good Liverpool team, good luck to both of them but they are History! Thet were certainly not irreplaceable fantastic players, they were good and played in a good Southampton team. I believe some comments on here equate them to Aguero or Bale or Ronaldo, It wasn't so and the quality of our present bunch of forwards is not that different to M and P. If our midfield contributed with some goals like VVD then success will follow for our team. Finally I was loud and clear last season that Clasie was not good enough for our team and I have been proved right. Cedric is no better than Clasie.

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bstokesaint added 12:30 - Nov 8 That's a really good point Ace. I think a number of our ex-players have been really good players when playing as part of a really good team. When taken out of that team they generally struggle to make the same impact. For me personally Schneiderlin was the biggest loss to the club and statistically-speaking was the best player in the Premiership for consecutive seasons (from memory), yet he can't get into a poor to average Man U team. The same for Chambers. Nowhere near the same quality, but a great prospect who has effectively disappeared. And Clyne too is unsettled at Liverpool, but performed week in, week out for us. You'd think by now that some players would have realized the grass isn't always greener, although I suppose the cash is a good softener for lack of game time.

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SaintBrock added 18:44 - Nov 8 Cash is King for too many of these lads bstokesaint. Then again when you look at the plight of Rodriguez it is perhaps more understandable. Careers can be ended very abruptly indeed and if it is a little early to call time on his career it surely and sadly cannot be too far away in the future. You are completely right about Morgan Schneiderlin, a hugely talented player and very principled young man who gave us some of the best years of our supporting lives. Chambers moved too soon to figure seriously in our plans but from my own recollections of the young player it does not surprise me that he has missed the boat at Arsenal. I am fairly certain that he would not have been an answer to any of our current woes.

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