Koeman taking the positives from defeat

Southampton manager Ronald Koeman has said that his players must take all the positives from the loss to Manchester City at The Etihad over the weekend.

The Saints lost 3-1 to the team top of the Premier league thanks to goals from Kevin De Bruyne, Fabian Delph and Alexandar Kolarov. Shane Long pulled one goal back to make it 2-1 at the time before Kolarov finished the game off with his low drive.

Despite many, many negatives from the first half showing Southampton improved significantly in the second 45 and there were positives to take from the match. Shane Long’s fine header was one, as well as the chances that they created. Dusan Tadic also had a clear-cut chance as he saw his one-on-one saved by the stand-in City ‘keeper Caballero.

Speaking in the aftermath of their defeat on the road this season, Saints manager Ronald Koeman said this:

It’s important that the players take out of the positives from the second half.

Then you see if we play our level, if we have good ball possession, we have players between the lines, we can make it difficult to the big ones.

We had the best chance to score the 2-2 from [Dusan] Tadic, and some other counter attack situations stopped by the referee. “The 3-1 killed the game after that.