Martin frustrated by slow start
Russell Martin was left ruing another slow start as Southampton found themselves behind inside 21 seconds to a Leicester side who ran out 4-1 winners at St Mary’s.
Saints were 2-0 down after 18 minutes, having found themselves trailing by the same scoreline early on at Sunderland last time out.
Martin was pleased with a lot of his side’s attacking play, including Samuel Edozie’s goal from which Saints won the ball high up the pitch – a recurring theme on the night – but too often their finishing was not clinical enough to cash in.
“My overriding feeling is we can’t start a game like that again,” Martin reflected. “It makes it so hard for us, but we got ourselves back in the game, we pressed relentlessly, we stole the ball.
“When they stole the ball they scored, when we stole the ball we didn’t. One team was really clinical, and we weren’t clinical enough, because the chances were there for us.
“I think it was a really even game in that sense, until the last 15 minutes when we gave away a couple of big ones (chances) because the game’s gone, and it’s difficult at that point.
“The lads are still trying to go for it and I admire them for that, but we concede two so early and the atmosphere to be how it was, which I understand, is frustrating, because we can’t start the game like that.
“It’s up to me to find a way to help the players to manage the game, especially early on in the game, because we got punished.
“We really hurt them with the ball. We stole the ball a lot more than they stole it from us, and really hurt them with the build up and some of the football was outstanding, but we need to score.
“People won’t care about that because we’ve lost 4-1, but there will be plenty of positives to take for us, and if anyone thought we were going to get to where we want to get to without any pain at all, with the amount of change we’ve got and with the size of the change from where we were to where we are, then I think that’s unrealistic and naïve.
“We’ve had pain in the last few games, but I’m proud of the players tonight, especially the guys that were on the pitch at the start of the game. I really liked a lot of what they did, but we have to stop conceding poor goals and we have to stop starting games like that.”
