Koeman - The Luckiest Team Won
I'm not sure that the word lucky is the right phrase to be used after the Swans became the third visiting team to leave St Mary's with a win in the league this season.
But it is the word that manager Ronald Koeman used after his side were undone by a brilliant defensive display from the Swans which was made all the sweeter for us thanks to Jonjo Shelvey's late strike that was enough to give the Swans the win that they so desperately wanted.
Admittedly it must have been hard for Koeman to watch his side lose a game where they dominated possession but we know exactly what that feels like but it certainly does not make us lucky to have come away with three points.
Koeman's Southampton went into the game knowing that avoiding defeat would have lifted them back above Manchester United into 3rd place in the league but they leave with Arsenal right behind them having dismantled Aston Villa earlier this afternoon.
"I was very happy at half-time with how we played in the first 45 minutes,” Koeman told Southampton’s official YouTube channel. "I think we played very good football.
"We had a lot of ball possession and we had some good chances. Maybe we lacked a little bit of sharpness in the box but we played well.
"That’s the problem if you don’t score in the first 45 minutes, you have to keep your organisation and the second half was more difficult.
"There was more space between the lines for them to play but I think the luckiest team won. They came for one point because they didn’t press our defence.
"You need good ball possession, we had that in the first half and we had enough chances to score. Even in the last five minutes we had two good chances to make a draw.
"Maybe it was one of those days that the ball wouldn’t go in. It’s maybe good defending from them but you need to be sharper than we were.”
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