RALPH Hasenhuttl insists he will “try to be as self-critical as possible” to help Saints out of their poor run of form, but remains confident he has the right group of players to put things right. Following Sunday’s 2-1 loss to Wolves, Saints have now suffered six consecutive league defeats for the first time in the club’s 135-year history. Asked how he copes with a bad run of results personally or if he becomes more difficult to live with after a string of defeats,
Ralph Hasenhuttl said: “There’s not a general answer I can give there. It’s different. Sometimes it’s harder for me. I must say for example the Aston Villa game (1-0 loss) hurts me more than the Man United game because it was absolutely undeserved to lose this game. This hurts sometimes more than a game where you know you have no chance, even if it’s 9-0. You would be worrying about other things that you cannot affect or you cannot control. It’s never nice to lose games. It’s never nice to have such a setback as we have at the moment but I ask myself or I try to be as self-critical as possible to find solutions why it is like this and what are the few things that are missing at the moment and it’s not so much I think. We still create chances, we still don’t have 20 chances against us – then I would really worry. But it is then to find the small things that are missing and I’ve seen in the Newcastle game, especially in the defence in the reverse gear, a few situations where we can do it, or normally we did it better in the games before we lost. This we have to do again. You have to show the players and I think they can take it. I was very critical to them (after Newcastle) and I know that they can take it and I hope that we all find the way back to better result football.”
Hasenhuttl joined Saints in December 2018 and is approaching his 100th game in charge next month. His record so far reads won 37, drawn 21, lost 38 since arriving at St Mary’s. Asked whether he has better tools now to deal with this poor run then when he began his managerial career here,
Ralph Hasenhuttl said: “Yes, because you know more about your game. You learn a lot about your game, and you learn a lot about your players. When you are two years together, and I think especially this group, we are working together. We went through all the weathers, and all the sunshine in these two years, there was everything included. Position one in the table and I think the last position we also had. So we know everything – players in the stands, players in the first XI, a manager flying high, a manager really low because of no energy. We had everything. This commits us in a very special way and helps us hopefully in such moments to find a way out.”
Saints will look to pick up a first league win since January 4 when Chelsea visit St Mary’s on Saturday.Quizzed on if he still trusts this squad of players to get results,
Ralph Hasenhuttl said: “Sure, this is my group.”
