Marcus Tavernier’s second-half winner at St Mary’s left the the division’s bottom club six points from safety with five games to go. Beleaguered Saints thought they had snatched a dramatic draw but Che Adams’ 89th-minute effort was disallowed for offside following VAR intervention. A painful defeat to their south-coast rivals inflicted a club-record 11th home league loss of the season on Southampton, with lingering hopes of survival fading fast.
Ruben Selles said: “We are going to go and try to put a performance in every game to try to win, and we are going to do it until the very end. I know it’s only five games to play. But we are professionals and we will fight until the very last point. I know now it’s hard, I know the table is looking like it’s a difficult one but we are going to give it a try. It was a disappointing night. We came with the intention to put in a good performance and we obviously didn’t. Some of the things that can go against us, they went against us. Even the offside goal, it’s a couple of centimetres but it is offside. It was a hard night.”