Saints forward makes Leeds United admission and voices Whites boost regret

The Saints approached the weekend’s Elland Road contest sat bottom of the division but boosted by the previous weekend’s 1-0 win at Chelsea which brought the south coast side to within one point of the second-bottom Whites.

Leeds, though, condemned Southampton to a 13th defeat of the season in Saturday’s contest as Junior Firpo’s late strike sealed a 1-0 triumph and Elyounoussi pulled no punches in his assessment of the contest and Javi Gracia’s Whites.

Morocco-born Norway international forward Elyounoussi admitted his side were below the standard required and voiced his regret that his Saints had failed to deal with a “fresh, energised” Whites, boosted by the arrival of new boss Gracia.

“It was a tough game,” admitted Elyounoussi to southamptonfc.com. "We were not near good enough, not even close to how we performed last week. We were lacking the aggression and the intensity we had last week. It’s a tough one to take, for the boys, for everyone who loves the club.

"There’s plenty more games to play. Every game is like a cup final for us. We lost today but there’s plenty more to come. Obviously they had their new manager and fresh beginning so came with a lot of energy.

"We couldn’t match that today unfortunately. We came about better second half. We looked better, more composed, more confident with the ball. We tried to play it through them and around them. We should have done that much more but we didn’t find enough solutions. We’ll go back and work on it and there’s plenty more left to come.”