The players were “extremely distraught,” according to Conor Townsend, in the away dressing room on Saturday night following full time.
At St. Mary’s Stadium, Albion outperformed a Southampton team that was one of the favorites to win promotion after being demoted from the Premier League the previous year.
With the score tied at one, Carlos Corberán’s team was in control and pressing for a victory. But, in the last 12 minutes, Adam Armstrong scored at the other end of the field to deal the Baggies a brutal and unjustified blow, earning the hosts all three points in the process.
For the visitors, it was just their second loss in 11 games, and Townsend acknowledged that their performance was well short of expectations.
“That was a tough one to take, he remarked. Obviously, we had the chance with Darnell hitting the bar right before they scored the second, and you would have said that we would have been the ones to score the winner if you had said someone would have.”
We played some very excellent things while we were leading, but we ultimately conceded. When you play like we did, you frequently miss opportunities.
I felt we restricted them, and considering the work and performance we both put in, it’s clear that everyone is utterly sad.
I believe that the crowd were also pleased with our efforts because they stuck around to the end and gave us enthusiastic applause. It simply wasn’t meant to be today.
We didn’t have many opportunities in the first half, but overall, I felt the game was very even and didn’t have much going for it.
“Obviously, it’s challenging to visit a place like St. Mary’s, especially given their recent performance, but we came here, the early goal was somewhat of a kick to us, and we still played some decent first-half football; it was just a matter of continuing the same pattern and projecting more threat.
We had a great outlet today, in my opinion, thanks to the attacking players and the midfield, and we generated a lot of opportunities as a result. All we need to do is try to grab one or two more.
“The guys are really sad, but it only goes to show how good we were when we didn’t win.
“We’ll just focus on the good things, take a little break for now, and come back and try to make this right.”
“We’ve lost every game leading up to an international break, which is obviously not ideal, but we’ve recovered and had successful outcomes following both holidays in the past, so we need to repeat that.
“We have an extremely difficult stretch of fixtures coming up. Southampton is a strong team; we defeated Hull with relative ease and had the opportunity to win again tonight.
Positives exist, though, and we shall seize them. We know all these games will be hard, but with efforts like that, maybe we can turn them into victories and we’ll be there, or thereabouts. The Championship is a competition where no game is easy; anyone can beat anybody.
We’ve also suffered a great deal of injuries. At one point, the group was completely worn out, and we still needed Swifty, Maja, Dike, and Reachy to return. We therefore have bodies that need to return, and I believe that some of them will be near when the Ipswich game or the following week comes around. Their return will be really significant for us.
They’ll significantly strengthen the team. We have faith in the management as well as the team in the locker room.
“This season, we’ve seen a lot of positive things. There are undoubtedly areas for improvement, but we are where we are, and ideally, we can continue to build momentum and get closer to the play-off spots.
