Ronald Koeman wants Southampton to take the positives from their second-half performance at Manchester City into their Capital One Cup quarter-final against Liverpool.
Saints welcome the Reds to St Mary’s on Wednesday night, when the teams will battle for a place in the last four of the competition.
Koeman’s side will go into the game on the back of yesterday’s 3-1 defeat at Manchester City, and while the manager was disappointed at how they started the game, falling behind 2-0 during a sloppy opening 20 minutes, he was pleased with how they responded, particularly after the break, when they dominated.
He now wants them to try to replicate that sort of display against Liverpool.
"I said to the players even after this defeat we are disappointed,” explained Koeman to youtube.com/southamptonfc.
“I’m disappointed with how we started the game, but at least we showed in the second half our level and then we can beat everybody.”
Koeman added: “It’s important that the players take the positives from the second half.
“Then you see if we play our level, if we have good ball possession, we have players between the lines, we can make it difficult to the big ones.”