Ralph Hasenhüttl praised a committed display after seeing his Southampton side battle to a crucial 2-1 victory over Leicester City in the Premier League.
James Ward-Prowse’s penalty on 11 minutes gave the visitors the lead, before Yan Valery was dismissed after two bookable offences late in the first-half. But Shane Long’s goal in stoppage time gave Saints a two-goal cushion.
And despite an inevitable second-half onslaught from Claude Puel’s side, which included a Wilfred Ndidi goal, Hasenhüttl’s men stood up to the test admirably.
“After the red card for Yan Valery, nobody will have thought we can win this game with 55 minutes to go. It’s a long time to defend against such a good team. Then we scored the second goal which is unbelievable,” Hasenhüttl began.
“Longy did a fantastic job today I think. He was hard-working, going after every ball. In the second-half we said that we will try to keep the clean sheet as long as possible and if a goal happens we stay focused and keep believing that we can take this win.
“It’s a fantastic win. It can be a very important one because we showed that we act as a team with fantastic commitment. That’s what I want to see.
“We showed today more of our potential that we have to bring to excellence, which is the step we want to go to. It’s only possible with hard work and we had a very good week ahead of this game.
"Now I think we have made a very important step but only one, the others have to follow.”
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