Managing Liverpool must be hell at the moment. Not that the current incumbent, Roy Evans, should necessarily be considered totally blameless.

Those spectators who waited around for Saturday's final whistle - perhaps half of those who witnessed the afternoon's first kick - were resigned to an unavoidable fate. As the Southampton party began in earnest, the realisation that this Liverpool team are probably not good enough to win this or any other Premiership struck.

Liverpool spent most of an open game all over Southampton and yet they still slipped to defeat, one which may just prove to be their undoing. With the exception of the irresistible, indefatigable Michael Owen up front, who scored both their goals, and Phil Babb at the heart of a defence which otherwise boasted the mobility of a fully-laden bin bag, Liverpool were breathtaking in their ineptitude.

Evans chose his words carefully when invited to criticise those whose collective indiscipline had nudged him one step closer to a new job description. "We handed them victory on a plate, but it is still wide open, it is still all to play for," he said, between gritted teeth.

Evans was not asked to explain why he sees fit to handicap his side on a weekly basis by selecting Robbie Fowler when, self-evidently, the young gun has developed the footballing equivalent of the yips. Fowler should not have started this game and he certainly should have been withdrawn long before Southampton found the courage to slip their shackles.

Delightfully-fashioned goals by the substitute Egil Ostenstad and David Hirst inside the final five minutes pushed a depleted Southampton side over the line for only a second league success away from home all season. It was a curious end to a game which throbbed with vitality even though it held only isolated moments of genuine enterprise.

LIVERPOOL: James, Jones, Matteo, Babb, Harkness, McManaman, Ince, Carragher (Murphy 58), Leonhardsen (Berger 58), Fowler, Owen. Subs Not Used: Kvarme, Riedle, Wright. Booked: James, Fowler. Goals: Owen 24, 90.

SOUTHAMPTON: Jones, Dodd, Todd, Monkou, Lundekvam (Dryden 49), Oakley (Williams 15), Beresford, Davies (Ostenstad 39), Richardson, Hughes, Hirst. Subs Not Used: Le Tissier, Moss.

Booked: Monkou, Hughes.

Goals: Hirst 8 pen, Ostenstad 85, Hirst 90.

Referee: J Winter (Stockton-on-Tees).