SOCCER/ FA Premiership/ Southampton 2; Liverpool 0: It is safe to assume Michael Owen will not be rushing to the south coast for his summer holiday.

Having missed a penalty at Portsmouth last month when Liverpool went out of the FA Cup, the striker repeated the trick here yesterday as his team suffered a setback in their quest for a Champions League place. Throw in Liverpool's league defeat at Portsmouth in October and Owen's hatred of this part of the world will be complete.

Gerard Houllier's players dominated here and did not deserve to lose. They sit eighth in the Premiership partly because they failed to take their chances but also because of Antti Niemi's excellent goalkeeping.

Owen, a largely periperhal figure, was a victim of both. He hit a post when he ought to have scored and struck Niemi's legs before having an unmerited 72nd-minute penalty saved. That would have made it 1-1. The lack of conviction in Owen's all-round play sums up Liverpool's stop-start season.

This costly defeat came despite the best efforts of Steven Gerrard and Harry Kewell and heightens the pressure on Houllier. While the Frenchman cut a frustrated figure, not so Paul Sturrock. Southampton's new manager says he prefers winning football to pretty football and got that in his first match.

The opener from James Beattie ought to have been disallowed for offside and Kevin Phillips's late strike took a hefty deflection. At least the drive lacking from Southampton's play was replaced by a determination to hang on.

Liverpool's disappointment will be all the greater because they failed to take advantage of Newcastle's defeat. Houllier was visibly upset, though victory in their game-in-hand at home to Portsmouth in midweek will move his team to within a point of the final Champions League qualifying place.

Houllier strongly criticised the assistant referee who failed to spot Phillips was offside in the build-up to the opening goal and said it "tells you everything" that Niemi was man of the match.

Liverpool were hard done by, but the team still fails to totally convince. They are snatching at chances when calm is needed. Perhaps Owen's penalty miss was poetic justice, because if Jason Dodd did foul Kewell it was outside the box.

It would not have been unjustified for Liverpool to have led at the interval. Southampton's first-half performance was miserable.

Yet Liverpool failed to take advantage of the control they enjoyed in the opening 25 minutes, when Rory Delap and David Prutton allowed too much time and space to Gerrard and Didi Hamann. Although Niemi had made two good saves from Kewell and Owen by half-time and Gerrard ought to have scored, Liverpool's attack was sporadic.

Southampton improved in the second half but it was a surprise when they found the net. Beattie turned Igor Biscan too easily and found Phillips, who ought to have been given offside. Phillips inadvertently provided a perfect return for Beattie to clip over the onrushing Dudek. The Pole was playing after Chris Kirkland sustained a wrist fracture which will keep him out for six weeks.

"I think the turning point was when the linesman made a major mistake," Houllier said. "It was offside and even their people knew that. They told me. How can you miss that?"

As Liverpool pressed, Niemi continued to form a formidable barrier. He saved from Biscan, Kewell and between times from Gerrard, with Owen putting the loose ball against the post.

When Phillips beat Dudek after a deflection off John Arne Riise it was game over. "Hopefully all our breaks didn't come in one game," Sturrock said. Liverpool's consolation is they do not have to return to the south coast.