Ronald Koeman questions Southampton's hunger after defeat

Ronald Koeman heavily criticised his Southampton players following their lacklustre 2-0 defeat at Bournemouth.

The Cherries pulled eight points clear of the relegation zone with a 2-0 victory over their south coast rivals, who only mustered one shot on target during the entire game.

A goal in each half did the damage for the hosts with Steve Cook and Benik Afobe getting on the scoresheet, both courtesy of dangerous Matt Ritchie free-kicks which were poorly dealt with by Southampton goalkeeper Fraser Forster.

The victory was Bournemouth's first over local rivals Southampton in the league since 1958 and Koeman admitted Eddie Howe's team showed more hunger in the derby environment.

"There was a big difference tonight in how Bournemouth started the game - they were hungry and winning challenges that we didn't win," Koeman said.

"That's not tactics - that's character, that's mentality. They fight for their lives. That was the difference.

"If you analyse the game and you ask the Southampton players if they won or lost more battles. All of the 10 players on the pitch will recognise that they lost more. After the change we made we had more control of the game. We had more ball position in the second half but we didn't create really big chances.

"It's always very disappointing as a manager if the opponent is hungrier than your team.

"I always speak to the players after the game and normally I try and defend the players but today I'm not because they [Bournemouth] were more hungry than we were on the pitch.

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"They [the players] are not stupid. We will show them some clips which will help them understand."

The manager was left disappointed his side failed to create any meaningful chances during the game but was even more frustrated regarding their inability to defend Ritchie's set-pieces.

"Sharpness is also defending set-pieces," he said.

"We had a great record defending but Chelsea scored to make it 2-1 at the weekend out of a corner kick and today we conceded two goals from a free-kick. We have received three goals in a row now and that's all about sharpness in the team. It wasn't good enough."