AN injury list the size of Sir Clive Woodward's backroom staff may have been a factor, but head coach Steve Wigley certainly picked his most imaginative Saints line-up yet yesterday.

Central defensive and midfield partnerships predictably contained Claus Lundekvam, Andreas Jakobsson, Rory Delap and Anders Svensson, but elsewhere there were one or two surprises.

On the left, the Jelle Van Damme/Neil McCann combination continued, while on the right, Wigley paired Darren Kenton with Mikael Nilsson.

Up front, Fabrice Fernandes was given a roaming role behind Dexter Blackstock.

So, leaving aside a disappointing nil-nil scoreline at home to an unimpressive Birmingham team, how did Wigley's selection experiments work out?

Starting with the positives, the left-flank looks good.

Jelle Van Damme and Neil McCann have brought an understanding developed on the training ground into matches and are currently an improvement on the Graeme Le Saux/Svensson axis, which has played much of the season.

McCann provides natural width, while Van Damme oozes energy and commitment. Le Saux is, of course, quality and could play with either, but for now, both deserve a run in the team together.

On the right, Kenton and Nilsson showed promising signs.

Swedish international Nilsson looked at home further forward in midfield and delivered several good crosses.

He also came closest to scoring - doing everything right to go around ex-Saints keeper Maik Taylor just before half-time except for his finish.

Kenton defended extremely well, although rarely looked likely to get forward and offer much width.

Whether the tried and trusted Paul Telfer/Fabrice Fernandes axis remains a better option remains an arguable point.

Wigley clearly did not want to drop his enigmatic Frenchman and so gave him the freedom of creating something as a second striker behind young Blackstock.

It didn't work and it should not be tried again.

Fernandes thrives on space and struggled to find any when taking up more central positions.

The best strikers are generally either big and strong on the ball or very quick (both in Thierry Henry's case).

Fernandes is neither.

Wigley should simply make the choice between Nilsson and Fernandes wide on the right, rather than persist with one or the other out of position.

All in all, it was another mixed performance.

Saints largely controlled possession and the effort and commitment was beyond question.

But they rarely looked like threatening - James Beattie and Kevin Phillips are certainly being missed at present.

In the second half, Saints did not create a single clear chance and a return of just one goal in their most recent ten hours of Premiership football tells a very sorry story.

For now, the bad news is that Saints are down in the bottom three on merit so far this season. Performances have been OK recently, but it is hard to say they have deserved significantly more points.

The good news, though, is that the foot of the table remains tightly bunched and Saints have every reason to believe they will improve.

No other club has had so much off-field uncertainty, while the injury list is far worse than their rivals.

The coaching structure is now settled and some top players should become available again soon.

After Arsenal next week, the month of November presents a real opportunity to finally gain some momentum.

It really cannot come soon enough.