OFTEN the most forgettable of wins can be the most important.

That certainly summed up Saints' 1-0 victory at Sunderland last night - it was pretty turgid stuff but it doesn't matter if you come away with the three points.

There can be no underestimating the importance of this result or the immense satisfaction the players and management will get from it.

It's worth making it clear that after just two games without a win it was far from a disaster.

But there's no doubt that with the visit of Manchester United coming up on Saturday a result at the Stadium of Light was desirable, if not vital.

After conceding a two goal lead at Middlesbrough, albeit through a bad refereeing decision, came defeat against Liverpool at St Mary's. That was no disgrace - they're an excellent team and were awesome on the day.

Only getting a draw against Millwall on Saturday, especially after a good opening 15 minutes, was slightly more worrying.

But after this win everything is back on track and those two results, neither of which were even all that bad, can be consigned to history.

Southampton's away wins are beginning to take a common theme this season - 1-0, James Beattie scoring the second half winner.

Gordon Strachan's men have now won three times away from St Mary's during this campaign, each via the above route.

Last night's winner in their first league double of the season came five minutes into the second half and was one of very few opportunities for either team during a torrid 90 minutes.

Michael Svensson's long ball was latched onto by the run of Beattie who rounded the keeper and finished coolly.

The Sunderland defence were stood still with arms raised in the air but it was not Beattie who was offside but Jo Tessem, jogging back from an offside position but not interfering with play.

Saints had gone closest in the first half with Rory Delap heading over after 10 minutes, Fabrice Fernandes' excellently struck free kick being turned onto the post after 37 and Anders Svensson seeing his effort tipped wide just before the break.

In the second period Saints almost stole the lead through Beattie after just a matter of seconds but it didn't take long to come.

There was no moaning about the result from the Wearsiders after the match.

Black Cats boss Howard Wilkinson admitted his side were awful and their performance was unacceptable - they sure didn't have many ideas.

The nearest they came was three efforts in 11 second half minutes - two from Kevin Phillips.

His first saw him react first to a breaking ball and toe past Antti Niemi and into the side netting while the Finnish number one did well to save from him twice when he was clear with Saints appealing for offside.

Francis Benali, starting his first Premiership game for almost three years, produced his second goalline clearance in four days when he turned Julio Arca's shot round the post after Niemi had headed outside his area to the Sunderland man.

The game was a very hard fought affair, much as everybody had predicted, and the strong wind didn't help in that respect.

Saints started off with a 4-4-1-1 formation with Anders Svensson playing in behind Beattie.

Its success was limited but it had to change after 36 minutes when Delap hobbled off with a calf injury.

He had had a strong game up until that point but was replaced by Tessem, who joined Beattie in attack in a 4-4-2 with Svensson moving into Delap's central midfield role.

It worked much better and Sunderland were reduced to a fruitless long ball game.

Captain Michael Gray admitted: "The manager told us if we didn't keep the ball on the ground he was going to take us off - but he couldn't take all 11 of us off."

But for all Sunderland's shortcomings Saints did well.

It wasn't the prettiest of their wins, but they showed plenty of spirit and resolve to scrap for the result and in the end their extra quality and confidence clinched it.