MATT OAKLEY admitted it was particularly painful to suffer a rare home defeat on Saturday.

Saturday's 1-0 loss to Middlesbrough was the first time Saints had been beaten at St Mary's since the 2-0 defeat to Manchester United back in February.

Since then, Saints had gone 11 unbeaten at home.

Throughout the whole of last season, Saints lost only twice at home as they picked up 35 of their final tally of 52 points at fortress St Mary's, with Liverpool the only other team to gain an away win on the south coast.

In all, Saints had only lost three of their previous 36 at St Mary's with Everton the other winners, 1-0 in April 2002.

"Our team has come on in leaps and bounds during the past year," said Oakley. "We have only got beat twice at home last season and we are very disappointed and the fans will be disappointed, but we will just have to move on."

Oakley, who has not yet missed a minute for Saints this season, suffered an injury scare late on in Saturday's game.

"I went down and felt a pop in my knee," he said. "But after a few minutes of treatment the pain went away, although I was quite worried about it at the time."

Oakley felt Saints lacked a clinical touch against Boro and admitted that conceding a goal after just 13 minutes was the worst possible start for the team.

He said: "We didn't create enough clear-cut chances. We put in the most crosses, but the final ball wasn't quite good enough.

"We thought it might be a 1-0 and they probably scored at the wrong time for us. We had plenty of possession but the final ball just wasn't quite there. We knew it was going to be a tough game, we just needed to be a bit stronger in the first 20 minutes."

He added: "We worked very hard, but the final ball to Kevin (Phillips) and James (Beattie) just wasn't there. In the last three or four games they have been getting five or six chances a game but they didn't get that and that is why we didn't score.

"We were putting everything into the game, it was just that our final ball into Kevin and James was wrong and at times we played into Middlesbrough's hands.

"They defended very deep and we kept putting in the balls and they just kept heading it away.

"But that has given us something to motivate ourselves with for next week. Now we have to make sure we get back to winning ways."