Errors proved costly, says Monk

Garry Monk felt his side were punished for costly mistakes after the Swans suffered a 3-1 defeat at Southampton.

Despite a late goal from the penalty spot by Gylfi Sigurdsson, Monk's side were subjected to their second loss of the Barclays Premier League campaign, courtesy of goals from Virgil Van Dijk, Sadio Mane and Dusan Tadic.

Van Dijk opened the scoring in the tenth minute with a crashing header at the near post, before Mane and Tadic extended the home side's advantage in the second half.

After Neil Taylor was fouled by Jose Fonte in the 18-yard box in the 83rd minute, Sigurdsson held his nerve to convert from the spot, which triggered a late rally from the Swans.

But it proved too little too late for Monk's side, and the Swans boss insisted that his side must cut out the individual mistakes in order to improve their results away from home.

"It's very disappointing," said Monk. "That's two away games now where we've been well below our usual standards. 

"It's not good enough for us, and we have to put that right.

"The goals came from individual errors and poor decision making, which we were punished for.

"We knew that we had to perform at the standards that we set to make a game of it, but we made too many errors, which is uncharacteristic for us.

"We got back into the game with 20 minutes to go, but by then it was too late - we had already conceded three goals."

But Monk backed his side to improve on their recent away performances with hard work on the training pitch.

"The players have a great work ethic and show a great attitude," he added. "But we've been making poor decisions in the last two away games, which we will need to assess and improve on.

"We have to make sure we are stronger and sharper, and it's my job to make sure we do that.

"We will work hard this week to put these wrongs right, and we'll move forward from here."

Meanwhile, Southampton boss Ronald Koeman was pleased that his side were able to secure maximum points at St. Mary's but was less than satisfied with their overall performance.

"I am satisfied with the result, but we didn't create a lot of chances," insisted Koeman.

"The performance was not very good - we made a lot of mistakes when in possession of the ball - but we were very clinical.

"It's not easy to win against Swansea, but we have to control the game much better than we did. We must improve."