Fulham head coach Rene Meulensteen admits keeping the club in the Barclays Premier League will be his biggest ever challenge in football.

Southampton were the latest side to take all three points from Craven Cottage as their trio of England World Cup hopefuls put Fulham to the sword in the second half, with England manager Roy Hodgson in attendance.

Adam Lallana, once again the best player on the pitch, opened the scoring with a great finish before Rickie Lambert and Jay Rodriguez got in on the act.

The defeat leaves Fulham bottom of the table and, despite a busy transfer deadline day, which included the club-record signing of Greek striker Konstantinos Mitroglou, Meulensteen, pictured above, feels keeping the team in the top flight would be his greatest achievement to date.

“It is the biggest challenge I have ever faced in regards to being in football,” he said.

“I think it is the biggest challenge Fulham Football Club has faced for many, many years. We cannot afford to lay down and feel sorry for ourselves and beat ourselves up about it.”

The heavy defeat was made worse for Fulham with fellow strugglers West Ham, Cardiff and Sunderland all picking up victories, but Meulensteen was keen to remain focused solely on his own side’s fortunes.

“It is very hard, but we can’t rely on other teams,” he added.

“It is all about yourself – you can’t look at others you have to look at yourselves and see what we can address.”