Lallana wants to get even (From Daily Echo)

Lallana wants to get even

7:30am Tuesday 26th August 2008 in

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ADAM LALLANA says Saints will be looking for a bit of revenge when they take on Birmingham in the Carling Cup tonight.

Saints put in a good performance ten days ago when they faced the Blues in the Championship, also at St Mary's, but came away from the game on the wrong end of a 2-1 scoreline.

On that occasion Saints took a deserved lead just before half time but Birmingham's strength in depth told in the second half with former Saints striker Kevin Phillips coming off the bench to score what proved to be the winner.

Jan Poortvliet's young squad have faced a steep learning curve so far this season but go into this second round clash at St Mary's on the back of their first league win of the season, an excellent 1-0 victory at Derby.

Lallana, who scored the goal to give Saints their first three points of the season (although the Press Association awarded it to teammate David McGoldrick), views the Blues and the Rams in a similar way and is hoping his side can make it two wins on the bounce in all competitions tonight.

He said: "Because we did so well against them in the first game we just want to get a bit of revenge against them now and get through to the next round where we might draw a Premiership team.

"Derby are similar in the fact that they've just come down so I don't think we're afraid of anyone."

Lallana believes Saints have learnt a host of valuable lessons in their opening three league games this season.

Some of those lessons, such as the one against Birmingham, have at times felt hard to take, but the attacking midfielder reckons it will stand his team in good stead this time out.

"We just want to play our own game and we think we can win every game," said Lallana, whose side also had to stomach conceding a late goal at Cardiff to rob them of a point on the opening day of the Championship season.

"We didn't see the first Birmingham game out in the second half, but we did do on Saturday so it shows that we're learning, as a team and individually."

For full story and more Saints news don't miss today's Daily Echo.