Nigel Adkins hailed a terrific weekend for Rickie Lambert as the striker celebrated the birth of his son with his 50th Saints goal.

Lambert scored the only goal of the game as Saints defeated Carlisle 1-0 at St Mary’s some 24 hours after celebrating a new arrival to his family.

The goal, his fifth in three games, marked a brilliant half century for Lambert at Saints and he became the fifth quickest man to reach that milestone for the club in the post-war era.

Adkins said: “He had a superb season last year and on the back of that he had to try and get his body right this season.

“He’s that focal target man and he does put his body through a lot and we’ve taken a long period of time to get his body in a good position now and he’s been scoring goals regularly.

“Congratulations to him and his wife because they had a baby boy on Friday and great credit to him for going out and scoring a great goal for us.”

Adkins was not happy with the overall performance from his team even though they bagged the three points.

“We have set standards at this football club and the players were made well aware of that at half time and full time,” he said.

“Our principles are to get the ball and pass it quickly and we’ve not done that.”