CLAUDE Puel insists his one season at Saints helped him become a better manager at Leicester City.

The Frenchman was sacked after his only campaign at St Mary’s in June because reservations over his management of the team and style of play.

The 56-year-old returned to St Mary's with the Foxes last night and exacted revenge by inflicting an embarrassing 4-1 defeat on Saints.

Puel led Saints to eighth place in the Premier League and the League Cup final in his only campaign, and admits his St Mary’s experiences have helped him after replacing Craig Shakespeare at the King Power Stadium in October.

He said: “I said before the game my feeling was always to keep the positive with Southampton.

“I tried to give my best here and I think we have had some fantastic games and journey for the club, like against Inter Milan, to develop a lot of players also.

“This is a good feeling and the positive feeling and it was great introduction also in the Premier League for me.

“All this work allows perhaps better management today with my players.”

Puel has led the Foxes to four straight victories in the Premier League and they now sit in eighth place, eight points ahead of 11th-placed Saints.

“Of course it is a good thing to win away and with the quality of the game against a good team,” Puel said about his team’s performance.

“It was important to start this game with intensity, with good reason on the play.

“The first half I thought we were fantastic play, fantastic goals and proved that we can play this first half.

“It was important second half to keep this level and to prevent the opponent to come back on the goal.

“Perhaps the beginning of the second half we tried to manage the game, keeping the ball in our pitch and it was important to play on the opponent’s pitch to try to score another goal.

“It was dangerous that they can come back in the game. They score a goal and it was important to play forward to score another goal, which was fantastic from Shinji Okazaki.

"It is a good game now and we want to try to continue this work.”

He added: "Of course it was a strange feeling to come back and it was nice to familiar faces and I think I kept a good understanding and good relationship with a lot of people here, with players and it was important to come back and to try to keep my concentration."