RORY DELAP described the first-half display last night as "not good enough" - admitting Saints find themselves in a critical league position.

The Irish midfielder was desperately disappointed by the 2-1 defeat at Birmingham which leaves Saints some points adrift of Crystal Palace and safety in the Premiership table.

He said: "We have got to do better. In the second-half we did enough to get back in the game, but it is the same as the Newcastle game.

"We can't go like we did in the first-half and expect to come back from two goals down.

"There are not many teams that can do that and we have got to stop giving goals away and take the games from the start when we are away.

"It's particularly disappointing after the last two performances. We have got to do better from the start of the game.

"The situation has been critical for a while. It's not good enough. There is pressure on, but if we can't take it we shouldn't be here."

The damage was done last night during the first-half when Saints fell 2-0 behind to goals from Walter Pandiani and Robbie Blake.

"It was horrible to play in the first-half," said Delap.

"We just seemed to run around and couldn't get a touch of the ball. They were coming at us from all over. We couldn't get out and the balls up to Crouchie weren't good enough.

"We were too deep as a midfield to get up and support Crouchie.

"We were a bit better when we changed it to two up-front. But it doesn't matter what system we play, we have to do better than that.

"We didn't start the first five or ten minutes and then you can't get out.

"We were caught out playing little balls and maybe we should have hit them longer in the first five or ten minutes to get the tempo of the game, get in behind them and put them on the back foot, but we didn't do that."

Delap admitted there were some harsh words exchanged at half-time with Saints looking a different team and clawing a goal back after the interval thanks to a superb Henri Camara strike.

He added: "There were a few words said and we came out a lot better. What was said was valuable and we need that sometimes.

"It was a great goal, we know how fast he is and it was a great finish, hopefully there is more to come from him."