RALPH Hasenhuttl admits managing Saints from home was a "horrible" experience.

The Saints boss is currently self-isolating after a member of his household tested positive for COVID-19.

The Austrian took charge of this evening's goalless draw with West Ham United from his flat, with assistant Richard Kitzbichler and the rest of the coaching team guiding the side from the dugout, with Hasenhuttl in constant communication.

Asked how tough it was to not be at St Mary's himself, Hasenhuttl said: "Horrible. It’s very difficult.

"Before the game it was good, I must say. We definitely found a good way of managing the players. I could do the meetings and I was also in the dressing room always speaking to them, explaining what we want to do, what we need to do and also at half-time I spoke to them.

"But the rest, my assistant coaches did a good job I think, both Flem (Craig Fleming) and Richard. But the difficulty was that I didn’t have the live picture and the live voice. So this is horrible because you hear the live voice but you don’t have the live picture and that makes it difficult to coach and concentrate on the game. But I’m happy that it worked quite well I think."

He added: "I must say congrats to my team. We set it up today in a fantastic way really I think. After speaking with the players yesterday, or with Prowsey (James Ward-Prowse) yesterday, we decided to let me do everything, the meeting, because it’s good for the players when you have the same speech, you have the same rhythm.

"The only thing was I wasn’t personally there, but there was a big screen, you could see me and in the modern world now with Zoom meetings and everything, you can definitely do a lot of things you couldn’t expect to do in the future.

"So it was definitely a good way of coaching them before the game. During the game it’s horrible – to not stand on the side and you want to shout and they don’t hear you, it’s tough. But it was overall I think a good performance from my whole team – the staff did a good job so far and hopefully I’ll be back very soon."

Asked if he refrained from getting animated in his flat watching the game or if there were any damages, Hasenhuttl said: "In the second half I felt my seat was not very healthy!

"I have pain everywhere because I was nearly in the television! Then I relaxed a little bit in the end, so it was okay."