ALAN Pardew felt Saints were halfway towards what he wanted after their 1-1 draw with Brentford.
Though the result was not the first league win of the season he had been hoping for, Pardew was satisfied that at least his side had righted some of their glaring wrongs.
The additions of Neal Trotman and Dean Hammond gave the side a more steely edge and helped them defend the setpieces which have been their downfall.
Saints have only managed to creep to minus eight points after four games but Pardew, main picture, is content because he can see progress being made.
He said: "We got one box ticked and now we need to improve upon our imagination and our quality from wide areas because I thought we were poor from wide areas.
“Ultimately you’re not going to get the delivery that Lambert wants. He had three or four deliveries and showed how good he is if the delivery is right.
“I felt sorry for Paterson because I thought that miss in the first minute affected him.
“To be fair to Saganowski when he came on he helped us.
“I thought it’s a fairly new team but when they had the ball we were a lot better – from set-plays we were stronger and the disciplines we have started to install have started to bear fruit.
“I had it at West Ham that when you’re asking some players to work harder defensively it takes a little bit away from us with the ball and I thought it was disappointing when we had the ball and the energy levels we had because it’s a new work ethic.
“Having said that we competed well with a good team, got the lead and we could have controlled the ball at that point.
“We need to learn those skills.”
Pardew opted to pair Trotman with Chris Perry at the back and the combination worked.
“It’s more natural,” said Pardew.
“I said to Chris that I thought he needed to up his game and I thought he did. I thought he was good.
“Alongside a young boy like that I thought his voice and organisation would work well and those two did well.
“Carl Cort is a handful – he doesn’t train much but he’s a very good player.”
After taking the lead through Dan Harding on 73 minutes Pardew was naturally disappointed that Saints conceded an equaliser ten minutes later.
“I thought the back post was an area that was disappointing for us,” he said.
“I thought we had players to protect the line.
“The run was fortuitous I thought, it bobbled for him and his momentum took him through it.
“What bothered me was our control of the ball at times.
“We can’t play Brentford’s game – it’s not what I want to do and what we’re about.
“We dealt with them but didn’t play our game enough.”
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