The unbeaten start for Tom Cleverley ended on Saturday and, instead, he’s now looking at a run of five games without a win.

Watford made an awful opening to the match at Southampton amid some dreadful defending, and could easily have been out of the contest before it had barely started.

The interim head coach admitted all of that, but said he still came away with positives particularly in terms of the character of the players.

“I won’t give the players any excuses for that start, Southampton were out of the blocks quicker than us,” he conceded.

“We changed the system and I was worried straight away after the first goal went in, and it took us a bit of time to put pressure on them with the high press.

“When we got a couple of successful ones they started to become nervous, and then we went 2-0 down but we really got to grips with the game after that and started creating chances.

“We showed good belief in the second half, and played some good stuff in patches but I need to see more consistency and desire to control the possession of the ball.

“However, I admit that’s not easy to do against the best possession team in the league.”

With a 2-1 lead and at home in front of their home fans, Southampton appeared to be happy to defend what they had after half-time and were surprisingly cautious.

“It’s a nervy position they’re in. It’s still in their hands to get promoted,” Cleverley pointed out.

“The weather, their midweek game, you’ll never know why they were flat in the second half.

“Credit to us as well, we really drove forward.

“It becomes hard for a coach when you can still take so many positives out of the game but we’re not winning so I need to keep instilling that belief and sooner or later this run of results will come to an end, and hopefully with a home win.”

The interim head coach used his bench to make his team more attack-minded after the restart.

“I’d been worried about Tom Dele-Bashiru having burn-out because since I’ve been in charge he’s played every minute of every game,” he said.

“That’s five games in 16 days and unfortunately he got a little Achilles flare-up and he just burnt out a bit today, so that one was forced at half-time.

“And then the three young lads came on to really give us energy, because that was what I wanted and felt we needed.

“We were getting in good crossing positions without finding that killer ball and I thought James Morris’ quality in the final third was brilliant when he came on.

“Matheus Martins gave us good impetus and then Ismael Kone popped up with the goal.

“I was really pleased with how the substitutes made a positive difference for us today.”

Could Watford have handled the closing stages, after they made it 2-2, differently and managed the game better?

“I don’t deal in draws I want to win games, and maybe we were a little too eager to try and score a winner when we got it back to 2-2,” Cleverley reflected.

“But the main objectives we’ve had since I came in were to win the next game and try to create a real belief we could have a promotion push next season.

“We’ve failed on the first part on five out of six occasions, but we’ve definitely achieved the second bit.

“I cannot question the character of the players at all. Nobody can in the six games I’ve had.

“It would be easy for people from the outside looking in to say Watford have got nothing to play for, and Southampton, Ipswich, Leeds and West Brom have all got massive things to play for.

“But today we looked like the team desperate to win in the second half. We looked like the team pushing for promotion.

“That is a big, big character tick.”