Ronald Koeman says Southampton not dealing properly with mistakes

Saints defender Jose Fonte gifted United their first goal when his backpass to goalkeeper Fraser Forster was under hit and easily picked up by Robin van Persie, who scored 12 minutes into the match.

The hosts struck back and levelled before halftime, but a second Van Persie goal -- this time from a set piece -- left Koeman feeling his side were hard done by.

"I think we deserved more," Koeman said. "We played our style. We don't like to play long ball. We had good ball possession. We like to press our opponent very early.

"We did everything to create chances, but we also did mistakes. Maybe they did more mistakes than we did, but they have players who handle those kind of mistakes. And that was the difference."

The loss was Southampton's third in a row against elite teams, coming off defeats to Manchester City and Arsenal. The stretch has seen them tumble from second place to fifth.

Koeman said the Saints' struggles are an example of what happens when a team makes mistakes against the best players in the league.

"If you give players like Van Persie those kind of mistakes, he will punish you," Koeman said. "There was [Man City's Sergio] Aguero, now Van Persie, and we didn't punish them those kind of mistakes."

Prior to the match most of the column inches were devoted to Manchester United boss Louis Van Gaal facing off against his former protege Koeman.

Van Gaal gave Koeman his first coaching role when he was at Barcelona, but relations soured when Koeman was in charge at Ajax and Van Gaal became the club's technical director.

The Man United manager was in agreement with Koeman that his side were fortunate to win, calling the Red Devils "lucky."

And Koeman added: "At this level the difference is detail in the game and to handle when opponents make mistakes but we had more chances in the game, we played better. We had more possession, but the result is 2-1 and I said to the lads we didn't lose to United, we lost to ourselves."