West Ham's impressive defensive record continued after they secured a point at St Mary's with a third clean sheet of the season.
Sam Allardyce's side, missing key players such as Joe Cole, Stewart Downing and Andy Carroll dug in to hold out for a second successive away point in a game that ebbed and flowed but also saw the best chances fall to the home side.Unfortunately for the Saints, they found Jussi Jaaskelainen - who made at least three first-class saves from Dani Osvaldo, Morgan Schneiderlin and Rickie Lambert - in imperious form. When Jaaskelainen couldn't intervene, the woodwork was on hand to assist; most notably when Lambert's 49th minute header beat the 'keeper but not his near post.
Conversely, West Ham's toothless attack - which managed just one shot on target in the entire game - meant the Hammers were never likely to steal all three points, even if James Collins should have stolen a win in the final minutes when presented with a golden opportunity that he blazed over the bar.
That chance aside, Sam Allarydyce's team barely threatened to make an impact in the final third of the field - as has been the case in the last three league games, during which United have managed to create just TWO shots on target in 270 minutes of football.
Even the inclusion of young midfielder Ravel Morrison failed to make much of a difference to West Ham's attacking threat. And whilst many pine for the return of Andy Carroll, the stark truth is that even he would have struggled today given the lack of service stand-in Modibo Maiga received.
Unfortunately West Ham's best chance of the game was to fall to centre-half Collins who, with the goal at his mercy, could only fire high into the stands with just three minutes of normal time remaining.
United's only other real sight of goal came when Matt Jarvis' shot on the half-hour mark was pushed away by 'keeper Boruc and returned into an empty net by Kevin Nolan, but the former was adjudged to be offside; TV replays showed he was in line and that the 'goal' should have stood.
Southampton, always the keener to get forward created more but will no doubt be hugely disappointed that their new, improved team (featuring £26million-worth of new signings in Osvaldo and Wanyama) could only fashion five efforts on target themselves.
In the end, one suspects that both teams - plus those poor unfortunates who paid to watch it - will be keen to forget this particular fixture and move on quickly. For West Ham, that comes at the Boleyn Ground this weekend when Everton visit east London.
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