NATHAN Jones admitted Southampton were “as good a side as we have seen at this level” after Saints scored five goals in a devastating first half at The Valley on Saturday.
Ryan Manning headed in the opener before Adam Armstrong, Caspar Jander and Finn Azaz made it 4-0 after 22 minutes.
Azaz then scored another in the 43rd minute, before Charlton pulled one back a minute into added-time as Lloyd Jones headed home from a corner.
the Addicks tightened up in the second half, though the damage was done as they were beaten for just the second time at home since August in the Championship.
Tonda Eckert has now won all three games in charge as interim boss.
“Give credit to them, for 20 minutes they were as good a side as we have seen at this level [but] could we have been a bit more aggressive? We did not do the things we normally do and that is basically what has cost us,” Jones said on BBC Radio London.
“We do not defend the box well enough for the first goal, we allow certain things to happen for the second which kind of kills it, and then they go up and level and make it three and four very quickly.
“We showed a lot of character in the second half, we tweaked it defensively – we were probably a little more reserved than we normally are. Credit to Southampton, they were much better than us but that is a learning curve for us.
“We are stretched. We have four fit defenders and one could not play today because it is against his club, wingers in wing-back positions, so it’s tough.
“We did not quite get things right, we gave them too much respect.
“We were deep and weren’t aggressive in winning that first ball that we normally do and then they had runners and quality and real technique to go and hurt us and we looked open, which is not something we normally do.”
Saints, who sacked Will Still after a poor start to the campaign, are sixteenth, two points off Charlton in thirteenth.
Eckert said: “We knew that they would be coming for us and that obviously gives you space further up the pitch and I think we used them quite well.
“We are very very happy to have Adam [Armstrong] as a character, as a player on the team – with the quality he brings, it’s very nice to have him up there and he recognises moments like nobody else.
“Those teams are tough to play against, when you know they are coming for you. You will have a little bit more space between the lines and if you get that one pass right, there is a whole pitch to open up.
“We worked on this [over] the last [few] days and it came off.
“After the break, you just have a couple more days to prepare and we did that well.”
Charlton have two of the Championship’s toughest current fixtures next. They travel to third-place Stoke City on Tuesday before a trip to Coventry City on Saturday.
