Russell Martin hailed his “relentless” Southampton side for finally blowing apart a Championship rival after thrashing 10-man Blackburn 4-0.
Samuel Edozie, Stuart Armstrong, Sekou Mara and Carlos Alcaraz all netted as Saints continued their best unbeaten run for 39 years and made it five home victories in a row.
Southampton’s single-digit goal difference and early-season slump had seen them fall behind pace-setters Leicester and Ipswich, but after 14 matches without defeat, they are starting to put pressure on the top two.
Martin said: “We’re not even halfway through the season and there is so much more room to grow.
“Hopefully we can have more days like today but even when we have only been winning by one goal in our eyes it has been convincing.
“You can’t always win convincingly, not even the teams at the top are leaving teams in their wake.
“I felt like we needed the second goal in the second half and always looked likely to get it even before the sending-off.
“I don’t know how you define a convincing win but we have got the goals we felt have been coming.
“We have been punished a couple of times for not scoring the goals but today we were relentless. The league is so tight and the goals might be really important at the end of the season.
“I’m really pleased we got the third and fourth goals as it is a fair reflection of the players’ mentality and creation. I enjoyed watching the team.
“That is five wins at home in a row and that is really amazing for the players. If we keep putting in performances like that we’ll see where it takes us.”
After dominating the first half, Saints finally led in the 44th minute when Edozie – on his first start for two months – diverted James Bree’s corner home.
Rovers defender Callum Brittain was shown a second yellow card for kicking the ball away in the 55th minute, having already been booked for pulling Kyle Walker-Peters’ shirt.
And from then on Saints turned on the style.
Stuart Armstrong stroked in after following in on Flynn Downes getting chopped down to make it 2-0 in the 64th minute.
Mara won a penalty, only for Alcaraz to chip over, but the Frenchman tapped in Ryan Fraser’s cross before Alcaraz thumped in a fourth deep into stoppage time.
Rovers boss Jon Dahl Tomasson revealed Brittain apologised in the dressing room after the match, but pinpointed his lack of discipline as the turning point at St Mary’s.
“It is a disappointing day. It is always going to be a difficult game against a team that is a Premier League squad,” he said.
“We knew that but we came with the intention of winning the game. In the first half we were quite solid and gave one chance away but we weren’t quite good enough on the ball today and the first goal’s timing hurts our game.
“The game totally changed after the red card and being a player behind against a Premier League side is difficult. We were still in the game after the first goal but after the second booking the game is over.
“Callum apologised to his team-mates in the dressing room immediately. A game where we could have got something out of it at 1-0, then suddenly the game is over.”
Bristol City Women 0-4 Man City Women: Hosts relegated as Fowler double inspires WSL leaders
Mary Fowler scored twice to set WSL leaders Manchester City on their way to a 4-0 rout of Bristol City, who suffered relegation as a result, on Sunday.
With Arsenal having drawn with Everton earlier in the day, Man City knew a victory would be enough to take the title race down to two teams.
That victory duly arrived in emphatic fashion, with all four of Man City's goals arriving in the second half.
Fowler's fantastic strike opened the scoring in the 62nd minute, with the Australia international doubling her tally soon after, paving the way for an Amy Rodgers own goal and Alex Greenwood's late header to seal a huge victory.
Arsenal are now out of the title race, with Chelsea - who have two games in hand on Gareth Taylor's team - the only side capable of catching Man City.
The Robins, meanwhile, will be playing in the second tier again next term.
Data Debrief: Bristol heading down with a whimper
Bristol City have failed to score in their last five games in the WSL, a run of 544 minutes without a goal.
They mustered just 0.09 expected goals (xG) to Man City's 3.4, with the visitors having now kept a clean sheet in nine of their 20 league games this season.
De Rossi demands more from 'tired' Roma ahead of crunch run
Daniele De Rossi acknowledged his Roma team may be tired, but he insisted they must not allow themselves to be embarrassed.
Roma fought back to draw 2-2 with last season's Serie A champions Napoli in a pulsating fixture on Sunday.
Tammy Abraham's late header secured a point for De Rossi's team, who took the lead through Paulo Dybala's penalty before going behind to goals from Matias Olivera and Victor Osimhen.
With Serie A set to have five teams in the Champions League next season, Roma occupy fifth spot with four matches remaining, but sixth-placed Atalanta are just two points behind with a game in hand.
There is also the small matter of a Europa League semi-final against Bundesliga champions Bayer Leverkusen on the cards over the coming weeks, and De Rossi set the stall out.
"We drew, it is not a result to throw away, but it is not the result or the performance that we wanted," Roma coach Daniele De Rossi told Sky Sports Italia.
"At times you can steal the ball off Napoli, but we then gave it back again too many times. Napoli had a lot of chances in the first half, we did better in the second, but we have to do better.
"Look, we are tired, but we cannot start thinking that we’re tired and that means we can be embarrassed in the final few weeks of the season."
Roma host Leverkusen on Thursday before taking on Juventus on May 5, with a crunch clash against Atalanta – who are also into the Europa League semi-finals – set to follow after the away leg against Xabi Alonso's team.
Key to a successful end to the campaign for Roma will be keeping Dybala fit. The Argentine has been involved in the joint-most goals (12) in Serie A since the turn of the year, scoring nine and setting up three, level with Juve's Dusan Vlahovic.
PSG's latest Ligue 1 title arrives as Monaco lose to Lyon
Paris Saint-Germain have been crowned as Ligue 1 champions after Lyon overcame Monaco 3-2 on Sunday.
A 4-1 midweek win over Lorient ensured that one more victory would be enough for Luis Enrique's team to get over the line, but PSG failed to get the job done themselves when they faced relegation-threatened Le Havre on Saturday.
That game was the 700th match of the QSI era at PSG, and the club's 1,900th in France's top flight.
However, PSG's wait to win their third straight title did not last long, as less than 24 hours later, Lyon – who will face the Parisians in the final of the Coupe de France at the end of May – came out on top in a topsy turvy encounter with second-placed Monaco.
Substitute Malick Fofana was the matchwinner for Lyon, and ultimately the player who handed the title to PSG.
Wissam Ben Yedder had put Monaco ahead in the opening minute, but quickfire goals from Alexandre Lacazette and Said Benrahma turned the match on its head before half-time.
Ben Yedder netted his second to restore parity on the hour mark, and thought he had sealed his hat-trick when he volleyed in from a free-kick, only to have strayed offside.
With only a win good enough for Monaco to stay in the fight, the visitors were then caught out in the 84th minute, with Fofana racing onto Lacazette's throughball and finishing calmly.
After a dismal start to the season, relegation looked a real possibility for Lyon, but they are now, with three games remaining, still in with a shout of qualifying for Europe.
PSG on the other hand now have 12 Ligue 1 titles to their name, with 10 of those coming under QSI's ownership. Aside from the COVID-impacted 2019-20 season, five of their last six league titles have been secured before the start of May.
It also means Luis Enrique remains in the running for a treble in his first season at the club, with PSG taking on Borussia Dortmund in the Champions League semi-finals next week.
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