Graham Potter felt his side did everything right apart from find the back of the net against Fulham.
After a cagey first half, Adam Lallana had a goal ruled out by the VAR for a handball by Danny Welbeck in the build-up before Adam Webster crashed a header against the underside of the bar.
Potter said, “You'd expect a tough game between two sides that are fighting and you saw that. We hit the bar, we had a goal disallowed – I thought the second half performance in particular was really strong.
“The spirit of the players was fantastic, I can't complain about that in any way. There was personality out there, they worked for each other, they had everything but the goal.
Asked about the disallowed goal, Potter reflected: “Sometimes decisions go for you, sometimes they don't. I haven’t seen the VAR call back. It’s a good job there wasn't a crowd in here otherwise they would have been going spare! That's the new reality with VAR.
“The overall quality of the performance was there and if we maintain that then I am pretty sure we will score goals. We’ve scored goals over the past few weeks and it will come.”
Rob Sanchez kept his first Premier League clean sheet in an impressive performance.
“Rob was in on merit, he has been training really well, you can see his qualities,” said Potter. “Our job is to help him fulfil his potential.”