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Watford vs Southampton. Sky Bet Championship.

Vicarage Road StadiumAttendance16,066.

Last-gasp Saeijs saves Saints

Image: Saeijs celebrates his first goal

Jan Paul Saeijs's last-gasp goal earned crisis club Southampton a 2-2 draw with Watford at Vicarage Road.

Saints pick up priceless point

Jan Paul Saeijs's last-gasp goal earned crisis club Southampton a 2-2 draw with Watford at Vicarage Road. Watford looked to be heading for all three points after goals from Aleksandrs Cauna and Tamas Priskin cancelled out Saeijs' early opener, but the Dutchman popped up with his second goal of the contest in the final minute with a superb free-kick to grab Southampton a priceless point. The draw ended a difficult day for the troubled Saints after the Football League called for an independent inquiry to determine whether they will be deducted ten points after their parent company went into administration last week. The draw leaves Southampton two points adrift of safety, but is a welcome boost after a turbulent week for the club. The visitors' need of points was apparent in their bold 4-2-4 formation and they had the first sniff of goal in a sterile opening when Chris Perry's flick from a corner was well cleared away from the lurking Jason Euell. That scare was not observed by the Hornets and Mark Wotte's side took the lead in the 13th minute. Ryan Smith swung over the corner from the right and Saeijs was left all alone to head down and into the net from six yards. Watford had not got going but rallied after the goal and equalised in the 21st minute through Cauna. The Latvian had barely touched the ball on his full debut but after Lloyd Doyley's quick throw was controlled by Priskin he received the ball on the left of the area and arrowed a powerful strike through Kelvin Davis.

Mistake

The goalkeeper saved a penalty in the 3-2 defeat to Charlton on Saturday but should have done much better at his near post. Wotte turned to Polish substitute Marek Saganowski on the hour in a bid to fashion a winner and with his first touch he sent Euell clear of the defence but the striker produced a horrible shot which hardly reached Scott Loach in the Watford net. It was an awful effort and within 60 seconds Priskin had the hosts ahead. Jobi McAnuff delivered a corner to the near post for Jack Cork to head on and Priskin rose to thunder a header past Davis from eight yards for his 13th goal of the season.
Equaliser
There were 24 minutes remaining for Wotte's men to salvage a point and with the seconds ticking down the hulking figure of Saeijs lined up a free-kick at least 25 yards from goal. Andrew Surman appeared the more probable candidate but Saeijs calmly strode forward and smacked a thunderous shot past Loach and into the corner for his second of the night.

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