Sadio Mane spoke of his delight at ending Saints’ long goal drought – but insisted the result mattered far more than his own individual glory.

The forward broke the team’s run of nearly six hours without scoring when he coolly lofted the ball over Julian Speroni to give Ronald Koeman’s side a precious 1-0 win against Crystal Palace, at St Mary’s.

Mane, whose strike arrived in the 83rd minute after James Ward-Prowse’s shot had rebounded to him off the Palace keeper, was thrilled to have drawn a line under a frustrating few weeks for his club.

“I am happy, very happy, because we win three points and it was so important for us, and we get it, so we are very, very happy for that,” he said.

Mane, who has been putting significant time into learning English and is rapidly improving with the language, added: “I get the goal and it’s very important.

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“It’s good for every player to score, but the most important is the team and I score for the team.

“It’s good for the confidence now, also for the team and now we’ll keep going and work hard for the next game.”

Asked about his finish, the Senegal international smiled and said: “It was nice. I think every goal is nice.”

His teammate, Dusan Tadic, was also relieved that Saints had re-energised their Champions League hopes by ending a run of three games without a victory.

“It was an important win, important points,” he said.

“I think we were a little bit lucky also, because they had some chances.

“But, in the end, it was a good result for us.

“Every three points is important – it doesn’t matter against who.

“Especially now, as we didn’t take so many points last couple of games and now we finally get three points and this is really important for us.”

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Winger Eljero Elia explained how, despite being frustrated for much of the night, the team always had faith they would score.

“To win a game again also is important for the team – the confidence,” he said. “We know that we’re going to score. It was a little bit late, but we score and we are very happy to win the game.”