By the end, the scarves given out to Southampton supporters – presumably to placate for that record-breaking 9-0 shellacking here against Leicester a fortnight ago – were strewn across the pitch in anger. They should have doubled up as blindfolds, such was the spineless manner of a first-half performance that set the tone for a sixth defeat in seven Premier League matches. The dark clouds that loomed over the Everton manager, Marco Silva, may have subsided but the pressure has intensified on Ralph Hasenhüttl, whose side have the worst defensive record in the division. This was yet more anguish for disenchanted Southampton fans, who have not seen their team record victory on home soil since April. Hasenhüttl grimaced as Richarlison struck the winner and, up in the directors’ box, food for thought for Katharina Liebherr, the former majority shareholder.

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“When we defend like this, when we are exposed like this, it is simply not good enough for the Premier League,” Hasenhüttl said. “When I see our performance in the first half, normally you don’t get anything in football if you play like we played. It was a very, very early goal. First chance, first goal, like very often in our home games. After this goal you could feel the lack of self-confidence, nervousness. All that we prepared for this game was gone in that moment. Nobody wanted to have the ball anymore. The spaces we wanted to use, nobody saw them. Not brave enough and not good enough, simply.”

Asked if he feels he has the support of the club’s hierarchy, Hasenhüttl replied: “I don’t think about what I feel for this. In the moment I feel disappointed because we lost the game. Everything else is not interesting for me. I try to stay focussed to give my team answers for what happened in the moment.” As for questions over his own future, the Austrian said: “To be clear, I need all my energy to find answers for other questions – questions that are more focused on how we can play and what we can do better. This is all I do and therefore I’m here and therefore I try to be strong.”

This victory hoists Everton up into mid-table but Southampton remain in a precarious predicament, a point off the foot of the table with eight points from their opening 12 matches. For so long, Southampton’s turgid buildup play matched the terse atmosphere in the stands. They recovered from an abysmal first half when Danny Ings cancelled out Tom Davies’s opener, but Everton kept knocking in pursuit of a winner and found one when Richarlison volleyed in Djibril Sidibé’s cross.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Danny Ings (centre) scores to make it 1-1. Photograph: Matt Watson/Southampton FC via Getty Images

For Southampton, this must have felt as though they were returning to the scene of a heinous crime, two weeks on from the harrowing defeat against Leicester. Since then Hasenhüttl’s side have been clinging to the positives having twice avoided humiliation at Manchester City, but this was back to square one. Everton, too, have endured a rough ride of late but only one team appeared bereft of belief and cripplingly low on confidence. The other racked up 24 shots, though only two found the net.

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It took Everton just 240 seconds to breach a desperately frail defence. It was an alarmingly soft goal from a Southampton perspective, with Mason Holgate beating the tallest player on the field, 6ft 6in Jannik Vestergaard, to a header from Gylfi Sigurdsson’s corner. Holgate flicked on towards Davies, who nodded in unmarked. With four minutes played, one could forgive Saints supporters for fearing the worst given it took Leicester twice as long to open the scoring en route to that trouncing. As it happened, Southampton were fortunate to trail by a single goal at the interval.

The arrival of Sofiane Boufal helped Southampton weather the storm. The forward beat Morgan Schneiderlin, who was loth to foul the forward, to the byline before causing further panic. His low cross trickled off Yerry Mina and into the path of Ings, who lashed in his seventh goal of the season. But back came Everton, with Jan Bednarek gifting Sigurdsson a free hit, while Tosun also drove wide. At the other end, Jordan Pickford made a superb save to stop a James Ward-Prowse free-kick finding the top corner. In the end, though, Everton gleaned what they deserved with Richarlison striking the winner. “We should have killed the game in the first half because of all the chances we created but we showed strong character after the equaliser,” Silva said.