Internationals took their toll on Southampton, says Jose Fonte

Jose Fonte believes Southampton paid the price for having so many players away on international duty as they sacrificed a two-goal lead against Leicester on Saturday.

Club captain Fonte scored the opening goal and Virgil van Dijk added a second to put Ronald Koeman's men in control at the break.

They faded after the restart, however, and were pegged back when in-form Jamie Vardy's double drew the sides level again.

Southampton receded after Vardy's first goal and found themselves under pressure because of the deep position they occupied after previously being in little danger.

Fonte is convinced having so many people away representing their countries during the recent international break took its toll on the hosts at St Mary's.

He said: "We controlled the game in the first half but we were against a team that never gives up. We knew about that, before the game we were talking about it.

"In the second half, we weren't fresh. We dropped our intensity. We stopped pressing them. We allowed them to have the ball too much. We didn't hold the ball up front.

"That invites pressure. It looked like a question of time when they were going to score, because it was ball after ball after ball, too much defending.

"When that happens, you run the risk of conceding goals and that is what happened.

"We had a lot of people away on international duty. They came back tired. You could see we were tired. Leicester don't have as many players [as us] in the national teams and it showed.

"We weren't fresh enough after 55 minutes. It's hard when you go away [on international duty] but we will talk about what we can do."