GORDON Strachan tackled his striker crisis head on by selecting all the attack-minded players he could muster.

But in the end the Southampton boss had to accept that his best efforts had counted for nothing and the new St Mary's Stadium had staged its first scoreless draw.

"I tried," he insisted. "I wanted to win the game and my team was set up to try and get as many people in the team who could score goals.

"That was why we had Fabrice (Fernandes) in there. I tried to get as attacking a side as I could on the pitch. If you've not got your top strikers, you try and fill up elsewhere with goalscorers and that was why Telfer and Oakley were a bit unlucky to be left out because they've both been doing well recently but I had to get players out there who could score."

Saints - already without the suspended Kevin Davies and the injured trio of James Beattie, Matt Le Tissier and Agustin Delgado - were forced to employ midfielder Jo Tessem in attack alongside Marian Pahars. But their problems mounted when Pahars limped off with a groin injury after 22 minutes, forcing Strachan to send on substitute Brett Ormerod, who had been sidelined for five weeks with a knee injury and needed injections before being passed fit.

The former Blackpool striker was hailed a hero by his manager.

"I know my back four played well and Rory Delap played well and Jo played well considering he's not a striker. But he (Ormerod) had one training session on Thursday and that was the lot!

"He had a jag (injection) in his knee on Monday ... so he's my man of the match, whatever anyone else thinks. He's getting 10 out of 10 for guts.

"To run about like that and get chances and go back again ... because you actually get no sympathy whatsoever as a football player once you cross that white line. No fan gives you any sympathy or takes into consideration you've been out for five and a half weeks or you've had two injections in the last week and just one training session.

"But he's actually helped us out of a hole. If he hadn't said to me on Thursday 'Gaffer I'll give it a bash!' we could have been in a right mess."

Strachan praised his players for "playing with guts" although he admitted "I thought it was a fair result. The conditions were not conducive to great football".

But, like the fans he spoke of in his tribute to Ormerod, he showed no sympathy for Delap, who was sent off two minutes from time after kicking out at Stig Tofting as the Dane was on the ground - his second bookable offence.

"They tell me he's flicked out or kicked out and you can't defend that, can you?" he responded. "If that's what he's done and put himself in the position where he gets sent off, there's nothing we can do about it.

"I'm not happy with that but I'm happy with his performance because he was excellent considering he's been out for a long time."