How much do you make your own luck, and how much of it is just fate?

In the context of football, the two surely go hand-in-hand.

Saints can quite rightly feel aggrieved and utterly gutted with the manner in which what would have been a vital away win at Watford turned into just a draw.

Abdoulaye Doucoure’s late equaliser at Vicarage Road was clearly handball. There can be no doubts or arguments about it.

Maybe the officials found it hard to spot, and that, in a sense, is fair enough, and the reason why the VAR system is being slowly, albeit belatedly, introduced into English football.

But that there was a goal, whether it should have stood or not, didn’t come as a total surprise given the context of the match, and Saints’ approach to it.

Having been so positive in the first half, looking almost a team reborn, they really did let it slip in the second period.

Again a decisive half time change from the opposing manager proved a game changer and the approach went from front foot pressing to back foot defending.

Once you retreat you surrender the momentum in the game, and you let the opposition believe they might get back into it, these sort of things are always a possibility.

And, given the run Saints are in at the moment, it becomes somehow much more likely that this sort of fate will befall you.

This would have been, should have been, such an important win.

Mauricio Pellegrino was so comparatively buoyant going into the match. He felt his team had fully committed to a battle, prepared themselves for a fight, and he knew if a comeback is to come, facing a deflated Watford side was the perfect time to start it.

Now they face having to try and take the positives out of the match and attempting to kickstart the fightback at home to a Tottenham team that hammered them just a few weeks ago.

It was just the first half Saints would have wanted.

Despite the theory that both teams would be low on confidence, it was Watford who looked overawed by the importance of the game and Saints who seemed far freer in their play.

Their approach of defensive discipline, which started with pressing from the front, mixed with some incisive counter attacking was a successful one.

They were knocking on the door and eventually burst through it on 21 minutes.

Shane Long got to the right by-line and saw his cut back deflect to James Ward-Prowse. The midfielder took a couple of touches to get the ball out of his feet and buried it low into the bottom corner.

The same man was on target again a minute before half time.

Long produced a brilliant burst of pace down the left on the counter attack and squared to Tadic in the area.

He was calmness personified and laid it off one more to Ward-Prowse, who finished low and hard across Gomes into the opposite corner.

It could have been even more given Saints’ first half superiority.

Tadic’s high and hanging cross was met at the far post by a brilliant leap and looped header back across goal from Long but Heurelho Gomes dived to save.

The Watford stopper turned over a Wesley Hoedt effort from distance, while Long was denied by a superb sliding challenge from Marvin Zeegelaar.

Watford created a couple of openings, but were so low on self-belief they didn’t convince that they would take them, and duly didn’t.

Andre Gray’s awful attempted shot broke to Andre Carrillo but he drove it straight into Hoedt, Daryl Janmaat’s speculative effort was turned over by Alex McCarthy while Christian Kabasele put a free header from 12 yards out over the bar.

Marco Silva’s half time switch, putting the imposing figure of Troy Deeney on through the middle and dropping Gray deeper, going more direct, really did for Saints. Even more so once he threw on another physical striker in Stefano Okaka.

Saints tried to shield the back four from aerial bombardment, but ended up too deep, and unable to keep possession, meaning the ball was continually just being shelled back.

Richarlison messed up a header thanks to pressure from his own player Gray and Roberto Pereyra curled a shot wide as the momentum shifted.

The Watford crowd sensed it and got right behind their side, who knew they were in with a sniff.

That feeling only grew stronger as they pulled a goal back on 58 minutes.

Janmaat’s shot was well saved by McCarthy, but the ball hit the bar and Gray reacted first and headed home from close range.

For all their pressure, Watford struggled to create clear chances against Saints, but there were plenty of scrambles.

Eventually the equaliser came late in the game.

Deeney had space to head back across goal after Jack Stephens had slipped, Doucoure got in just ahead of McCarthy, failed to connect with a header but clearly bundled it past the keeper with his arm, but the officials didn’t see it.

It was heartbreak for Saints, on so many levels.

When you are down, it’s amazing how often things like this happen.

But they have to be positive, and, vitally, try to stay positive, including during an entire match, and that goes from the manager to the players too. Only then might they take luck out of the equation altogether.