Wearside wears a smile these days as if it is always Christmas. A third successive win takes Sunderland to third place, less significant to Peter Reid than the 37 points he reckons may guarantee their Premiership safety - and it is not even halfway through the season yet. If the manager cannot bring himself to look cheerful, the fans swing between joy and ecstasy.

Bring on the giants, they seem to say. Manchester United are the next visitors, tomorrow week. Chelsea were the last, routed 4-1 by a five-star performance - what the review pages define, maddeningly of one-off classical concerts, as unmissable. Saturday's was two-star, mediocre, back to merely the joy of the result.

Southampton have lately tightened defence at the expense of attack; they are goalless for four games now and have won only once in three months. They came first to frustrate, with five across the middle, until they "pushed Soltvedt forward after 10 minutes to match their 4-4-2" as if Dave Jones had not noticed what Niall Quinn and Kevin Phillips have been up to.

He noticed well enough after half an hour. "It's normally a good sign to see Reidy on the touchline," he said. Then Quinn nodded through a free-kick, Phillips pounced and Reidy sat down. As the snow drifted into the great bowl and Southampton halted home attacks only to give the ball back, the game cried out for an artist, a Lowry or Le Tissier, to freeze the action. The shambling Saint was given the last quarter and set up four chances. In injury-time, after Phillips had won and wasted his second penalty running, James Beattie was inches from Marian Pahars' cross. In the next minute new signing Kevin Kilbane, showing what Reid called "a great left foot plus the pace to gain half a yard", crossed the first possession of his Sunderland life to the far post where Quinn returned across the goalface. For Phillips, a Southampton reject, it was unmissable.

SUNDERLAND: Sorensen, Makin, Butler, Bould, Gray, Summerbee, Roy (Williams 65), McCann, Schwarz (Kilbane 87), Quinn, Phillips. Subs Not Used: Marriott, Reddy, Rae. Booked: Makin, Phillips. Goals: Phillips 30, 90.

SOUTHAMPTON: Jones (Moss 33), Tessem (Beattie 49), Lundekvam, Richards, Benali, Ripley (Le Tissier 66), Soltvedt, Oakley, Dodd, Kachloul, Pahars. Subs Not Used: Davies, Boa Morte. Booked: Kachloul, Benali, Beattie, Le Tissier, Lundekvam.

Referee: M Reid (Birmingham).