Peter Crouch believes that Southampton's approach against Manchester City is "needed" if you want to take points off the league leaders.
Armando Broja didn't find the back of the net on Saturday but proved a handful for the Blues defence as they ended City's 12-match winning run.
Kyle Walker-Peters' goal was cancelled out by Aymeric Laporte to deny the Saints a victory but Liverpool's win narrowed the gap at the top to nine points.
With teams around the Premier League succumbing to City's quality, the former striker says that "brutish" forwards are the sort of players needed to take points off Pep Guardiola's side.
"With City, you are lucky if you are allowed the ball for any period of time. Liverpool are so explosive in the way they cut through with pace and power," he wrote in his Daily Mail column.
"By contrast with City, it is wave after wave of keep-ball. Squeezing the life out of teams. Making them suffer with their manipulation of a football.
"Hasenhuttl said before the weekend draw that he was hoping for 35 per cent possession and that speaks volumes for how the rest of the division have struggled to contend with Guardiola.
"Southampton played really well. They always carried that threat going forward and made sure they were affecting the game as high up the pitch as possible. Armando Broja, on loan from Chelsea, is obviously a handful, a brutish striker who can make defenders think.
"These are the sort of guys needed if you are taking anything off City. And Southampton under Hasenhuttl are more adept than most."
Sign up to our City newsletter so you never miss an update from the Etihad Stadium this season.
