Television viewers south of the border called Monday night's debate for Alex Salmond, but found they were baffled by what Scottish independence might mean for them.

At the Finborough Arms, a Victorian pub in London's Earls Court, they have shown both referendum debates live and are also marking the independence referendum with a month of themed plays in their upstairs theatre.

Landlord Jeff Bell, originally from Newcastle but whose paternal grandmother is from Wick, is keenly aware of the scale of the choice involved in next month's vote.

"Never in my lifetime will we have more of a significant referendum in the UK," he said,

As well as England he predicted that the result would have "implications for other European nations such as Italy, Spain and France, where many of our customers are from."

He said he felt that the First Minister had had the better performance in the second debate and was withering about the leader of the No campaign.

"Personally I felt Alex Salmond made up a lot of lost ground from the first debate," he said, "and Alistair Darling looked wooden".

Others questioned what the outcome would mean for them.

Jim Green, 56, from Wolverhampton, said that he was interested in the debate but confused about what the repercussions would be for England, especially on issues like national debt and North Sea oil.

"(Independence) might be good for (the Scots)," he said "but what would it mean for us?

"I guess it is quite hard to work that out and because of that nobody is really talking that much about that angle of things.

"We might find out soon enough, I suppose," he added.

His wife Joan, 54, agreed. "The talk is about whether or not Scots will be better or worse off, not the effect on the rest of the UK."

Others were nonplussed by the entire debate.

Chris Price, 24, from Chiswick in West London, said that he had been out with friends on Monday evening, but would not have watched the Darling-Salmond showdown even if he had been home. "I'm not really that interested in politics to start with," he said, "but I also genuinely don't believe that Scottish independence would have any effect on me."

But there were some south of the border who were very sure of what Scottish independence would mean for England and the other remaining parts of the UK.

Robin Tilbrook, the chairman of the campaign group English Democrats, said: "Alex Salmond clearly won this debate for his vision of "Team Scotland".

But he also predicted that the effect on many English viewers would be to encourage them to protest at what he said was the "unfair" way that public spending was allocated to Scotland.

Eddie Bone, from the Campaign for an English Parliament, complained that English views had been ignored.

His organisation had asked to be in the audience and ask a question during the debate, a request denied by the BBC.

Mr Bone accused Better Together of trying to bribe unsure voters to stay in the UK "at the expense of the English taxpayers who are currently seeing hospitals and libraries close as part of the Coalition's English austerity measures".