Post-Match Thread and Ratings Southend Utd 0-1 Forest Green Rovers

[Barry.C]

The sad thing is that Rush missed what would be a sitter for him normally and what a difference it would have made at that time if he poked it away. But probably in only his second full game, and no doubt anxious to impress, the anxiety kicked in. He worked hard though and has something about him. A goal of course would work wonders as ever with strikers and he would confidently calm down a bit and slot those home all day long

Shows though just what we are missing upfront and how many games might we have won but for Rons Embargo

 

[Tangled up in Blue]

It will be interesting to compare our "progress" with Bolton's on Saturday.At the begining of the season I'd have been quite happy with 22nd place.Now it's quite clear that unless we pick up points in December (unlikely IMO) we'll be relegated to the conference at the end of the season.As Chairman Trigg says the embargo has finished this club.We can't even play Sam Hart and Akinola who we've already signed.let alone go out and get the CH and other players we so desperately need.RIP SUFC.

 

[Jay_SUFC]

I would have 100% agreed before the game 451, but actually 442 worked better than anticipated and we help are own. However, playing two up front really made no difference to our goal threat - which given current resources in a way is an argument to go back to 451 next time out. 433, 343, no we've shown that doesn't work, no point reverting back just to double check..

Arguably we only played one up front, and Goodship!

 

[yogi bear up the cagire]

These early kick-off times are playing havoc with my cooking and meal times. I compromised by standing up my telephone against the condiment set for the start of the game. further complications as the wife moved into an offside position to see President Macron address the nation on Covid-19. Strange time to make a speech?.........perhaps he'd recorded the game? If he had, one can only hope that ifollow will sit up and listen when they have a complaint about their service from the President of the French Republic!
Watching a game on a 15cms X 7cms screen is really only for emergencies and not for pleasure..............never mind, I said to myself, I can watch the second-half on the large screen of my desk-top
More seriously, from what I saw, we looked organised and competed well against, supposedly, one of the better teams in the league. Honestly, in the first-half there was little difference between the two teams. I felt for Matt Rush, set up on his own, twelve yards out on the left with only the keeper to beat and he couldn't find the target. In the run of a game a normal side would expect up to half a dozen goal scoring opportunities, Unfortunately, as far as I observed, it was our only clear cut chance, so it sticks out embarrassingly. Oxley came out and did well to get the ball rather than the man, in denying probably their best chance of the half. The defense looks more solid with White and Kyprianou made the best of his unexpected opportunity. For me the jury is still out on Egbri. You can't criticise his endeavour, snapping at opposition players like a little terrier, yet his end product is questionable. He does fall over a lot, which gets us free-kicks but I wonder whether refs will eventually wise up to this? He was as guilty as many of the others with poor delivery, crosses that didn't beat the first man..........but he certainly wasn't unique in this respect.
Now for the sting in the tail! Not many people would have expected us to get much from the Walsall or FGR games.........happily Cambridge will face a rather stronger Blues side. Our football league future could largely depend on our next five games. A few weeks ago Bolton were struggling like us, sadly (for us) they have started to put together some good results. Saturday is going to be a very tough ask for us to get anything from the fixture. The next four games are a different matter, against sides in the lower half of the division; Stevenage (A), Scunthorpe (H), Grimsby (H) and Mansfield (A). IMHO we need at least eight points from those games, failing that, fear of Christmas lock-down will be the least of our problems.

 

[dannypav]

Right , here’s my ‘cold light of day’ thoughts as opposed to how I feel directly after a game.

We are now much more competitive than at the start of the season.
Not great , but competitive.
We beat Wallsall 1-0 but they had a penalty at 0-0 near the end , so that game could have been lost.
We lost 1-0 to FGR but Rush missed a sitter just before half time which could have given us something to hold on to and changed the course of the game.
Fine margins - one we won and the other we lost but both could have been different - but at least we are putting ourselves in the position to compete and have half a chance.
At the start of the season it was a matter of ‘when’ we would go behind and ‘how many’ we would lose by.

The Manager was one I really applauded at the time of his appointment and I still hope he’s the right choice.
He’s got a few more experienced players back and also adapted the system that wasn’t working, but he’s had some awful luck with players out too and he’s really had little to work with.
The players seem behind him and I see little merit in changing the Manager who will be stuck with the same players.

So where does the blame lie.
Well it is certainly with the Chairman IMO and the fact that we remain under a very restrictive embargo - although Sol seemed like a disaster, don’t forget he suffered with that too.
However, I don’t subscribe to this view that there is ‘much more’ Ron can do to change things right now.
IF he could clear the embargo , IF he could sign 6 decent players , IF he could get the final green light on the stadium - then he would do them.
It makes no sense to think anything otherwise as our L2 status and FF are of benefit to him.

For sure the club has been run appallingly in the past few seasons , and I still think the last period of stability came under Brown ( helped by the excellent ground work Sturrock did ).

A lack of a CEO and bad managerial / player appointments sit solely with Ron , but he’s not willingly wanting everything to go to pot.

I don’t see any chance of us not being relegated and just hope we can stabilise at that point , but it will be tough as I don’t think there’s a huge difference in standard and is actually got a number of progressive teams on the up.

Sad times

 

[damien]

These early kick-off times are playing havoc with my cooking and meal times. I compromised by standing up my telephone against the condiment set for the start of the game. further complications as the wife moved into an offside position to see President Macron address the nation on Covid-19. Strange time to make a speech?.........perhaps he'd recorded the game? If he had, one can only hope that ifollow will sit up and listen when they have a complaint about their service from the President of the French Republic!
Watching a game on a 15cms X 7cms screen is really only for emergencies and not for pleasure..............never mind, I said to myself, I can watch the second-half on the large screen of my desk-top
More seriously, from what I saw, we looked organised and competed well against, supposedly, one of the better teams in the league. Honestly, in the first-half there was little difference between the two teams. I felt for Matt Rush, set up on his own, twelve yards out on the left with only the keeper to beat and he couldn't find the target. In the run of a game a normal side would expect up to half a dozen goal scoring opportunities, Unfortunately, as far as I observed, it was our only clear cut chance, so it sticks out embarrassingly. Oxley came out and did well to get the ball rather than the man, in denying probably their best chance of the half. The defense looks more solid with White and Kyprianou made the best of his unexpected opportunity. For me the jury is still out on Egbri. You can't criticise his endeavour, snapping at opposition players like a little terrier, yet his end product is questionable. He does fall over a lot, which gets us free-kicks but I wonder whether refs will eventually wise up to this? He was as guilty as many of the others with poor delivery, crosses that didn't beat the first man..........but he certainly wasn't unique in this respect.
Now for the sting in the tail! Not many people would have expected us to get much from the Walsall or FGR games.........happily Cambridge will face a rather stronger Blues side. Our football league future could largely depend on our next five games. A few weeks ago Bolton were struggling like us, sadly (for us) they have started to put together some good results. Saturday is going to be a very tough ask for us to get anything from the fixture. The next four games are a different matter, against sides in the lower half of the division; Stevenage (A), Scunthorpe (H), Grimsby (H) and Mansfield (A). IMHO we need at least eight points from those games, failing that, fear of Christmas lock-down will be the least of our problems.

That run of stevenage scunthorpe and grimsby, I make you right sir. Must get 8 points from those if we are to have a chance. If we get akinola and Hart in, and this mystery other forward. Maybe, just maybe this might start to click as its frustratingly not far away to consistently picking up points. In my humble of course

 

[Chris Powell's mate]

SOUTHEND United left-back Tom Clifford was forced to drop out of the starting line-up for tonight's clash with Forest Green Rovers after his back went into spasm.

Read more on this story


Help with Echo links

Back spasms in athletes are most frequently caused through lack of stretching.
You don't have to stay up till 10pm analysing to know that.

 

[dannypav]

That run of stevenage scunthorpe and grimsby, I make you right sir. Must get 8 points from those if we are to have a chance. If we get akinola and Hart in, and this mystery other forward. Maybe, just maybe this might start to click as its frustratingly not far away to consistently picking up points. In my humble of course

Just being pedantic but you can’t get 8 points from 3 games .....

 

[OldBlueLady]

We managed to watch the whole game - we go through the SUFC website and access ifollow from there, on one of our mobiles then cast it to the TV, never had a problem - Kev's not seen them for over a month due to work, and he was impressed at the improvement, though frustrated as we all are, at the lack of a goal scorer.

There is no doubt that we have improved from those awful opening games when we really did look like boys against men. I have to say that we both thought Harry Kyps did really well, coming in at late notice and presumably without a lot of training with the team recently. He has a natural tendency to go forward and can cross the ball well. It's a waste him taking corners though because we need his height in the box - AT THE BACK POST, where we seem to miss putting people regularly.

I really wanted Goodship to push on under his former manager, but he's still not showing anywhere enough. If we had other options, then he'd be on the bench I think. Can I check that it was Kenny Coker playing as a sub and not Oli, because several times on the commentary, they said Oli Coker?! He didn't look at all out of place, and I might be tempted to give him a start soon.

I thought we started very well, pressing them high up the pitch and making it really difficult for them to play out from the back as they clearly wanted to. The energy from Rush and Goodship was really good, and we managed to cut out a few passes in their half and put them under pressure. Dieng was particularly good at this. Rushy should have scored, no question of that. Gutted for him that he didn't.

Demi is not doing it for me in midfield, I don't remember much forward play from him at all, and the lack of creativity has been a massive problem for us. Ultimately it was his poor defending that led to them scoring. Olayinka was quiet but still showed some good skill. Egbri, loads of energy but not a lot of end product.

On the whole, I thought Hobson did well, though there were a couple of errors. He looked much calmer alongside JW, who had his usual game. Elvis was better than he had been too, got forwards lots but didn't seem to want to put crosses in.

Why do we always look to go backwards from throw ins???!

Oxley - 6, didn't do a lot wrong, but actually didn't do much. One excellent save
Bwomono - 5, still a way off his best
White - 7, put his body on the line a few times, leads by example
Hobson - 6, solid, marked down for the errors
Kyprianou - 7.5, my MOTM. Enthusiastic, good crossing, good corners - someone needs to learn they're going deep though
Egbri - 6, a little lightweight at times
Dieng - 7, much improved back in midfield
Demetriou - 5, when Macca is fit, I'd put him at RB and try Elvis in front
Olayinka - 7, continues to impress, needs to find those target shooting boots!
Rush - 6, he'll be disappointed
Goodship - 5, not doing enough

 

[BluePartridge]

So where does the blame lie.
Well it is certainly with the Chairman IMO and the fact that we remain under a very restrictive embargo - although Sol seemed like a disaster, don’t forget he suffered with that too.
However, I don’t subscribe to this view that there is ‘much more’ Ron can do to change things right now.

I feel like Sol Campbell is an extremely well-connected, and talented, football manager. I think it's unfair to compare MM to him. MM was completely new to League football as a manager. I think it's more fair to compare MM to Bond (seeming as they both smell of Redknapp), and then the question is, which of these would you rather have? Because Ron isn't going to put his hand in his pocket for another ex-England International footballer.

 

[yogi bear up the cagire]

Just being pedantic but you can’t get 8 points from 3 games .....

To be even more pedantic, I imagine damien just omitted to mention Mansfield from the original list of four games I compiled! I think he, I and probably you, would agree to the minimum necessity of an eight point target from this series of games

 

[dannypav]

To be even more pedantic, I imagine damien just omitted to mention Mansfield from the original list of four games I compiled! I think he, I and probably you, would agree to the minimum necessity of an eight point target from this series of games

If it’s 4 games , then I’d settle for nothing less than 11 points !

 

[Evening Echo]

SOUTHEND United fans have their say on Tuesday night's defeat to Forest Green Rovers at Roots Hall.

Read more on this story


Help with Echo links

 

[Holy Joe]

I really wanted Goodship to push on under his former manager, but he's still not showing anywhere enough. If we had other options, then he'd be on the bench I think. Can I check that it was Kenny Coker playing as a sub and not Oli, because several times on the commentary, they said Oli Coker?! He didn't look at all out of place, and I might be tempted to give him a start soon.

Defo Kenny Coker - they don't look similar

 

[Holy Joe]

Highlights here

Southend 0-1 Forest Green

Highlights of the Sky Bet League Two match between Southend and Forest Green.

www.skysports.com

I might have been abit harsh on JD for ducking out of the free kick - I don't think it was going to hit him anyway

 

[Oakley1]

which one will happen first

we will all have the vaccine injection before Easter

Covid19 will be gone before Easter

Southend will be relegated before Easter

 

[Yorkshire Blue]

I thought we were not far away from being a below average league two team tonight.

Let's pretend we live in a world of make-believe, and Ron gets the embargo situation sorted. You'd back us with some fresh blood in January and the players currently sitting out, to make a fist of it in the second half of the season.

Trouble is, we're already cut adrift, and it will not be enough.

On a positive note, Molesley is clearly starting to get the best of these very limited players he has at his disposal. The basics are being done much better, there is some level of competence, and defensively we looked OK in the first half.

We had 12 professionals on the sidelines tonight for various reasons. Embargo/Covid/Injuries. With the players we had available, a point would have been an excellent result and we fell short. I'm not angry, I'm just sad that our club is in this position. Nobody to blame tonight, it is what it is.

It's not so much being behind cut adrift that worries me - you can make up ground quickly at the bottom - but the effect on the confidence that the continued losing has. That's what we have to battle with.

Other than enthusiasm Elvis offers very little for me, I love the enthusiasm but defensively he is average at best and attacking wise he is poor.

Attacking wise he created the only chance we had when he put the ball on a plate for Rush, yet he's the one singled out?

We concede another goal down our left and again it's Elvis that's singled out.

I feel that MM has addressed the awful tappy , slow football in our own half , which invites pressure . He has tightened up down the middle and we look less vulnerable from every ball into our box .
However we lacked quality last night and could of played another 90 mins and not scored , we need a winger that beats his man and another CF who has league 2 experience , I would bite your hand off for the 2 FG subs that came on and linked up for the goal .

We are improving , but so are the teams around us and the gap is looking more unreachable by the week

I sit here having watched a game that I quite enjoyed and I saw players that were playing for the manager , that’s a far cry from the last 3 games I’ve watched where we were an embarrassment of a team and an insult to us fans .

We have one of those but he has coronavirus.

Nathaniel-George glides past defenders like they aren't there.

 

[Fairport]

The positives from that performance were that the work rate continued to be good and John White has made the defending look a little more secure. The downside is that Rush and Goodship looked nowhere near good enough for even this division. Rush may improve but Goodship has failed both here and when he was at Yeovil. We desperately need two different strikers.

 

[in the know]

I feel like Sol Campbell is an extremely well-connected, and talented, football manager. I think it's unfair to compare MM to him. MM was completely new to League football as a manager. I think it's more fair to compare MM to Bond (seeming as they both smell of Redknapp), and then the question is, which of these would you rather have? Because Ron isn't going to put his hand in his pocket for another ex-England International footballer.

I'm sorry. I totally respect your opinion but to say SC was a talented football manager may draw the attentions of the trade descriptions act! Well connected, arguably yes, ex international yes, talented manager, unfortunately not! Possibly as far from that as you could even dare imagine.
I think you've made a good point about bond though
Currently, happy to stick with MM because we seem to playing more cohecively .....

 

[Rayleigh boy]

Currently, happy to stick with MM because we seem to playing more cohecively .....

Well MM is the still the manager and we will still be bottom of the football league next week.