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Play offs were definitely the minimum Id expect after Sturrock was fired for not achieving them. Sadly they are a bit of a lottery as we know and we didnt get to Wembley, but a decent achievement to get there.

Going to lose our central defence next season so a big ask to replace that and lots of work to do over the summer, but he has an established squad to build on now.

Just hope we can keep the players we have.
 
Overall, Phil Brown has done a good job, the squad that finished the season was a good one but just lacked a pacy striker and maybe another midfielder who could score a few goals. If I were him, the most annoying thing would be Ron Martin interfering by signing Barnard who I am sure was not on the managers radar. The main issue now is will Bentley be here next season and what are the chances of signing the two loanee centre backs? If all three go then sadly it will mean starting from scratch all over again. If Brown were to have achieved promotion then I do feel that he would have got offers elsewhere but by missing out his CV has not been enhanced enough to make him sought after higher up the Football League. Lets hope that he is in charge next season and that we can get back to Division One.
 
I think all we are missing is a goalscorer, doesn't have to be pacy as people always go on about just need to get someone in who can stick in the net!

The defence may be a problem if we cant get either Egan or Sokilik but I'm confident that we can get similar quality replacements either on loan or permanently.

Overall Brown has done a decent job but he HAS to get automatic promotion next season IMO.
 
I'm feeling prety optimistic for next season so long as we keep PB (doubt RM will sack him - by and large he's not a sacking man) and the players which I think likely as team spirit seems fantastic. My fear is the lure of the north affecting PB. One good offer and i think he'll be off. Pity we'll still be playing Burton next season. Surely their cynical brand of boring counter attack football is the reason for their appalling crowds. Teams like that usually get their comeuppance.
 
I would say to Messrs Brown & Penney - Stay & finish the job - & get a few specialist players for Feb/March as it appears most of out current squad suffer from SAD.
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We've had 12 departures at start of season and brought in 19 players including 9 on Loan. With that and being so poor last season, and having a GK in his first full season, 20 clean sheets, playing proper football, much better home form by miles last year, and average record crowd increase shows what work has been done by Phil Brown, bob Shaw and all of the background staff. 11th to 5th in one season was very good. But for the first time I'm really confident for next season, great group of players, for me 4 should be on their way out (Freddy, Mark Phillips, Barnard and Paul Smith) and bring in EGAN + Sokilik and 1 more CB, 1 winger and 2 more strikers and I think it's easy top 3.
 
Echo what everyone else has said, I wasn't overly impressed when he was appointed but he's definitely won me over, and I am particularly impressed with the way he has got players now fulfilling obligations with fan interaction that we'd not seen under Sturrock.

His style of play is infinitely superior, but I get very frustrated with the lone striker thing which looks so negative on paper. It's not 4-3-3, it's 4-5-1. Corr has impressed me playing that role but he's not been well supported and that needs more work, or Straker to be more consistent. Prosser back to form and with a new central partner and someone as cover, and a pacy youngster up top and we're done and hopefully in autos next year to avoid a 3rd in 4 seasons lottery of the play offs.
 
I think he has done a terrific job this season, I honestly thought with the squad we have we should have gotten playoffs at least. At Christmas or around then though I really think we should have been aiming for the autos.

Good style of football, good transfers, decent motivator, loyal to his players, good with the media.

I can't really think of anything he is bad at. Maybe we are a bit one dimensional in tactics and we rarely have a player to come on and change a game when we are behind but he has only been here one season.

I think it would be great if we can hang on to him for a little while longer!
 
I think PB is doing a great job. My only concern is how he reasoned that BBBC/ Freddy/ Barney would score nearly enough goals. Surely he can see they do not score enough?

But PB is the man for the job!
 
I think he got most things right this season. Most substitutions right in my view when players were booked etc. And the timing of the subs right.


Where i think he got it wrong, was the Burton league game that we won 1-0 at home, in the end it meant for nothing and gary rowetts (resting) of players proved the right decision. It clearly gave them the advantage of not putting their strongest team out, and showing their hand, and gave McGurk and Kee (players who i think look to be carrying injuries) time to rest.


Having said that if we had not beaten them at home then we wouldn't have had the home leg last, something that eventually made no difference in the end anyway.
 
I think PB is doing a great job. My only concern is how he reasoned that BBBC/ Freddy/ Barney would score nearly enough goals. Surely he can see they do not score enough?

But PB is the man for the job!

Totally agree on the great job front but I don't think we will ever know the bottom line concerning those three. With nothing to hinder him next season (umbongos etc) I am really hopeful that PB and his team will bring in the last pieces of the jigsaw that will see us walk the autos and rampage up into Div 1. The only tiny fly in the ointment is keeping our best players already here.................yeah, piece of ****!
 
I think he has done a pretty good job overall. He is only the 3rd Southend manager to get a team into the play-offs and only one has one won, so that in itself is pretty good going by my reckoning.

I am not sure if it is Brown himself or the players, but sometimes we seem take our foot off the gas when we have the upper hand, and we had poor results against the teams fighting at the bottom of the league.

A bit of tinkering to a good side, a ruthless attitude, and hopefully automatic promotion next season.
 
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I did like Luggy and was underwhelmed when Brown was appointed, but I have to say that I have warmed to him. He hasn't got everything right, but we had a far better season than I could have hoped for. I think he knows only too well what and where we need strengthening for next year. His main task though will be keeping hold of our current best talent. We have a far better chance of holding onto them while Brown remains in charge.

Think they are pretty much in line with my views and so it's a good base on which to develop my thoughts. I don't like management change, unless there is a good reason for it. I hope and trust that PB will carry on next season and will achieve what he hasn't been capable of doing this year........promotion.
The season, rather like the game yesterday, has been a roller coaster, full of highs and lows. We started brilliantly with three league victories and then lost our way without a win in six games. IIRC there were even murmurings on here, at the end of September, as to whether PB would last till Christmas. By November Kiernan was clicking with the ever improving Prosser and we looked capable of beating anyone in the league........automatic promotion started to look a possibility. Kiernan left, Prosser and Thompson both got injured and our form nose-dived to the point where many (including myself), thought that our play-off chance had also gone. Enter, Sokolik, Egan, Loza and Murphy and six wins from our last eight games. Then the final downturn in yesterday's drama.......well, you can't say it hasn't been entertaining! :smile:
For me the only shadow on the season was that run of twelve league games without a win and the thought that, if something had been done sooner (bringing in the likes of Sokolik & Egan), we may not have had to go through the agony of the last week.
With no evident progress on FF, money again risks being a major stumbling block in PB's efforts to strengthen the squad and I suppose we can't rule out another long embargo. Loanees are going to be an important factor again and to provide us with options, maybe we will have to use our full quota earlier in the season.......will be interesting to see if PB tries to negotiate season-long ones?
Agree with those that say the pressure will be turned up on PB next season, it's not just Uncle Ron that will demand promotion and in my opinion that won't be quite as easy to achieve as it appeared this season. I fear Luton and a fast improving and well supported Portsmouth to be at least two of the front runners. I'm looking forward to it and thank you PB for reducing our close-season by two weeks!
 
Think they are pretty much in line with my views and so it's a good base on which to develop my thoughts. I don't like management change, unless there is a good reason for it. I hope and trust that PB will carry on next season and will achieve what he hasn't been capable of doing this year........promotion.
The season, rather like the game yesterday, has been a roller coaster, full of highs and lows. We started brilliantly with three league victories and then lost our way without a win in six games. IIRC there were even murmurings on here, at the end of September, as to whether PB would last till Christmas. By November Kiernan was clicking with the ever improving Prosser and we looked capable of beating anyone in the league........automatic promotion started to look a possibility. Kiernan left, Prosser and Thompson both got injured and our form nose-dived to the point where many (including myself), thought that our play-off chance had also gone. Enter, Sokolik, Egan, Loza and Murphy and six wins from our last eight games. Then the final downturn in yesterday's drama.......well, you can't say it hasn't been entertaining! :smile:
For me the only shadow on the season was that run of twelve league games without a win and the thought that, if something had been done sooner (bringing in the likes of Sokolik & Egan), we may not have had to go through the agony of the last week.
With no evident progress on FF, money again risks being a major stumbling block in PB's efforts to strengthen the squad and I suppose we can't rule out another long embargo. Loanees are going to be an important factor again and to provide us with options, maybe we will have to use our full quota earlier in the season.......will be interesting to see if PB tries to negotiate season-long ones?
Agree with those that say the pressure will be turned up on PB next season, it's not just Uncle Ron that will demand promotion and in my opinion that won't be quite as easy to achieve as it appeared this season. I fear Luton and a fast improving and well supported Portsmouth to be at least two of the front runners. I'm looking forward to it and thank you PB for reducing our close-season by two weeks!
You make some good valid points but I think people seem to forget that PB has had to work with a significant number of loanees. I find it irritating that RM might sack the manager (whoever they are at the time) for not gaining promotion yet it is RM's fault and his alone that we cannot afford to bring in permanent signings. Mismanagement of a business on a massive scale yet it's always the manager that pays the price of failure. If we were talking rich arabs that have backed the manager financially then fair enough but Sturrock and Brown have operated with one hand tied behind their backs.
 
I too wasn't overly happy when PB was appointed. However, a lot of that was down to the timing, and that I felt very sorry for Sturrock. I also wasn’t impressed with the way we finished that season after the JPT final, which didn’t instil any real confidence in me for this season.

However, PB has proved me wrong. We play attractive, entertaining football and are a very solid team defensively.

It’s also important to remember that PB had an embargo to deal with for a very long time. When we were on our very good run I suggested that RM needed to get us out of the embargo to give him a chance to sign players whether permanently or on loan. My reasoning was that during the winter months pitches are heavier, which leads to tiredness and injury and because we play more games as there are always mid week games. More to the point, signing players when we’re doing well is always going to be easier than when we are not.

IIRC that failure also coincided with our poor run, which ultimately cost us a chance at automatic promotion. However, we were also unlucky with the players we did sign to start with, until we settled on Sokolik and Egan. But it is important to remember that there were players that didn’t want to come to us during our poor run. PB made a big deal of a forward that he really wanted, but turned us down. We ended up with Barney, who hasn’t really set the world alight. (I have to say that is a shame because I really wanted him to be a success.)

Next season will be interesting. It really could go one of two ways. Often a team that makes the playoffs one season fails miserably the next. However, as Burton have proved that doesn’t have to the case. The team need to understand that this season counts for nothing next season. It doesn’t give them (us) a god-given right to automatic promotion. Every win will have to be earned just like it was this.

Next season starts now.
 
You make some good valid points but I think people seem to forget that PB has had to work with a significant number of loanees. I find it irritating that RM might sack the manager (whoever they are at the time) for not gaining promotion yet it is RM's fault and his alone that we cannot afford to bring in permanent signings. Mismanagement of a business on a massive scale yet it's always the manager that pays the price of failure. If we were talking rich arabs that have backed the manager financially then fair enough but Sturrock and Brown have operated with one hand tied behind their backs.

I have been very careful not to aportion blame for the period, February to mid March..........although I have my suspicions. There was an image that stuck in my mind during that period, a post-match interview with PB (was he sitting in an away ground stand?) It was following another poor result in our long run without a win, when we were playing without any experienced central midfielders. He said he had faith that the present squad could turn the situation around. I couldn't believe what he was saying and more importantly I got the impression, he didn't believe it either. I couldn't actually see whether he had one or even two of his hands tied behind his back! :winking:
 
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