Post-Match Thread and Ratings Southend United 2-0 AFC Telford

[Cricko]

It was a diabolical performance in the first half and not much better in the second..Mildenhall kept us in it with two great saves..and if there was anything to smile about apart from the fact we won, it was a great goal by Walker.

 

[Mr Gilbo]

But he was terrible for the rest of the game. Midenhall did well, and I thought Barrett and Herd did fine. But the rest of the team didn;t turn up. Tilly saying that they need to prove that they should start the next game was obviously ignored by them all!

We missed Revell tonight.

 

[Jay_Shrimper]

Mildenhall was brilliant tonight. Kept us in the match with 2 brilliant saves in the 56th & 57th minute. That performance would have done wonders for Mildy's confidence!!
Had they have gone in, I couldn't see a way back, unfortunately!

Ermm, apart from a wicked goal from Walker, he was pretty anonymous - like macca!

Dissapointing performance by all concerned today, and if there 2 things that made me smile:

a) Barrett was tutoring herd all game, telling him where to go and what to do. Was brilliant to see, and you could see Herd was really enjoying himself. Glad he got a home debut, fair play to the lad!
b) Mildenhall's reaction when we scored. Priceless...!

 

[Clinton Baptiste]

Mildey- 7 MOM, good all round performance from Steve, 2 fab saves. Looks far better than in early on the season
Francis- 5, forget the lucky goal, he is in the worst form of his life and a liability. But thanks to our paper thin squad and awful back up (sankofa) his place is secure
Clarke- 6, defends well but I really am getting sick of his distribution and wouldnt cry if he is sold in the window.
Barrett- 7, pick of the defence as always.
Herd- 5, poor, out of position too often and didnt use his long throws much.
Betsy- 6, worked hard, moved to a more advanced positon as 2nd striker, but his finishing is truly awful.
Christophe-6, pick of the midfield but not saying a lot.
Macca- 4, dear oh dear have aliens come and swapped Macca for Stuart Thurgood? Totally anonymous, only contribution was a booking.
Grant- 3, one of Tillys worst signings, gave the ball away with almost every pass. Too negative to play on the wing.
Scannell- 3, not league standard.
Walker- 5, awful bar for one minute of brilliance. WIll be 5th choice when all strikers fit.

Subs
Ademeno- 6, looked lively, why didnt he start on the left???

Other 2 only on for a few mins but good to see some youngsters getting a chance.

 

[Harold Bishop Killer]

So once again our 'reserve' players give a inept performance. If I was them I would be running all over the park to make Tilly take notice. Obv I was not there but it could be a worrying sign that these players who play quite woefully against, lets face it, inferior opposition are the same players that may have to come in after next week due to the loan players having to leave.

But then it wasnt like we lost, we are through to the next round and have a good chance of reaching the 3rd and maybe it was just a off night.

 

[David Icke]

Gruesome performance. As Tilly said - "terrible". And it was.

Saw the last home reserve game and knew what we were going to get served up to us tonight.
Scannell is not fulfilling his potential and has put on weight imo. I know they wanted to get some condition into him but it has worked the opposite way. He was lumbering tonight.
Grant should never grace the pitch again, if he ever has graced the pitch that is. He is exposed and should go.
Francis needs a selection of fireworks up his jacksy and every time he loses concentration in a match, which is normally a dozen times on average, I am going to start lighting blue touch paper.
Macca is only at 60% at the moment and I am beginning to doubt he will ever get back to his best, when the competition with tactless Bailey kept him fizzing.
The rest were all 5 on the scoreboard with the exception of Mildanddull 8 and Christophe 7.

 

[Scamps]

Francis should get a 2... thats only cos he scored... he was **** again!!
Thought Barrett was MOM...

 

[Shrimpersarmy]

We were so bad tonight it was embarassing. If we play like that on Staurday we will lose 4 or 5-0 and that isn't an exageration.

Only real positive was Mildy, 2 cracking saves at the start of the second half. Good to see a few of the youth players get a run out though.

I think i'd rather have Stuart Thurgood and Drewe Broughton than Anthony Grant and Damien Scannell. At least ST and DB would have put some effort in.

 

[Clinton Baptiste]

So once again our 'reserve' players give a inept performance. If I was them I would be running all over the park to make Tilly take notice. Obv I was not there but it could be a worrying sign that these players who play quite woefully against, lets face it, inferior opposition are the same players that may have to come in after next week due to the loan players having to leave.

But then it wasnt like we lost, we are through to the next round and have a good chance of reaching the 3rd and maybe it was just a off night.

Problem is they are now our first teamers not reserves. No Sawyer or Kanu, and Jeff will go back soon so we will have to get used to such performances unless Tilly pulls some magic in the loan market, which he said last week he is hoping to do.

 

[canveyshrimper]

Problem is they are now our first teamers not reserves. No Sawyer or Kanu, and Jeff will go back soon so we will have to get used to such performances unless Tilly pulls some magic in the loan market, which he said last week he is hoping to do.

Listening to Tilly on BBC Essex he indicated that clubs have been approached with a view to more loanees coming in.

 

[chapperzUK]

Awful peformance. Against a better team we would have been thrashed! How was that not a penalty. We need some defenders!

 

[Nobby Snide]

Problem is they are now our first teamers not reserves. No Sawyer or Kanu, and Jeff will go back soon so we will have to get used to such performances unless Tilly pulls some magic in the loan market, which he said last week he is hoping to do.

dont you just hate having the season saved by loan players again. Ok, fingers crossed, they will be permanant within a few weeks, but would like to have at least a full squad at the start of the season.

we won..thats the main thing...lets see what happens saturday

 

[Cricko]

After some thought my ratings.

Mildenhall..8....made two great saves and seems to have picked up a few tips from Feds.
Francis.....3....Francis Who?...has he been replaced my some alien?
Herd.....4... out of his depth.
Barrett... 6..solid enough performance and seemed to be out biggest threat going forward in the first half.
Clarke...5..ok performance but can't pass a ball to his own player.
Scannell... 4...overweight and I do not see what others do in him.
McCormack...3.....just does not seem the same player without Bailey along side him but may not be fully match fit yet.
Grant..2.....woeful...I do not see him as a league 2 player let alone league 1.
Christophe...6 Tried his hardest without any support from others.
Walker...4....apart from a great goal was anonimous for the rest of the game.
Betsy..4.....chased shadows all night like a cat in headlights.

That is all.

 

[bazzashrimper]

My ratings...

Mildenhall 8 - Two Excellent saves, and came for a few crosses.
Francis 6 - Thought he was OK for the first half hour until he gave the ball away sloppily on the counter attack. Such a confidence player and at the moment he has none.
Herd 5 - Only young, needs games but not league 1 standard yet
Barrett 7 - Pretty solid
Clarke 6 - Solid defending, but gave the ball away every time he kicked with his right foot. Interesting that he seems better with his left!
Jeff 7 - Decent game for the holding player.
Macca 5 - Way off last seasons standards? Is he trying too hard, still carrying a knock or is it something else?
Grant 6 - Thought he looked pretty lively when running with the ball, although passing was poor.
Betsy 5 - Didn't seem to get in the game for me, but out of position.
Scannell 6 - Seemed to be the only one who wanted to create something for the first hour. Another one who could do with a loan spell at Wycombe or Gills.
Walker 5 - Awful until just before we got the first goal. Scored a decent goal himself and improved. Hope it gives him some confidence.

Subs Ademeno 7 - Looked lively and seemed to be the spark that got the rest of the team going a bit.
O'Keefe & Hazell - Not on long enough for comment.

Overall - We were very bad. We can only play 4-4-2 for some reason, although I could understand with the personnel available that Tilly switched it.

On the positive side of things, we won - and had it been a convincing performance we may have shyed away from trying for a couple of loanees & played like this on Saturday

 

[ShrimperNath]

The good things are we kept a clean sheet (which should do wonders for Mildenhall and Herd's confidence), we're through to the next round (and we could have Barnard, Freedman, Laurent and Revell available again by then) and we picked up no new injuries.

 

[Andy_S]

Dreadful performance, dreadful game, dreadful tactics by Tilly, yet somehow we won. How, I don't know. I'd swap some of Telford's players for ours and I was one of many in the East that stayed back and clapped them as they left the pitch. We were clueless, we didn't want it enough. McCormack? What has happened? Grant - Chelsea!? Jesus. He can't pass the ball 5 yards without f*cking it up.

Ratings:

Mildenhall 8: Apart from 1 misjudgement in the 1st half which could've been a free kick he was faultless. 1 World Class save, 1 very decent save and claimed anything and everything that came into the box. That performance has probably just ended the chances of Federici coming back after Oldham. Critics where are you now?

Francis 5: Usual 2008/09 woeful fodder from Francis. Awful.

Clarke 5.5: After half an hour he seemed so fed up with what was going on around him he started lashing the ball into the crowd in frustration.

Barrett 6: For once I'm marking him higher than Clarke. Still gives away far too many free kicks though.

Herd 6: 1st half I thought he was our best outfield player easily, yet he got sloppier in the 2nd. He's so calm on the ball and clearly has potential. For someone so small he doesn't get beaten in the air everytime either as he's got a good leap on him. Given time and nurturing he'll do well for us.

Grant 4: Diabolical. Pub player like.

McCormack 4.5: Not much better than Grant. Does he not want to be here anymore? Is he fed up that's he's lost Bailey and Maher? Is he more concerned about when the next night out at Mayhem is? Who knows but on that performance he's a massive downgrade on Sawyer. A big let down.

Christophe 6: The only player in midfield who actually didn't let himself down. If only his shooting was better.

Scannell 5: Seemed lost with where he was playing. I didn't agree with his substitution though. Surely keep Betsy and Scannell on as wingers, take off a central midfielder and put Ademeno up top? Surely that's simple enough Tilly.

Betsy 5: Terrible and a shadow of his early season form. Like Scannell he suffered terribly from the strange choice of formation from the management.

Walker 5: He gets bumped up to 5 for his goal. Other than that, same old from Walker. Couldn't trap a bag of cement for most of game and still doesn't know when to release the ball. Perhaps his goal will give him a new lease of life. Perhaps not.

Subs:

Ademeno 7: Just like when he came on against Cheltenham in the League Cup he was a breath of fresh air amongst dross. Deserves to start next weekend in the 2nd Round. Full of energy and drive, took people on and beat them and added a bit of life to our otherwise static attack. Am still surprised we used him on the wing though.

O'Keefe and Hazell didn't really get much of a chance but it was nice to see them make their debut. Pat on a back to Tilly for that anyway. What was all that about when we tried to bring Hazell on though? I know Grant didn't seemingly want to break out of strolling pace to come off, but surely we didn't have to play on around him whilst he did it.



On the whole for me, Mildenhall, Herd and Ademeno were the only ones who could come out of that and actually say they put in an acceptable performance. Lets hope we can get those couple in that Tilly was talking about before Saturday because otherwise we're gonna struggle.

 

[fbm]

Blues through to Round 2

Well, tonight has to be one of the most comedic football matches I have seen for a long time.

It was frankly so poor as a match it was laughable. Telford huffed and puffed and were the better side in the first half; had they been able to shoot they would have been 2 or 3 goals up. There was no cohesion between defence, midfield and attack for the Blues and there were frankly appalling performances from Francis, Grant, Scannell and Walker.

The ball spent more time off the pitch than on it and it was a mystery as to why the stand lights were kept on throughout the match which certainly made it a slightly odd atmosphere.

The ref slowly dragged the game down to the level of park football by blowing up for every single piece of contact which stopped the game flowing. Having said that, it probably saved players making even more errors.

It got worse. Players were misplacing passes for fun and for all their endeavour and effort, Telford looked a very poor footballing outfit indeed. In the second half however they burst into life as the Southend defence went AWOL for 5 minutes. Twice Mildenhall made excellent saves to keep the match goalless. There looked only one team in it.

The game changed on Southend's first substitution. The ineffective and disappointing Scannell was replaced by a hungry Ademeno who did what his predecessor should have been doing; running at the defence. Southend moved up a gear - actually really only shifted from neutral into first - and all of a sudden it became clear that there was a league team on the pitch.

The Telford keeper made a terrific save from a defenders deflection from just 3 yards to keep the match level. However, within a couple of minutes, the ball fell to Simon Francis in the box who waved his leg at the ball and poked it in the net. It was the only meaningful contribution he made to the game and he knew it; he didn't even celebrate the goal.

Telford now had to open up more and this gave James Walker more space. At last he showed what he could do when he hasn't anybody in front of him by curling in a shot from 25 yards.

Cue substitutions and debuts for Stuart O'Keefe and local lad Justin Hazell who got a great ovation from the West stand (well, part of it). Even that was a comedy moment. He was stripped and ready to come on with 2 minutes of normal time left. Telford were attacking and it was a minute into 3 minutes added time before the ball went dead in a safe area for him to come on. The substitution was announced but the ref restarted the game before Grant could leave the pitch and there was only a minute left when poor old Justin finally got on. Still, he managed to touch the ball 4 times and got flattened in the process.

Even dear old Peter Holmes, the announcer and someone who I have a lot of respect for, got into the comedy act by showing exactly how much he knows about football and geography. Can someone tell him that Altrincham isn't pronounced "Ulchingham"?

The fun continued. After the game in the post match BBC Essex interview the interviewer (David Grant I think but more like David Brent) asked possibly the most stupid and irrelevant questions ever. The best bits were something like -

DB - So Steve, did it suprise you that Telford were so positive?

T - No. Positive? They were 4-5-1. I don't think that's very positive is it? We had to play that way because of injuries and suspensions but no, I didn't think they were positive at all. We just played terrible.

DB - Saturday we have Oldham at Roots Hall. Is it a must win game?

T - What? Must win? (laughs) No way. We've lost one in 13 and sit just outside the play offs. It's not a must win game at all. Obviously we want to win and Oldham have a lot of good players but we're looking forward to it.

DB - When I say "must win" what I meant was that it would be nice to win but are you saying that you've had a good run, 9th in the league and so you'd be happy with a draw as you're 3 points outside the play offs?

T - No not at all - we're at home and obviously we want to beat whoever at home. Oldham are a good side with some good players but we'll give it our best and hope to get all 3 points. We always want to win at home against anyone.


That obviously isn't a direct quote as I can't remember it word for word but I do remember laughing at some of the questions and Tillys reaction. Classic.


RATINGS -


Mildenhall - 8 - MOM - Did whatever was asked of him and kept us in the game at 0-0.

Francis - 3 - Would have been 2 had he not scored. Appalling throughout in all respects.
Herd - 6 - Did nothing wrong but hardly set the game alight either.
Clarke - 7 - An easy night. Not stretched.
Barrett - 6 - Got caught in possession a couple of times but again, was hardly stretched.

Betsy - 6 - Wasn't sure where he was playing. Worked hard - did little.
Grant - 4 - Worst I've seen from him. Didn't look interested.
McCormack - 6 - Played well within himself but showed glimpses of what he can do. Managed to get booked.
Christophe - 6 - Did ok. Hardly noticed he was playing so obviously didn't do much wrong either.
Scannell - 3 - Woeful. Should have been able to destroy Telford but did nothing at all. Very disappointing.

Walker - 4 - Would have got 3 apart from a terrific finish. Should have done a lot better. Only really looked interested after he had scored.


Subs -

Ademeno - 7 - Did what Scannell should have done.
O'Keefe - 5 - Touched the ball twice and got caught in possession once.
Hazell - 6 - Touched the ball more in 2 minutes than O'Keefe did in about 8. Good to see a true local lad grace the Roots Hall turf.

The ref - 3 - Jesus, what a jobsworth. Ruined the game and showed more cards than I could count.

 

[Suffolk Shrimper In Dorset]

Noticed mid way thro' first half that Macca gave Clarke some verbals for a poor pass (pot kettle me thinks).

Anyway, Clarkie none too pleased and in the next two mins the ball came to him three times. What did the seething Clarkie do - show Macca what a true pro he was and pas out of defence skillfully?

No.

Like a true plonker he was so fed up he whacked it as hard as he could in what seemed like to be a temper, two of his kicks flting out into the stand.

What a plonker.

 

[Clinton Baptiste]

Just seen Tillys interview. Safe to say no defenders will be coming in any time soon. When asked if he was concerned about the number of goals we are letting in he says "not if we are scoring more than them". So another 5 strikers to be signed in the January window then!

 

[Sandbach Shrimper]

McCormack's attitude stinks at the moment, can't wait until we sign Sawyer in January. This tie against Telford shows that our squad is actually quite weak without the loaness (and Barnard), as a result of Tilson not buying enough players in the summer.