Post-Match Thread and Ratings Southend United 1-0 Scunthorpe

[ms brush]

Well, wasnt expecting that return yesterday. It was almost as though they needed us there to get the season underway. Also good to finally get the embargo lifted. They say good things come in three's!!

Firstly, i think there is a thank you to the club, the ticket office, the ground staff and all the stewards in the East (Blacks) and across all sections for making sure that we could get in and out of the ground safely! Despite tickets not arriving in the post, collections were well organised and efficient. Was worried about the social distancing affecting the match experience, but i need not have worried. It was well done, nicely spaced out and the huge roar when the ball hit the back of the net was fantastic!

I can quite safely say that I would have been happy to just be in the ground. Capping that with 3 points, a screamer of a goal and a team that looked industrious and much better than the league table indicates just made for a very happy Saturday!

Agree with many comments. 10/10 for all - huge win!

Oxley - didnt shut up. Amazing that i had long thought he wasnt vocal enough.

Elvis - a game worthy of an international player. Got his mojo back.

Hobson - is starting to look like a really decent CH. Maybe he just needed time to settle.

Dieng - played well. Don't think he missed a header.

Clifford - looks classy for such a young man. Should have a brilliant future in the game.

Hart - shaky few moments at thd start and impressive after a long lay off. Really good to see him back in a Blues shirt.

JD - makes a great captain. Good to see the assist, more please!

Alan McCormack was MOM by a country mile, awesome! Was checked for concussion though, hopefully no lasting damage. Surprised he lasted the full game, was flagging a bit by the end.

Olayinka - wasted out on the wing, fantastic strike, and good workrate.

Acqah - still a young man, still learning his craft. Easy to forget when you see his height and physical presence. His game is coming along, some good holding up going on, and in time will be a goalscorer. The lad just needs time

Akinola - bit rusty, and will need to get fully match fit. has an air of quality about him, and is a very good signing for us. Was concerned though, as he fell heavily and landed awkwardly after that challenge, which must have hurt! Amy must have administered the magic sponge, but he wasnt moving quite so freely afterwards. Will be a huge player for us when he settles in.

Subs: good to see KT back! Valuable game time for him. Egbri is a menace, Goodship and RT got some valuable minutes in.

 

[ms brush]

I will admit to be feeling a little apprehensive about going back today (I am 76) but can honestly say that if I develop Covid in the near future, it will not be a result of this afternoon. The Club have done everything possible to ensure social distancing and wearing of masks is adhered to. I was in the North Bank , but assume it was as good in the other parts of the ground as well. My only problem was my glasses misting up all the time, drove me potty!.......Great afternoon though.

My Dad came to the game yesterday as well. He told me he didnt care about the covid risks as he needs to 'live, not exist'! He is 78, and whilst i was very concerned because he is walking with crutches and is not as strong as he was, the organisation, the measures for covid safety were vigourously implemented, social distancing was very well done and the stewards were brilliant! They escorted him on all the stairs and through the shortest route out rather than the one way system (once most people had already left). He was buzzing, so lovely to see as his life has been so significantly restricted.

 

[Colchester and proud!]

What a difference a win makes and all the better for being there no doubt. Pleased for you folks, see I told you I thought you could still stay up, no doubt you will beat us on Boxing day now

 

[Barling Magna]

What a difference a win makes and all the better for being there no doubt. Pleased for you folks, see I told you I thought you could still stay up, no doubt you will beat us on Boxing day now

Thanks for de-railing Scunthorpe's recovery last Tuesday. That set them up to be beaten yesterday.

 

[RHB]

What a difference a win makes and all the better for being there no doubt. Pleased for you folks, see I told you I thought you could still stay up, no doubt you will beat us on Boxing day now

Thanks CAP, knowing our poxy luck we will be in Tier 3 by then. You really should switch allegiance you know we almost see you as our tame pet sheep these days.

 

[Jay_SUFC]

We were first in the West just on 2 o'clock, all a little strange and the aisle we sit by turned out to have the arrows a different way to what had been shown on the plans published by the Club, so that was a bit confusing! There looked to have been a recent cull of pigeons as there were remnants of wings, feathers and God knows what else on much of the floor plus loads of pigeon poo, which wasn't very pleasant, but the space between us meant I could put my stuff on the chair next to me rather than on the grossness on the floor. Lots of wet, mossy stuff on the ground on the front row meant that was a bit slippy - ground could have had a jet wash down in the time we've had to get it ready in my opinion.

I do think that, with the space available, we could have had staggered seating along the rows, so that there was no need to wear a mask in your seat. What I mean is, our seats were 96 and 97, if the people behind and in front of us had been put in 100 and 101 for instance, we'd have been far enough away for masks not to be a necessity when in your seat. In our row, there was only us one end and @Tinks and family the other so plenty of room for spacing like this. It was lovely not having to keep getting up and down to let latecomers, toilet goers and burger munchers in and out!

Lovely to see and hear our supporters in the North Bank!

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I'd disagree with anyone saying that was a poor match - I note a few comments of that nature - certainly didn't feel that way watching in person. Three stand out performers for me - Macca, Hart and Dieng, with Hobson not too far behind. Considering Hart has been out of competitive games almost as long as Akinola, you wouldn't have thought so the way he hit the ground running. He was a bit leggy to begin with but soon settled down and he and Clifford seemed to have good communication between them down the left. He played a lot longer than I expected and just didn't stop the whole time, continually offering himself as an outlet and getting in the mix with some feisty tackles too.

I think Akinola will be fine, he's obviously quite match rusty, and he played a lot deeper than I expected, but he has the same springy leap that Nathan Ralph has and will win a lot of headers for us.

Oxley - 7, lucky that one shot of theirs hit the upright as had that gone in we'd potentially have had a different game. Much more vocal than I remember noticing, some good punching, would prefer more route one goal kicks.
Bwomono - 7, Elvis seemed back to form, maybe he just needed fans back in the ground! Some good runs and good defensive work too.
Dieng - 8, been very complimentary of him the previous two games as well, very solid, great heading, marshalled the defence well.
Hobson - 7.5, best performance from him in a Blues' shirt, looking very comfortable alongside Dieng.
Clifford - 7, the youngster did ok, some great corner kicks, one early on would have gone straight in the goal if uncontested - the ref blew for a foul on it anyway. Good inter-play with Hart.
Olayinka - 7, well taken goal, not standing out as much because others have upped their game, still really like him so hope we can extend his loan spell.
Demetriou - 7, see Demi, that's what happens when you go forwards and don't keep playing backwards - a great cross and assist for the goal! Much more positive from the captain.
McCormack - 8.5, MOTM again, leads by example, does the dirty jobs so well, wins some good free kicks and orchestrates much of what goes on. Can pick a pass and direct and encourage others. Get that contract extension on the table!
Hart - 8, welcome back! Great first game for us, properly involved, didn't stop running the whole time, and the Scunny defence didn't like it.
Akinola - 6.5, as already mentioned, obviously lacking in match sharpness but could develop a good understanding with a CF, not sure if that's Acquah or not.
Acquah - 6.5, still needs to learn to not be bullied and to use his build and athleticism better. Bring in Barry Corr to give him some lessons! Did hold the ball up well on occasions.

Subs:
K Taylor for Akinola - 7, thought he showed the kind of form we'd been used to, got stuck in and seemed to be ready for the fight.
Egbri for Hart - 7, works really well with Elvis when they're allowed to, made a real nuisance of himself.
R Taylor for Acquah - n/a
Goodship for Olayinka - n/a

Let's hope someone has bottled that feeling and they really can believe that their season starts now. Tuesday will be interesting, not sure Macca can play another full game so soon, so wouldn't be surprised to see him and Kyle Taylor reversed for that game.

Twitter has been a great place following the game, with Akinola entering into discussion with supporters and I'll just leave you with this tweet which some may not have seen:

https://twitter.com/x/status/1337836849029648391

I noticed how Hart was jumping on some of the players at the end; seems they all like each other pretty well

 

[in the know]

How do you get half a footballing brain?

By putting grealish's and Barclays brains together

 

[OldBlueLady]

Blimey Kay have you been up all night celebrating?

Lol, was awake at half 2 and couldn't sleep!

 

[Shrimpet steve]

McCormack has made such a big difference. Akinola and Hart had decent moments as well. The team felt like it had a spine.

The experience/quality coming in now the umbongo is gone, hopefully more to come... there's a lot of repairing to do. This season has basically started with a mass handicap which is why I haven't been judging Molesley as much.

There will be tough days ahead, it will be a fight at the bottom end but I think they're now able to take points off similar lower sides, where as before it was losing every game. Win the mini-league games and Southend should stay up.

We can take points off better sides too.Exeter seem to be the best team in this league and we was one second away from beating them with a side which was not as strong as we fielded yesterday so there is great hope and expectation now.

 

[jackj13]

Great to be back and great to get 3 points. With a few additions and playing like that I think we’ll be ok.

In my opinion though I think Richard Taylor caused their defence more problems and competed more for the 10 mins he was on than the entire time Aquah was on.

 

[Ted]

I think the job for Akinola now is to realise he isn’t going to be blessed with chances. It was good to see him going for every header possible and he’ll have to get used to that. He’s going to spend a lot of time doing some not so glamorous work. What will really make the difference for us then is his head not dropping, staying alert and taking that one chance in each game. Going to be a mental game for him this season but he has the power to make an enormous difference.


MM has got some good options for the game vs Grimsby. Can Akinola play up top by himself as we have a lot of good midfield options now with Hart, McCormack, JD, Taylor, Olayinka. I’d probably like to see Olayinka play in behind Akinola as I’m not a fan of our other forward options. Not sure if it’ll be a bit too soon to ask Akinola to do that much work though but Olayinka would certainly give him some good service. Will JD move to right midfield? I hope not as I think we’ll miss his work rate and tenacity in the centre. Finally we have options which is great to see!!!!

 

[Tangled up in Blue]

How do you get half a footballing brain?

Did you go? (pm me if uou like).

 

[ESG]

Lol, was awake at half 2 and couldn't sleep!

You are not alone, same here from 3.30 to 5.30.

 

[yogi bear up the cagire]

For once 'lady luck' smiled on us. Scunny will be extremely annoyed with themselves that they didn't get at least a share of the spoils. The shot from Eisa(?) in the first half that almost broke the goalpost, with Ox well beaten. Then their two golden opportunities, at the death, headed over when it appeared easier to score. That last quarter of an hour was spent squirming in my seat, desperately trying to expunge the memory of that Exeter equaliser from my mind. So even with that wonderful, vital three points there are still concerns at the back of my mind. With the new additions it will no doubt take a few games for the side to settle in but to be sure of survival and to move confidently away from the bottom, we still do need some strengthening. One of the most surprising and gratifying things from yesterday was to look at the League table an find us only four/five points from safety. Looking at the League table is not something I have done a lot of in the past weeks!
I wondered whether Ron understood, as most of us did, how vital were the present four game we are engaged in? I wonder how long the lifting of the embargo had been planned for? Was it just a coincidence that it was for the second of our most important games and the first one in front of fans? Whatever, four points from the matches against Stevenage and Scunny was really the minimum we requred to dig us out of the hole in which we find ourselves. Is it churlish to suggest that if the embargo had been cleared a week ago we probably would have had two points more? Anyway onwards and hopefully upwards. Vital we get at least four points (absolute minimum three) frome Grimsby and Mansfield and we should all then begin to breathe a bit easier.

 

[Stan33]

Thanks CAP, knowing our poxy luck we will be in Tier 3 by then. You really should switch allegiance you know we almost see you as our tame pet sheep these days.

Lamb ?

 

[Rayleigh boy]

obviously the council decision allowed RM to leverage some money from somewhere to lift the embargo ...

this is exactly how he managed things last time we ran out of money and git relegated ...

slash all costs and run the club as a skeleton busisness untill next round of money arrives (which it always will because you control 2 major sites - RH and FF) - last time it was retailers (Sainsburys and British land)and this time it will someone associated with the housing developers.

RM might be cash poor but he is assett rich.

I hope he has got the football bug now (don't forget you can make a lot of money at it) and will invest in playing side and stadium ...

 

[RHB]

Lamb ?

Sadly no, at CAP's age it would be mutton!

 

[Stan33]

Sadly no, at CAP's age it would be mutton!

But very unkind !?

 

[SeldomSeenShrimper]

I forgot to mention it yesterday ....

But that was the best referee we have had for a long time.

He let the game flow, both sets of players were falling over from a shoulder to shoulder and he didn't blow ...

Pleasantly surprised. Even at 0-0 I said to myself that this is a good ref.

That's I wanted to say

 

[Barling Magna]

I think the job for Akinola now is to realise he isn’t going to be blessed with chances. It was good to see him going for every header possible and he’ll have to get used to that. He’s going to spend a lot of time doing some not so glamorous work. What will really make the difference for us then is his head not dropping, staying alert and taking that one chance in each game. Going to be a mental game for him this season but he has the power to make an enormous difference.


MM has got some good options for the game vs Grimsby. Can Akinola play up top by himself as we have a lot of good midfield options now with Hart, McCormack, JD, Taylor, Olayinka. I’d probably like to see Olayinka play in behind Akinola as I’m not a fan of our other forward options. Not sure if it’ll be a bit too soon to ask Akinola to do that much work though but Olayinka would certainly give him some good service. Will JD move to right midfield? I hope not as I think we’ll miss his work rate and tenacity in the centre. Finally we have options which is great to see!!!!

I don't think Akinola is match fit enough to be acting as a lone forward. Now that Oxley is kicking the ball upfield rather than throwing it I think Acquah needs to be upfront too in order to hold the ball up and intimidate the defence - although I thought Richard Taylor looked more impressive at that job so perhaps he is the man.