Official Match Thread Southend United v Barnsley 2nd Round FA Cup

[Brett Angle]

I do think he’ll be here. I bloody hope so too. This season has been a nightmare combination of elderly duffers signed by Brown (who don’t get injured) but far too many our decent players getting hugely unlucky season-ending injuries. We can (understandably) question tactics and subs, but remember we have another game on Wednesday and some tough league matches before we get to the transfer window.

Think it's a bit unfair to still be blaming Brown. Fortune, Rangers, Ferdinand, Wordsworth, Wright - players who arguably had the big reputations and we were originally lauding Brown for, rarely delivered and have all since moved on. He did sign some good ones amongst the duds and gave youth a chance in Yearwood and Bwomono. Not sure the players that CP has brought in permanently have achieved much more. In fact with the exception of Hopper - they have hitherto delivered arguably less. I'm not convinced that we have traded up in terms of the managerial team - or indeed the playing staff. The only silver lining at the moment is the work Ricky Duncan is doing - giving us a little hope for the future - but it imperative we keep our L1 status and give time for the talented group of youngsters time to breakthrough.

 

[AndyT]

^
Spot on, Brett.

Not sure what people expected Brown to have done. He was on a short term remit to accelerate the club forward into Championship level football, to run alongside the development of Fossett's Farm, yet had a limited budget and wage structure.

He saw the best way was to bring in experienced players, in general, to go with some younger ones coming through or on loan, knowing some of our best assets were likely to move on in the interim. A typical scenario in the lower divisions.

Under this set-up he achieved some very good results, overall. The "elderly duffers", were all players who contributed to the success of the side. Most of them have moved on, anyway, so how they are still linked to SCP's side I've no idea. However, to say that Ferdinand, Fortune and the like were a hindrance, just isn't factually correct. Take the 2016-17 season as an example, where a run of only 4 defeats in 28 matches saw us finish 7th whilst scoring 70 goals. Most of these Brown signings played a huge part in that season.

The reason we are running into a trough at the moment has nothing to do with Brown's management rein. Indeed, our best players in recent matches played under Brown. It's a combination of things that as a whole, add up to a lack of results - Injuries, tactics, form and so on.

The other myth is that we played "hoof ball" under Brown. If anything, we over passed it. I saw some of the best football we'd played since Tilly's days when Brown was here. Certainly didn't see much criticism when we were passing it through high-flying Bradford's back four at RH a couple of years back.

I like SCP as a person and I think he is a decent manager, but he has to settle on a side and stick with it, I feel. Brown did this eventually in 2016-17 and we went on that run of results mentioned earlier.

The players are good enough for this level. It's what they are asked to do and how much they want it themselves which will define the rest of this campaign.