Steve Tilson

[Tommy2holes]

For what its worth i think that tilly has to stay for the forseeable future and till the very least the end of the year.

Truthfully i doubt we will get relegated allthough current form is a worry. If tilly gets to spend wisely in january and we did get relegated then i think he would walk anyway.

The things that bug me with tilly are:

Lack of tactics or more importantly willingness to change tactics or formations early enough or at all.

Players that he cant motivate who become world beaters when they leave us. Harold mcdonald and hooper scored about 10 goals between them for blues and have 30 this season already. Why cant tilly get the best out of these players?

Willingness to accept that we are beaten by better teams or were not good enough. Its all "we were unlucky or "the referee robbed us". Its the same everytime we lose.

The other thing that annoyes me so much is tilly signs so much rubbish and pays through the nose for them. For me walker is diabolical as a striker and is conference quality at best. He must have seen him play. He has a heart problem and he still gives 100+k for him. Now i really like revel as he works hard , but for me if your a striker you have to score goals. 150k on a striker who scores every 6+ games is a waste. Thats 250+k on strikers who dont score. Thats not factoring in the likes of paynter etc.

Tilly must be one of the most wasteful managers in the lower leagues. Remarkably the players he gets for free or for small fees seem to work well.

In short i am losing patients with tilly's ineptitude and excuses, but i except that time needs to be given to put it right.

January will make or break tilly i hope it makes him, but i worry it could all end badly for a southend legend and a gentleman.

In answer to who i would like to come in , i would have to Aidy boothroyd as he has experience of championship and premiership footy on an extreme budget.

 

[CM2 Blue]

It is really interesting to read the debate and it is evident that contributors are taking part on the basis of recognizing what Tilly has done for the club. What has been so disappointing of late has been that we have lost the art of playing football for long spells in games. Our midfield has tended to sit too deep (perhaps to cover the frailties that are apparent in our defence) and in so doing we hand the initiative to the opposition and forfeit the chance to 'boss' the game. Southend have usually played attractive and thoughtful football over the years, not always as successfully as we would have liked, and in recent matches (Northampton apart) we have seemed quite incapable of doing this. The loss of Gower and Bailey may have had an unforeseen impact on the capacity of our team to maintain shape and play sustained, pressing and attractive football.

As to the Clarke/Barret debate, I concur with those who feel that we looked as strong as we have done all season in the game against Northampton. Francis had his best game for a long, long while and it seems to me that the imposed self-discipline of playing in the middle where it is more difficult to go 'awol' was a factor in his improvement. Like others, I would have liked to see Tilly persevere with the Clarke/Francis pairing for a while.

Finally, Tilly retains my support without question. The joy of our contributions to debate on SZ is that we are not accountable for any of the suggestions about team selection we might make. As manager, Tilly can only please some of the people some of the time at best and he is accountable for his decisions in a way that we are not. He is a fantastic servant of the club and long may this be the case.

 

[Rayleigh boy]

"Southend have usually played attractive and thoughtful football over the years, not always as successfully as we would have liked"

this is really important to me ...... Tilson always wants to play the game and always wants to win it but the right way ..... I would rather have that as my clubs ethos than "success" by any means like say an Allardyce.

And ultimately I think that really matters to the real success of SUFC

 

[Yorkshire Blue]

"Southend have usually played attractive and thoughtful football over the years, not always as successfully as we would have liked"

this is really important to me ...... Tilson always wants to play the game and always wants to win it but the right way ..... I would rather have that as my clubs ethos than "success" by any means like say an Allardyce.

And ultimately I think that really matters to the real success of SUFC

I could cope with winning ugly, but I wouldn't want us to lose or draw ugly. Yet people are suggesting people like Boothroyd as managerial alternatives.

 

[Sandbach Shrimper]

I was worried in the summer by our lack our permanent signings and how much the team had changed and that's surfacing now. We dont have a settled team with all these in and out loan signings and we lack cover in defence. I said at the start of the season this would be a big one for Tilson and possibly his last. I say give him the January window at least. We had a bad Christmas last season and he turned it round in January with signings like Mulgrew, Kanu and Grant. I've got faith in Tilson, he's proven himself in the past.

 

[bishmania]

Hello all, Merry Christmas,

Been away for a few days (not that you'd have noticed I post so little) but just sat down and read the first fe wpages of this thread,

The only sense in ever getting rid of a manager is if you are going to get someone better, which we're not.

At the moment we are a team in transition with no real spending power because of the new stadium being paid for and are dead centre of league one.

No manager better than Tilson is going to want to take on a club like that at the moment.

We feel we should be in the play offs, but we don't yet have the finances and off the pitch things in place to be demanding something like that.

In two years when the Farm is built and we have a Championship-sized stadium, then is the time to push on and demand bigger things, but Tilly is doing the best he can with a threadbare squad at the moment.

Our main weakness is midfield - particularly thorugh the centre - and the only spell of decent form we had was when we had two good, in-form midfielders playing there.

We were forced into the loan market because of finances and Bailey's late change of heart and have suffered (like we all knew we would when JFC and Sawyer weren't there anymore).

He's gone out and got JFC on a permanent to his credit when I'm sure others would have been sniffing around.

We built a brilliant team in a month last Jan but it was ripped out from us in the summer when Flavs, Gower, Bailey, Mulgrew (the last three, three of our best four players towards the end of the season) and we've been trying to rebuild once again through no fault of our own.

In this day of chopping and changing I find it refreshing we're giving a manager time who wants the best for this club and will always be a true legend, it's up to us supporters to show patience and our support :support: during that transition until we can make a run for the promised land!

Apologies for the warble, I hope that made sense, I'm still a little high on festive spirit!!!! :dim:

 

[grassroots]

Good debate and not too many mentions of "look where we were when etc..", thank goodness! In truth and for whatever reason, the Div 1 winning side was dismantled and the replacement signings are quite simply not good enough. Think back to that season, how many loan players did we have then? I cant think of any and this is, I think, where Tilly has hit a brick wall. Unfortunately, his permanent signings have been pretty ordinary and he (or RM!)seems to feel that loanees are the way forward. We now 'enjoy' this disjointed squad of players and it will test Tilly to the extreme and RM's resolve in the coming months. If we make the play-offs, then Tilly would once and for all have proved himself. Mid table consolidation should give us some time to learn lessons, but if we continue to slide, then it will be relegation and he has to go.........but RM has him signed until 2012 - will he want to pay out compensation!

 

[grassroots]

"In two years when the Farm is built and we have a Championship-sized stadium, then is the time to push on and demand bigger things, but Tilly is doing the best he can with a threadbare squad at the moment."

Rely on the new stadium at your peril! It's a long, long way off - if at all. We need to concentrate 'on the now' and this squad is on the slide.

 

[Sean 2]

Steve Tilson rules. Word.

Hard to argue with that when i stare into my cornflake bowl this sunny morning!

Tactically inept was the catchphrase i heard on here a couple of weeks ago,well i thought it was a brave decision yesterday leaving players like Laurent and more so Freedman on the bench then bringing them on to change the game at the death.

Give Tilly and Brush the keys to Southend and be done with it,those boys should be straight into our hall of fame already as they consistently put the town on the map.

Well done the management and i hope that the great draw at Ch£lsea will go some way to pulling in the players we need at this stage of the season.

 

[Irate Ian]

Hard to argue with that when i stare into my cornflake bowl this sunny morning!

Tactically inept was the catchphrase i heard on here a couple of weeks ago,well i thought it was a brave decision yesterday leaving players like Laurent and more so Freedman on the bench then bringing them on to change the game at the death.

Give Tilly and Brush the keys to Southend and be done with it,those boys should be straight into our hall of fame already as they consistently put the town on the map.

Well done the management and i hope that the great draw at Ch£lsea will go some way to pulling in the players we need at this stage of the season.

Can't argue with that. In fact it's about time we had a Hall of Fame, anyone up for opening one in partnership with other like mindeds ?

 

[BrettieAngell]

Tilly is a ****ing legend!

 

[davewebbsbrain]

2 promotions, league 1 champions, 2 LDV cup finals, beating Man Utd and drawing at Stamford Bridge...LEGEND!

 

[Yorkshire Blue]

Good debate and not too many mentions of "look where we were when etc..", thank goodness! In truth and for whatever reason, the Div 1 winning side was dismantled and the replacement signings are quite simply not good enough. Think back to that season, how many loan players did we have then? I cant think of any and this is, I think, where Tilly has hit a brick wall. Unfortunately, his permanent signings have been pretty ordinary and he (or RM!)seems to feel that loanees are the way forward. We now 'enjoy' this disjointed squad of players and it will test Tilly to the extreme and RM's resolve in the coming months. If we make the play-offs, then Tilly would once and for all have proved himself. Mid table consolidation should give us some time to learn lessons, but if we continue to slide, then it will be relegation and he has to go.........but RM has him signed until 2012 - will he want to pay out compensation!

How do you expect Tilson to sign players permanently outside of the transfer window? Once the season starts he can only sign players on emergency loan until the transfer window re-opens.

JCR was at least one loan signing during our championship winning team. Lee Bradbury might have been another.

 

[BrettieAngell]

How do you expect Tilson to sign players permanently outside of the transfer window? Once the season starts he can only sign players on emergency loan until the transfer window re-opens.

JCR was at least one loan signing during our championship winning team. Lee Bradbury might have been another.

Macca in league two.