It was one of the games that happen in a season, it just didn't gel today. We won, 3 points i'll take that. Southend deserve a mention, they had a go and good luck to them for the rest of the season.
We got away with it thanks to an excellent performance by the defence. Mind you I lost count of the number of times Basey gave the ball away in the second half which meant Southend kept coming straight back at them. I thought Burton played a good game up front and wouldn't be as critical of Mooney as some.
Thought Spring made a difference when he came on with his tidy calm play. Two wingers is always dodgy but Waggy did some great runs....the boy could be a star. Sam did alright...made a goal and did some good defensive play. After the slagging Omo has had on here i thought he did okay as well. loved Elliot's catch from behind his head...plus when Bailey did his dying swan act i wondered if he would manage to roll back on the pitch, Drogba style. He did!
I didn't think we were great but thought Southend offered very little apart from effort and Barnard's first half chance. Was quite impressed by Wagstaff today. Important win and Youga and Semedo should be back for the Stockport game. My only bit of a worry is that Akpo could be leaving this week and we'll have to start using McLeod more.
Missed both Brighton and this game - just got back tonight from a week visiting Palestinian refugee camps. But thought I'd better say something before admin or Sir Henry Irving accuses me of only coming on here when we lose!
Delighted by both results, for different reasons. Brighton, obviously, as we had to start winning away from home again. But also today as it sounds like we ground out a win in a game in which we were off the pace and last season would have certainly lost badly (under either manager).
Great to see Burton scoring so prolifically - and interesting that his hernia, a subject so heavily discussed on CL a few weeks ago, now barely gets a mention here !
And terrific to have Robbie back in goal. It sounds like Ikeme had a great game today for Shef U v Plymouth but personally I feel a lot more secure with Elliot and it sounds like he made a crucial safe this afternoon that in the end was worth two points.
But having been away for the last two games, a few questions for those who were there today :
a) how worried should we be about Racon's inability to stamp himself on a game?
b) do others share my concerns about Richardson's fragility?
c) what do we make of Wagstaff and even Spring leap-frogging Shelvey in the midfield pecking order?
d) Is Omo improving? I confess he has scared the life out of me every time I've seen him, but in the two games I've missed this week he has participated in two clean sheets...
Well done, Parky for a stirring recovery from that horrible Carlisle/Northwich/Southampton spell, and I really don't want to focus on the negatives. But I would be genuinely interested in thoughts on the questions above...
[cite]Posted By: nigel w[/cite]Missed both Brighton and this game - just got back tonight from a week visiting Palestinian refugee camps. But thought I'd better say something before admin or Sir Henry Irving accuses me of only coming on here when we lose!
Delighted by both results, for different reasons. Brighton, obviously, as we had to start winning away from home again. But also today as it sounds like we ground out a win in a game in which we were off the pace and last season would have certainly lost badly (under either manager).
Great to see Burton scoring so prolifically - and interesting that his hernia, a subject so heavily discussed on CL a few weeks ago, now barely gets a mention here !
And terrific to have Robbie back in goal. It sounds like Ikeme had a great game today for Shef U v Plymouth but personally I feel a lot more secure with Elliot and it sounds like he made a crucial safe this afternoon that in the end was worth two points.
But having been away for the last two games, a few questions for those who were there today :
a) how worried should we be about Racon's inability to stamp himself on a game?
b) do others share my concerns about Richardson's fragility?
c) what do we make of Wagstaff and even Spring leap-frogging Shelvey in the midfield pecking order?
d) Is Omo improving? I confess he has scared the life out of my every time I've seen him, but in the two games I've missed this week he has participated in two clean sheets...
Well done, Parky for a stirring recovery from that horrible Carlisle/Northwich/Southampton spell, and I really don't want to focus on the negatives. But I would be genuinely interested in thoughts on the questions above...
a) Racon was poor in my view and got himself stupidly booked for persistent fouling despite the ref warning him. He did produce one little piece of class in the second half losing a defender before chipping narrowly high and wide. That apart very different to the player he was earlier in the season.
b) Yes. If fit my first choice and was ok today but something is badly wrong and we need to sort it.
c) Horses for courses. Waggy is a specialist wide player and in theory Spring is the best fit to Semedo even though Racon started. We were overrun at times in midfield so probably a good one for Jonjo to miss.
d) Yes. Couldn't fault him and even showed a little coming forward at times. I prefer Richardson though personally.
Why are we even worrying?Leeds have played poorly on countless occasions this season and scraped wins! We cant play well every single game.....you got to remember before today we had scored 9 goals in our last 2 games at the valley! Give the boys a break! Onwards and Upwards...and i cant wait for stockport next week!
Was "watching it" on BBC Sport website whilst away on holiday - our possession went to 67% mid first half to under 50% late in the 2nd - must have been pretty bad at times !
Never mind, Millwall soon - still trying to work out where to drink pre-match!
[Quote]But having been away for the last two games, a few questions for those who were there today :
a) how worried should we be about Racon's inability to stamp himself on a game?
b) do others share my concerns about Richardson's fragility?
c) what do we make of Wagstaff and even Spring leap-frogging Shelvey in the midfield pecking order?
d) Is Omo improving? I confess he has scared the life out of my every time I've seen him, but in the two games I've missed this week he has participated in two clean sheets[Quote]
My only concern about Racon is if he keeps being picked amd not performing. he seems to have lost interest or maybe it is just form, needs a few games in the reserves and tyo come off the bench before starting again.
Answering b) and c) Omosuzi's improvement in the last two games shoild mean that we can give richardson time to get back to FULL fitness, am pretty confident Omosuzi can do a job for us, plus Kelly is back next week andmay struggleto get left back off Basey who is performing well.
Horses for courses, Shelv's ain't a winger and although Wagstaff is a right winger, it is hobsons choice between who to play out of position,personally I would prefer a winger to a central midfielder. Bringing on Spring instead of Shelv's was also a correct call, we needed someone who would take root and hold idfield and not chase up the field - Shelv's is a box to box player, which is not we needed at the time, if Racon had been performing and bailey had need to go off then I would have bought on Shelv's
[cite]Posted By: Southendaddick[/cite]Terrible game, terrible atmosphere but a wins a win.
I got the feeling everyone had the Millwall game on their minds.
Funny how folk see things differently....wouldn't describe it as a terrible game...not a good game I agree but 'not' terrible.
In fact some quite nice football was played by both sides...particularly in the first half...we won ugly as they say and that is important to be able to do sometimes.
To describe it as terrible is IMHO way OTT....now Northwitch is another thing altogether....that WAS terrible!
Poor game but I think you have to give some credit to Southend who were much better than I thought they would be--so, all in all, a good win while playing badly. Did anyone else think the best player on the pitch was their number 26--Francis Laurent. Very quick, lots of tricks and powerful. A handful throughout the game. Perhaps we can sign him up in the January window?
I thought halfway through the second half the substitution to make was to put an extra midfield player on to get control of the middle of the park where Southend were running things. Maybe, take off Mooney and Racon and bring on Spring and Jonjo.
Len said it was "Curbs like performance" and that is just what my brother said to me mid way through the 2nd half.
Ala Curbs we weren't playing well so we dug in, defended well enough, although we gave away a lot of free kicks, and won the game.
We couldn't get our passing game going or get behind them often enough due to them putting five in the middle and defending well.
Not quite the "parking the bus" I predicted as Southend played some good passing football without really creating many chances after Barnard missed what should have been the opening goal. Elliot did well but should never have been given a chance.
Defence did their job. Sodje got his head on most things. Dailly tidied up and Basey worked hard. Looked like Richardson had a head injury so perhaps not the same injury as before. Omo came on and did his job well if unspectacularly. Maybe could have got forward more but could have been instructed to sit back.
I've always been a big fan of Racon but not a good game from him. To his credit he was always looking for the ball and to try and close down but just didn't get going. Had 3 decent shooting chances none of which hit the target. When on form they would have been at least testing the keeper.
Shows again what a miss Semedo is. Looked better when Spring came on as he sat and occupied the space that Southend had had to themselves too often.
Another goal from Burton and the usual hard graft and lay - offs. Mooney should have scored when set up by Deon. Mooney didn't get much out of their defence but neither really did A Sodje.
Hope it was just one of those games that you have to grind out. Leeds have done the same more than once. Worry was that if they had equalised we didn't look like creating many more chances but that is an "if". We did score, we did win and we stretched the gap to 7th place a bit more. Think we are safe in the play-off places until Xmas at least now : - )
Stockport next. Bottom and on a losing streak so 3 easy points? No, we'll be worrying about banana skins etc, etc.
If Youga is fit would like to see Basey play LM in front of him. Omo looks capable of a full game at RB now and if not we can switch Kelly and pull Basey back. Semedo back of course.
[cite]Posted By: dwb[/cite]Poor game but I think you have to give some credit to Southend who were much better than I thought they would be--so, all in all, a good win while playing badly. Did anyone else think the best player on the pitch was their number 26--Francis Laurent. Very quick, lots of tricks and powerful. A handful throughout the game. Perhaps we can sign him up in the January window?
I thought halfway through the second half the substitution to make was to put an extra midfield player on to get control of the middle of the park where Southend were running things. Maybe, take off Mooney and Racon and bring on Spring and Jonjo.
Agree about Laurent. Shame he doesn't play on the right.
And if we ever needed to go 451 it was the second half.
Plusses...we won and kept a clean sheet. Basey was excellent (the only time he got beaten was in 2nd half when he slipped as he was about to challenge). Omozusi did well (the header out from 6 yard area under pressure was brilliant...ref gave a foul). Burton was Burton...matchwinner. Sam created another goal. Sodje only missed one free-header and was otherwise really dominant. Dailly was excellent. The team dug in, tried hard and won. The official crowd was quite good. Leeds dropped a couple of points...as did Huddersfield. We didn't get nearly as wet as we did at Yeovil.
Minusses....it was crap to watch. Wagstaff tried but made no real impact (can't recall one cross from him. He's very much work in progress). Sodje Minor came on for half an hour and was even less effective than Mooney....looked totally off the pace and may have only touched ball once or twice. Richardson got injured again. Racon looked short of confidence (needs to add a bit of nous to his game to go with the ability that he clearly has). Norwich won again and Holt scored yet another goal. The beer wasn't brilliant in the pub beforehand.
Overview...despite Southend looking good for much of the game, they created very little. Our defence worked well with midfield to keep them out of our final third. Bailey continues to look the best centre midfielder at the club and likewise Burton at centre-forward. The team may well be learning how to win matches despite not dominating. This bodes well for away matches in particular. Long long season....
[cite]Posted By: dwb[/cite]
I thought halfway through the second half the substitution to make was to put an extra midfield player on to get control of the middle of the park where Southend were running things. Maybe, take off Mooney and Racon and bring on Spring and Jonjo.
As we had the lead I agree with you there.
It's noticable that since we have gone 4-4-2 we understandably don't run the midfield as much (not just yesterday) but you could see the problems that playing one up front causes for any team. Southend created very little despite some decent football and possesion. Early season we dominated games and were maybe a bit fortunate to convert enough of the chances we created?
We should continue to play to our strengths. We will score more than most teams in enough games to gain promotion if we carry on taking the game to them.
To put it in gentleman's terms if you've been out for a night and you're looking for a young lady and you pull one, some weeks they're good looking and some weeks they're not the best. Our performance today would have been not the best looking bird but at least we got her in the taxi. She weren't the best looking lady we ended up taking home but she was very pleasant and very nice, so thanks very much, let's have a coffee"
[cite]Posted By: T.C.E[/cite]To put it in gentleman's terms if you've been out for a night and you're looking for a young lady and you pull one, some weeks they're good looking and some weeks they're not the best. Our performance today would have been not the best looking bird but at least we got her in the taxi. She weren't the best looking lady we ended up taking home but she was very pleasant and very nice, so thanks very much, let's have a coffee"
Overview...despite Southend looking good for much of the game, they created very little. Our defence worked well with midfield to keep them out of our final third. Bailey continues to look the best centre midfielder at the club and likewise Burton at centre-forward. The team may well be learning how to win matches despite not dominating. This bodes well for away matches in particular. Long long season....
Agree with this.
Last season we would have lost a game like this.
Tilson felt they were the better team and he may have a case, but most of their football was played in their own half or just inside ours.
They did look dangerous at times when they ran at the heart of our defence (something I wish we would do more)
In the end though, as you say, we managed to keep stop them from doing much in the final third.
Barnard missed his guilt edged chance; fortunately must have built up enough credit to avoid serious stick from his fans (imagine McLeod missing one like that for us).
I did wonder whether Southend play that well every week; their league position would suggest otherwise.
I know we have to live with it but it's bloody irritating when some mid table side starts passing it about like Brazil when they come to the Valley.
2nd half was dire - thankful to come away with the points.
We 'parked the bus' 2nd half & it seemed to me as if Bailey had been asked to drop deeper. This allowed Southend to dominate the middle of the park, as Racon was unable to exert much influence. As a result the two wide players also seemed to lose their way & our attacking options were severely limited.
Can't argue with the outcome, but I don't understand why we approached the 2nd half in the way we did & thereby handed the initiative to Southend.
[cite]Posted By: Six-a-bag-of-nuts[/cite]I did wonder whether Southend play that well every week; their league position would suggest otherwise.
Didn't realise until the other day Walsall are just outside the playoffs, and I thought they had nothing at all going forward when we played them. We were very comfortable that game, yesterday we weren't but did enough in the end.
a wins a win and we're in a pub league so the standard isn't gonna be great and that was as bad a win as you can get (just hope we haven't used up too much of our luck, which we should be saving for the millwall game)
i missed the big wins v mk dons and rovers and since getting back i've seen 2 grinding victories something i didn't think we were capable of but fairplay to parky he's turned the squad into a decent unit after that slump a few weeks back...
pleased with omosuzi, sam, dailly, sodje,bailey , burton(he has performed much much better than i thought he was capable of and fairplay to him and parky for getting him to that level)
elliot is an accident waiting to happen imo , great save in first half and amateur spill/drop in the second half from what should have been a routine catch and the scary moment when he nearly stepped back into his goal..
racon is a luxury poor player who i have never fancied
wagstaff will need a miraculous improvement form somewher if he is to make a career out of football , although his effort and commitment to the cause was commendable his ability is severly lacking
not sure about basey or mooney ....
anyway next up @ home the scum , 13 years without having to talk football with them chumps (cheers curbs) and now we're playing them, i feel sick .... still whatever the result we'll be above them mugs at the end of the day
agree with Oohaah about Elliott, he worries me sometimes with his decision making.
Seem to be alot of positives about Basey in this thread, to be honest I thought he was awful. His complete lack of pace means he will never play at LB at any level higher than league 1, think the only position I would have him would be as back up holding midfielder.
Waggy tried hard and had one great run in the first half but I'm still to be convinced.
Personally I thought Daily was our best player yesterday, howevr no one really stood out.....just glad to get the win really.
Gonna need to be 1,000% more at the races for the next home game !!.
[cite]Posted By: Elthamaddick[/cite]terrible game, but a wins a win.
agree with Oohaah about Elliott, he worries me sometimes with his decision making.
Seem to be alot of positives about Basey in this thread, to be honest I thought he was awful. His complete lack of pace means he will never play at LB at any level higher than league 1, think the only position I would have him would be as back up holding midfielder.
Waggy tried hard and had one great run in the first half but I'm still to be convinced.
I am sorry but I tend to agree with this post regarding Basey. League one is as far as it goes for Basey as a full back. Not too sure whether he even has the pace for any position other than a central defender to be honest. I am also reluctantly agreeing that Robbie is not as good as many on here think he is. He is still young for a goalkeeper so I hope he does go on and prove me wrong. Think Wagstaff is a typical winger. Sometimes he will look brilliant and on other occasions will be totally ineffective. Sam is a better player imho but then again he has much more experience so perhaps Waggy can carve out a career but like Basey I can`t see it being any higher than league one. Those three aside I think the rest are more than capable of getting us into the playoffs at least,
Personally I thought Daily was our best player yesterday, howevr no one really stood out.....just glad to get the win really.
Gonna need to be 1,000% more at the races for the next home game !!.
[cite]Posted By: ShootersHillGuru[/cite]I am sorry but I tend to agree with this post regarding Basey. League one is as far as it goes for Basey as a full back. Not too sure whether he even has the pace for any position other than a central defender to be honest. I am also reluctantly agreeing that Robbie is not as good as many on here think he is. He is still young for a goalkeeper so I hope he does go on and prove me wrong. Think Wagstaff is a typical winger. Sometimes he will look brilliant and on other occasions will be totally ineffective. Sam is a better player imho but then again he has much more experience so perhaps Waggy can carve out a career but like Basey I can`t see it being any higher than league one. Those three aside I think the rest are more than capable of getting us into the playoffs at least,
I know what you mean, though some will say it's harsh. Can't see Basey breaking into midfield, other than occasionally as back up. Centre back might well be the best position for him.
Elliot - I like him, he's quite reliable for a young keeper, makes the odd mistake but all players do. He could end up improving as the team does (well, if the team does) or get to a point where we need better (long way off though, he was certainly no worse than Weaver in the Championship, and that was with a poor team in front of him).
Wagstaff that's a good point, players like him will always have those flashes of quality but another day can look ineffective like you say. Like Basey he's out of contract in the summer, so it'll be interesting to see where they are next season. I can imagine Parkinson making decisions on them at the end of the season.
Comments
Two wingers is always dodgy but Waggy did some great runs....the boy could be a star. Sam did alright...made a goal and did some good defensive play. After the slagging Omo has had on here i thought he did okay as well. loved Elliot's catch from behind his head...plus when Bailey did his dying swan act i wondered if he would manage to roll back on the pitch, Drogba style. He did!
Delighted by both results, for different reasons. Brighton, obviously, as we had to start winning away from home again. But also today as it sounds like we ground out a win in a game in which we were off the pace and last season would have certainly lost badly (under either manager).
Great to see Burton scoring so prolifically - and interesting that his hernia, a subject so heavily discussed on CL a few weeks ago, now barely gets a mention here !
And terrific to have Robbie back in goal. It sounds like Ikeme had a great game today for Shef U v Plymouth but personally I feel a lot more secure with Elliot and it sounds like he made a crucial safe this afternoon that in the end was worth two points.
But having been away for the last two games, a few questions for those who were there today :
a) how worried should we be about Racon's inability to stamp himself on a game?
b) do others share my concerns about Richardson's fragility?
c) what do we make of Wagstaff and even Spring leap-frogging Shelvey in the midfield pecking order?
d) Is Omo improving? I confess he has scared the life out of me every time I've seen him, but in the two games I've missed this week he has participated in two clean sheets...
Well done, Parky for a stirring recovery from that horrible Carlisle/Northwich/Southampton spell, and I really don't want to focus on the negatives. But I would be genuinely interested in thoughts on the questions above...
a) Racon was poor in my view and got himself stupidly booked for persistent fouling despite the ref warning him. He did produce one little piece of class in the second half losing a defender before chipping narrowly high and wide. That apart very different to the player he was earlier in the season.
b) Yes. If fit my first choice and was ok today but something is badly wrong and we need to sort it.
c) Horses for courses. Waggy is a specialist wide player and in theory Spring is the best fit to Semedo even though Racon started. We were overrun at times in midfield so probably a good one for Jonjo to miss.
d) Yes. Couldn't fault him and even showed a little coming forward at times. I prefer Richardson though personally.
Onwards and Upwards...and i cant wait for stockport next week!
Never mind, Millwall soon - still trying to work out where to drink pre-match!
I got the feeling everyone had the Millwall game on their minds.
a) how worried should we be about Racon's inability to stamp himself on a game?
b) do others share my concerns about Richardson's fragility?
c) what do we make of Wagstaff and even Spring leap-frogging Shelvey in the midfield pecking order?
d) Is Omo improving? I confess he has scared the life out of my every time I've seen him, but in the two games I've missed this week he has participated in two clean sheets[Quote]
My only concern about Racon is if he keeps being picked amd not performing. he seems to have lost interest or maybe it is just form, needs a few games in the reserves and tyo come off the bench before starting again.
Answering b) and c) Omosuzi's improvement in the last two games shoild mean that we can give richardson time to get back to FULL fitness, am pretty confident Omosuzi can do a job for us, plus Kelly is back next week andmay struggleto get left back off Basey who is performing well.
Horses for courses, Shelv's ain't a winger and although Wagstaff is a right winger, it is hobsons choice between who to play out of position,personally I would prefer a winger to a central midfielder. Bringing on Spring instead of Shelv's was also a correct call, we needed someone who would take root and hold idfield and not chase up the field - Shelv's is a box to box player, which is not we needed at the time, if Racon had been performing and bailey had need to go off then I would have bought on Shelv's
Funny how folk see things differently....wouldn't describe it as a terrible game...not a good game I agree but 'not' terrible.
In fact some quite nice football was played by both sides...particularly in the first half...we won ugly as they say and that is important to be able to do sometimes.
To describe it as terrible is IMHO way OTT....now Northwitch is another thing altogether....that WAS terrible!
I thought halfway through the second half the substitution to make was to put an extra midfield player on to get control of the middle of the park where Southend were running things. Maybe, take off Mooney and Racon and bring on Spring and Jonjo.
Ala Curbs we weren't playing well so we dug in, defended well enough, although we gave away a lot of free kicks, and won the game.
We couldn't get our passing game going or get behind them often enough due to them putting five in the middle and defending well.
Not quite the "parking the bus" I predicted as Southend played some good passing football without really creating many chances after Barnard missed what should have been the opening goal. Elliot did well but should never have been given a chance.
Defence did their job. Sodje got his head on most things. Dailly tidied up and Basey worked hard. Looked like Richardson had a head injury so perhaps not the same injury as before. Omo came on and did his job well if unspectacularly. Maybe could have got forward more but could have been instructed to sit back.
I've always been a big fan of Racon but not a good game from him. To his credit he was always looking for the ball and to try and close down but just didn't get going. Had 3 decent shooting chances none of which hit the target. When on form they would have been at least testing the keeper.
Shows again what a miss Semedo is. Looked better when Spring came on as he sat and occupied the space that Southend had had to themselves too often.
Another goal from Burton and the usual hard graft and lay - offs. Mooney should have scored when set up by Deon. Mooney didn't get much out of their defence but neither really did A Sodje.
Hope it was just one of those games that you have to grind out. Leeds have done the same more than once. Worry was that if they had equalised we didn't look like creating many more chances but that is an "if". We did score, we did win and we stretched the gap to 7th place a bit more. Think we are safe in the play-off places until Xmas at least now : - )
Stockport next. Bottom and on a losing streak so 3 easy points? No, we'll be worrying about banana skins etc, etc.
If Youga is fit would like to see Basey play LM in front of him. Omo looks capable of a full game at RB now and if not we can switch Kelly and pull Basey back. Semedo back of course.
LLL&BH
Agree about Laurent. Shame he doesn't play on the right.
And if we ever needed to go 451 it was the second half.
Plusses...we won and kept a clean sheet. Basey was excellent (the only time he got beaten was in 2nd half when he slipped as he was about to challenge). Omozusi did well (the header out from 6 yard area under pressure was brilliant...ref gave a foul). Burton was Burton...matchwinner. Sam created another goal. Sodje only missed one free-header and was otherwise really dominant. Dailly was excellent. The team dug in, tried hard and won. The official crowd was quite good. Leeds dropped a couple of points...as did Huddersfield. We didn't get nearly as wet as we did at Yeovil.
Minusses....it was crap to watch. Wagstaff tried but made no real impact (can't recall one cross from him. He's very much work in progress). Sodje Minor came on for half an hour and was even less effective than Mooney....looked totally off the pace and may have only touched ball once or twice. Richardson got injured again. Racon looked short of confidence (needs to add a bit of nous to his game to go with the ability that he clearly has). Norwich won again and Holt scored yet another goal. The beer wasn't brilliant in the pub beforehand.
Overview...despite Southend looking good for much of the game, they created very little. Our defence worked well with midfield to keep them out of our final third. Bailey continues to look the best centre midfielder at the club and likewise Burton at centre-forward. The team may well be learning how to win matches despite not dominating. This bodes well for away matches in particular. Long long season....
As we had the lead I agree with you there.
It's noticable that since we have gone 4-4-2 we understandably don't run the midfield as much (not just yesterday) but you could see the problems that playing one up front causes for any team. Southend created very little despite some decent football and possesion. Early season we dominated games and were maybe a bit fortunate to convert enough of the chances we created?
We should continue to play to our strengths. We will score more than most teams in enough games to gain promotion if we carry on taking the game to them.
Had two muppets behind me constantly slagging off Bailey and calling for him to be subbed even though we'd made our three changes.
Just in case anyone hasn't seen it
>
Agree with this.
Last season we would have lost a game like this.
Tilson felt they were the better team and he may have a case, but most of their football was played in their own half or just inside ours.
They did look dangerous at times when they ran at the heart of our defence (something I wish we would do more)
In the end though, as you say, we managed to keep stop them from doing much in the final third.
Barnard missed his guilt edged chance; fortunately must have built up enough credit to avoid serious stick from his fans (imagine McLeod missing one like that for us).
I did wonder whether Southend play that well every week; their league position would suggest otherwise.
I know we have to live with it but it's bloody irritating when some mid table side starts passing it about like Brazil when they come to the Valley.
We 'parked the bus' 2nd half & it seemed to me as if Bailey had been asked to drop deeper. This allowed Southend to dominate the middle of the park, as Racon was unable to exert much influence. As a result the two wide players also seemed to lose their way & our attacking options were severely limited.
Can't argue with the outcome, but I don't understand why we approached the 2nd half in the way we did & thereby handed the initiative to Southend.
i missed the big wins v mk dons and rovers and since getting back i've seen 2 grinding victories something i didn't think we were capable of but fairplay to parky he's turned the squad into a decent unit after that slump a few weeks back...
pleased with omosuzi, sam, dailly, sodje,bailey , burton(he has performed much much better than i thought he was capable of and fairplay to him and parky for getting him to that level)
elliot is an accident waiting to happen imo , great save in first half and amateur spill/drop in the second half from what should have been a routine catch and the scary moment when he nearly stepped back into his goal..
racon is a luxury poor player who i have never fancied
wagstaff will need a miraculous improvement form somewher if he is to make a career out of football , although his effort and commitment to the cause was commendable his ability is severly lacking
not sure about basey or mooney ....
anyway next up @ home the scum , 13 years without having to talk football with them chumps (cheers curbs) and now we're playing them, i feel sick .... still whatever the result we'll be above them mugs at the end of the day
agree with Oohaah about Elliott, he worries me sometimes with his decision making.
Seem to be alot of positives about Basey in this thread, to be honest I thought he was awful. His complete lack of pace means he will never play at LB at any level higher than league 1, think the only position I would have him would be as back up holding midfielder.
Waggy tried hard and had one great run in the first half but I'm still to be convinced.
Personally I thought Daily was our best player yesterday, howevr no one really stood out.....just glad to get the win really.
Gonna need to be 1,000% more at the races for the next home game !!.
Elliot - I like him, he's quite reliable for a young keeper, makes the odd mistake but all players do. He could end up improving as the team does (well, if the team does) or get to a point where we need better (long way off though, he was certainly no worse than Weaver in the Championship, and that was with a poor team in front of him).
Wagstaff that's a good point, players like him will always have those flashes of quality but another day can look ineffective like you say. Like Basey he's out of contract in the summer, so it'll be interesting to see where they are next season. I can imagine Parkinson making decisions on them at the end of the season.