If we still had Freddy Eastwood .....

[duncan bulgaria]

I think the problem with Freddy wasn't so much it all going to his head and he was becoming lazy, as it was going to his team-mates' heads.

Freddy was never the hardest worker, preferring to 'save his energy for when it mattered', what changed was that his team-mates thought all they had to do was give it to Freddy and sit-back and wait to trot back to the centre-circle for kick-off. Our attacks became one-dimensional and when Freddy had the ball we had a distinct lack of off-the-ball movement which Freddy needed in order to give him half a chance of beating 4 or 5 men and putting it in the top corner from 25 yards.

Very true , All the opposing manager really had to say to the team in the dressing room was , snub out Eastwood and you snub out southend .

At League one level the defenders were not good enough to do that but in the CCC most were , so i felt a little for Eastwood as he had his work made twice as hard by the fact that every team would make sure they doubled up on him .

 

[Yorkshire Blue]

Its not so much the opposition, but his team-mates. As soon as players got the ball to Eastwood they felt their job was done, despite the fact that he was 35 yards out with 4 men on him.

 

[sufcintheprem]

Simple answer for you then JS , any thread you see with Eastwood in the title don't open , then hey you wouldn't need to get the hump ;)

People still look back on the lad with fond memories and i am one of them , yes he has moved on and so have we but this is a message board where people can talk about anything southend related past and present .

Exactly. The times we had with Eastwood were the best I've ever seen at Southend. Playing Nottingham Forest to win the league? I would have laughed at you 10 years ago. Going to White Hart Lane twice in one season? Would never happen.

In answer to the question, we're still conceding far too many goals. Prior from 2004 would be much appreciated, though.