Post-Match Thread and Ratings Southend United 2 -0 Northampton Town

[Jam_Man]

Those 4 home games we scored 2 goals !You cannot win football matches scoring just twice in 6 hours of home football it's ridiculous .

Yes and 3 of the last 4 games we have scored 2 goals each in.

It seems the only acceptable result is a 2 or 3-0 win when we totally dominate a game playing like Barca.

This is league Two, sometimes you have grind games out.

 

[chapperzUK]

I have said this a thousand times which is Corr is often isolated and being battered by CB's!

Northampton knew how to stop us and were comfortable until the red and penalty!,Without that pen we could still be playing now and not score.

Corr has my sympathy as he constantly plays with his back to goal and rarely has the chance to face the play.

Agreed, the one time he was facing the goal and received the ball he got a decent shot away. Having another striker next to him to receive the knock ons will help. It will mean he will still not get the chances, but there will be another forward there to be in the more advanced position.

Jack would prosper even more playing behind 2 forwards IMO as his quick feet and speed of thought would allow him to get further up the pitch,ATM Corr tries to feed him little lay offs but they rarely come off as Barry is constantly under pressure trying to even control the ball let alone lay it accurately .

Agreed again! With 1 up front it allows the other central defender to either be a free man or watch the attacking midfielder, i.e. Payne. Having 2 up front could give him more space, but who would you drop from midfield?

 

[Jam_Man]

Agreed, the one time he was facing the goal and received the ball he got a decent shot away. Having another striker next to him to receive the knock ons will help. It will mean he will still not get the chances, but there will be another forward there to be in the more advanced position.

Agreed again! With 1 up front it allows the other central defender to either be a free man or watch the attacking midfielder, i.e. Payne. Having 2 up front could give him more space, but who would you drop from midfield?

That would certainly benefit Payne to an extent but also shackle him as he would be expected to play deeper and track back more, even if you played 3-5-2

You cant play 442/4411/442 Diamond (rolling off the FM ta with Payne in the middle as he would really be shackled

 

[mrsblue]

Corr and ???? Shaq well out of sorts so we only have JJ....Scandalous squad depth!

Jack has the free role


Worral Lenny Hurst

Deegan sitting

 

[Jam_Man]

Corr and ???? Shaq well out of sorts so we only have JJ....Scandalous squad depth!

Jack has the free role


Worral Lenny Hurst

Deegan sitting

Having to change to a 3-5-2 that hasnt worked for us in the past and asking Hurst and Worrall to play as wingbacks ?

 

[mrsblue]

Having to change to a 3-5-2 that hasnt worked for us in the past and asking Hurst and Worrall to play as wingbacks ?

My line up would be attack minded,2 up top will have the CB's under pressure whilst Jack does his own thing,Lenny driving up the pitch alongside Worral and Hurst,Drop the back 3 low with Deegan giving cover and hey that line up will score more than they concede.

 

[Jam_Man]

My line up would be attack minded,2 up top will have the CB's under pressure whilst Jack does his own thing,Lenny driving up the pitch alongside Worral and Hurst,Drop the back 3 low with Deegan giving cover and hey that line up will score more than they concede.

Bit like the current set up then ? :smile:

Whilst I would like to see two up front I personally dont think 352 is a decent formation, I dont see playing 3 central defenders as more attacking and it would actually restrict Worrall and Hurst, turning two of our most attacking players into defenders every time we lost the ball.

 

[mrsblue]

Yes and 3 of the last 4 games we have scored 2 goals each in.

It seems the only acceptable result is a 2 or 3-0 win when we totally dominate a game playing like Barca.

This is league Two, sometimes you have grind games out.

Not at all.

Every manager has limited time to stamp their style of play,Phil has had near on 90 games and whilst some of you are just thankful for any type of win others want something more.Yes 4 wins on the bounce against lowly clubs.

Teams which look promotion candidates have the extra class to break down opponents,us on Saturday looked clueless!

Those 4 wins are welcomed very much but the games I have seen we are woeful and simply do not look like promotion favourites.

 

[dannypav]

Wilder knew how we would play and for over an hour his awful team which had no attacking threat were heading for a point or possibly better.Our problem under the system we use is when the opponent has severe attacking threat we then become cornered as we cannot get up the pitch in numbers,I love Jack but he ain't superman he needs support in numbers.

A point , possibly.
Better ?
Seeing as they failed to hit the target and would have retreated further as the game went on , I doubt this.

 

[Jam_Man]

Wilder said they were going to open up later on and try to nick a win, and if they had done that we could possibly have found it easier to score ourselves so there is no certainty we wouldnt have won.

We needed to break them down and whilst it took a bit of goalkeeping stupidity to do so we did.

Promotion favourites? No of course we arent favourites, but is that really the only acceptable limit ?!

We are certainly play-off contenders and within touching distance of top, we will get a sterner test the next couple of games against top teams, but we have slipped up against lower teams plenty over the past few years so winning 4 on the bounce is still an achievement.

 

[onceknownasrab]

Jam. I understand that Corr leads the line and has his back to goal. Me and others are talking about when the ball is going wide, and the cross comes in and our tallest player up front is slowly just arriving, miles too late. I'm sure Phil Brown doesn't tell him to play the target man roll, and stay just outside the box. He is meant to be our aerial threat. The next most forward player is Payne. Surely you don't think all those crosses are for him.
So you are now thinking of excuses as to why he doesn't get in the box and at the end of crosses. Can you please tell me, who are they crossing the ball to?

As Jam man pointed out, Corr is receiving the ball 30 or so yards away from goal and is supposed to feed the likes of Payne. Corr cannot be there and in the box.

The problem is Corr is too slow now. Some on here have mentioned how much he was still running in the last minutes of the game but stamina is not pace. Red Rum could run and run but he would never win a 5 furlong race. Corr is too slow to play further up because he would be offside even more than he is now.

That for me is the reason in a nutshell that PB is a fool for not getting another striker in. Someone with the height and the legs. We have players who can cross but right now our main threat in the air is 30 yards from goal. You wont score many headers with that.

I am not a corr fan, never was, but he does have a go and put in a shift but he is not up to the standard required in our current team. It may be due to his previous injuries or whatever and is unfortunate but we desperately need a quicker target man.

 

[Jam_Man]

Was Corr ever quick!? :smile:

 

[Supa Shrimpa]

I'm sure PB is quite aware. He did sign Elliott Lee, after all !!

 

[onceknownasrab]

Wilder said they were going to open up later on and try to nick a win, and if they had done that we could possibly have found it easier to score ourselves so there is no certainty we wouldnt have won.

We needed to break them down and whilst it took a bit of goalkeeping stupidity to do so we did.

Promotion favourites? No of course we arent favourites, but is that really the only acceptable limit ?!

We are certainly play-off contenders and within touching distance of top, we will get a sterner test the next couple of games against top teams, but we have slipped up against lower teams plenty over the past few years so winning 4 on the bounce is still an achievement.

Except we know from the past that when teams open up against us at RH we sit deeper. probably less likely we would have scored. Could have worked out either way but we should not have had to wait so late, and for a keeper to get a red, before we hit the back of the net.

 

[onceknownasrab]

Was Corr ever quick!? :smile:

true, true :smile: but quicker than he is now.

 

[Yorkshire Blue]

Where was Hurst?

Apart from our second goal (and I was a long way away) I don't recall one goog move or one piece of genuine skill or excitement. Maybe is because the last couple of home games have been against crap opposition, but although its great to win, I can't say I actually enjoyed watching today. Hopefully we will raise our game when we play better opposition in the next two games

There were actually a few signs of starting to string some moves together. Corr is building up a good relationship with Worrall, now they are finally allowed on the pitch together, playing some nice one touch stuff on the move. There was one move where we put the ball in the net but it was clearly offside - the way that move developed was encouraging. There's a long way to go before it could be described as entertaining but there are some signs there.

Any idea when Coker might return?

He can't return soon enough. He'll add a whole different angle to our game with his ability to attack from full-back.

Those still moaning about things are those who for whatever reason decided they didnt like Phil Brown from the minute he came here and just will not budge, also we have too many people who believe that an opinion is actually a fact and can not seem to handle the fact that someone may have a differing opinion or view hence why it gets so bitchy on here of late.

Roots Hall is like a morgue at the moment despite us winning. So there must have therefore been a lot of people opposed to Phil Brown's appointment from the outset. There's clearly little enthusiasm for the current regime so I'm obviously not alone in thinking that, despite beating some struggling sides, the manager is not getting anywhere near the best out of the talented squad he inherited and that this team will get found out when we play some half-decent opposition again.

That said, he's finally playing a better balanced team with far more attacking options than we were subjected to earlier in the year and it's good to see the likes of Worrall and Corr being trusted to play 90 minutes.

.
O.K. Jam, so I'm wrong, and the others that said it, and Glen Pennyfather as well, and you must be right then(As usual).
I'm asking you to watch for yourself. Corr in his best season would bomb into the box and power those headers in. Now the ball comes across and he has only just reached the edge of the penalty area.
Let me put it this way. How many headers on goal per game do you think he is having this season? And then think back to 2010-11 season when he scored 21 goals, a lot with his head. Apparently according to the stats, he has more crosses per game average this season to get on the end of.
The only time he seems to be there is corners and free kicks. He's way behind the play when the wingers get the ball. Pennyfather said he should be busting a gut to get on the end of some of these crosses, as they would be food and drink for him.

There's little incentive to bust a gut to get into the penalty area when there are always two centre-halves waiting there to pick him up. He scored his goals when he was playing as part of a two up front and had a partner to occupy one of those centre-halves, giving him some space to work with. He's good enough to get some space working against one marker, but it's unrealistic to expect him to escape the attentions of two markers in the 6 yard box.

 

[onceknownasrab]

I'm sure PB is quite aware. He did sign Elliott Lee, after all !!

He has not done enough. I bet you cannot name one other team in the top four leagues that has one crock up front, one failure of a loan on the bench and not another striker at the club. Its to the point of ridiculous.

 

[Jay_SUFC]

Corr and ???? Shaq well out of sorts so we only have JJ....Scandalous squad depth!

Jack has the free role


Worral Lenny Hurst

Deegan sitting

So this is playing 3 at the back?

If so, in my opinion it won't work, it'll end up as 5 at the back (as always happens with this formation) and you'll end up restricting the 2 wide players.

Therefore you either have to go with 4-4-2, but then where does Payne fit in (out wide?), or 4-3-3, but that'll only end up as 4-5-1 which is no different to what we are playing now.

Anyway this management malarkey is easy and we could all do a better job than Phil :smile:

 

[londonblue]

I haven't read most of this thread so apologies if this covers old ground.

Firstly, I don't think we played well at all. As team we gave the ball away too easily at times through misplaced passes. One the main culprits seemed to be Bolger, but it seems that Weston got more stick than anyone else.

I personally thought he had an OK game. Things didn't really work out for him, but his work rate and eagerness to try things should count for something. I also didn't realise that it was his shot that the 'keeper fumbled.

All that said, we looked solid at the back, which is backed up by the fact that Northampton didn't even have a shot on target in the match. For a team that supposedly have very good attacking wide players I thought we contained them extremely well. At no point in the match did I think we would concede. They looked ordinary to say the least.

I have a sneaky suspicion that we and them will make the playoffs, after we have done the double over them. They will then beat us.

Now, why do I think that...!

 

[Jam_Man]

Except we know from the past that when teams open up against us at RH we sit deeper. probably less likely we would have scored. Could have worked out either way but we should not have had to wait so late, and for a keeper to get a red, before we hit the back of the net.

That's very true and we have struggled when 1-0 up to contain a team coming at us, that said there is no guarantee that they would have scored and hopefully confidence is building with a settled side and positive results.

Not sure why we shouldnt have had to wait, it was the 69th minute, we still had over 20 minutes to go.

Its this sort of sentiment thats puzzling me at the moment. People seem unhappy even when winning and looking for reasons why that still isn't good enough or acceptable. After 3 years of Paul Sturrock,whose achievements I still respect despite the tediousness of the football where we often won a game with our only shot for me this is miles ahead in style.

We aren't playing teams off the park but we are competing and are up where we need to be for now. If we were still sitting outside the play offs Id feel far more aggrieved.

So this is playing 3 at the back?

If so, in my opinion it won't work, it'll end up as 5 at the back (as always happens with this formation) and you'll end up restricting the 2 wide players.

Therefore you either have to go with 4-4-2, but then where does Payne fit in (out wide?), or 4-3-3, but that'll only end up as 4-5-1 which is no different to what we are playing now.

Anyway this management malarkey is easy and we could all do a better job than Phil :smile:

We are surely playing 4411 at the moment, or does Payne still class as a midfielder to make it 451, or is he a striker and its 442 :smile: I think the last I heard Brown say he considered it 442, but who knows !