A combination of stage fright and the fact that Crewe from League 1 were just that bit better on the ball than us meant we needed a big chunk of luck to get anything from this game ... and it never happened.
The referee had a nightmare obviously weighed down with the bung that Crewe must have given him as he denied 3 good looking penalty appeals and disallowed our goal, while giving free kicks to Crewe for minor offences and one really obvious dive (I haven't seen them up close yet so maybe he got some decisions right, but I doubt it).
Crewe's 2 goals were mistakes by us, the first we failed to spot Murphy totally open on the edge of the area and he had plenty of time to tuck it away, the second came after Bilel Mohsni got caught in possesion about 30 yards out leaving us wide open.
Mohsni had our best chance meeting a cross 3 yards out which produced a stunning save from Phillips.
Phil Brown threw on Barry Corr and Reeves and later Freddie Eastwood but none really made an impact, Eastwood made one good run and shot late on but it was blocked.
The crowd was impressive 43,000 turned up of which 31,000 were Southend fans, our end was packed, there's was looking pretty empty.
The Crewe fans were singing before the match "30,000 fans jumping on the bandwagon" and to be honest it was true :( I'm one of them as I can't pretend to have been a regular at Roots hall for quite a few years.
Our 31,000 was probably made up of 5,000-6,000 real fans about 10,000 part time fans from the area who really support other teams like the Hammers like me, Arsenal, Tottenham and Chelsea and the rest a collection of locals just enjoying the day out.
We should have given the team some brilliant support but the singing never really got going, it's hard when only small pockets of the crowd could be bothered. Crewe's 12,000 were getting behind their team much better and I just missed the sort of atmosphere you get watching West Ham away when the singing hardly stops.
As for new Wembley it's way better than the old one, but it didn't impress me like the Millennium stadium did and £4.70 for a plastic cup of piss flavoured lager is a rip off too far.
A couple of pics, here's the Southend end.
... and Crewe's small but noisy end.
Sorry to hear you lost mate. It's an experience though ain't it and let's face it,if you didn't go with Southend you'd never get the chance lol
ReplyDeleteWell the Hammers were there last year, but as a part time fan now I didn't deserve to go.
ReplyDeleteBack in the good old days I saw the Hammers play there 3 times in a year :)
Oh for a Trevor Brooking eh. I remember that cabbage we brought off you the "new Alan Devonshire" Alan Dickens: God he was shite!
ReplyDeleteWe sold a few like that :)
ReplyDeleteDickens really did look like the new sir Trev when he played for us, but I agree he was shite for you :)
We sold a lad called Danny Williamson to Everton for 2.5 million which was big money then and he disappeared without trace? and Stuart Slater went to Celtic for big money and went the same way.
But the list of players we've given away for nothing or tiny transfer fees is just embarrassing :(