It wasn’t defeat at Morecambe, but things don’t feel brilliant as the winless run extends to eight games. Dave was there, Ben and Ian listened on the old wireless. We take your questions and thanks to Dexter Tyson and Tim Hubble for the voice notes.
Dave vs Dave on this Foot In the Opposition Camp as our Dave chats to Dave Salmon, who commentates on today’s hosts Morecambe for Shrimps Live.
Ian, Ben and Dave return to dissect the Southend loss. It was an improvement but not enough to get three points. We also discuss Prabhu’s pre-match interview with BBC Somerset and take your GCQs. Caution: contains moaning.
There was yet more disappointment at Huish Park yesterday with a late goal consigning a much-improved Yeovil to defeat. Here are Ian’s Five Conclusions.
We improved – again. After the Carlisle draw I wrote: That was just the tonic the supporters needed after the poor run. Many – me included – feared a bit of drubbing at the hands of a team that is unbeaten in October but we really showed that there’s more to this team than what we’ve seen of late. The same applies this time, but it’s an unsustainable way. The longer this run goes on, the more those three wins in September look to be a postive reaction to the chaos of Danny Webb’s departure. Things have ‘calmed’ down since then and while Yeovil keep turning a corner to improve the performance, Dryden’s men just can’t get a win.
It was an entertaining game. I thought both sides competed well in a fairly even affair. There was spirit in both teams and it didn’t feel like 18th vs 7th for a lot of the match. Mistakes at the back allowed Southend to spurn some glorious chances but we stuck with playing out (which I’m okay with) and when got through the lines we did create moments. Once again though, we tired towards the closing stages where other teams seem to find another gear, or their substitutes make an impact. Their late winner was a real kick in the knackers but I don’t think many will argue that Southend didn’t do enough to get all three points.
Where would be without Jed Ward? The glove man was imperious – again – in the Yeovil goal, keeping out a handful of efforts and saving his teammates bacon on more than one occasion. It’s not the first game (but it would be nice if it’s the last) where if were not for the Rovers loanee, Yeovil would have been on the end of a cricket score. As it was, he pulled off some blinding saves to keep the Southend attackers stumped.
Chances are hard to come by. If you don’t make the goalkeeper make a save, you can’t expect to get anything and that was the story yesterday. Southend’s keeper didn’t have a shot to save. Yeovil worked openings and got shots away that were charged down by defenders, but we’re back to “bits and pieces” around the box being called chances. We tried something different with the front three I thought it looked okay in the first half. Morias, Sims and Daly had energy, pace and fluidity that caused some problems when the wingbacks got involved too. Despite the attacking options on the bench, I don’t think Oluwabori or Jarvis improved us when they came on for the tired legs. We’re dangerously closed to lauding final third entries as our ‘Special One’ once did, but if we dont start testing keepers we’re not going to get points.
The echoes of 2022/23 are ringing. Sadly, I think we’re in a dog fight and I’m worried. That miserable relegation year is not a distant memory and there are parallels from that season. Changing manager early in the season, struggling to hit the back of the net, patching up a team until January. This time, however, we have committed owners who, I believe, genuinely have the best interests of the club at heart. Prior to kick off yesterday, Prabhu Srinivasan talked to BBC Somerset about the ambition to reach the EFL by the end of next season. I have no doubts that the new owners have invested in the club. Before selling the club, Martin Hellier said how the club was costing £200,000 a month to run and that number will not have changed – it will probably have increased. The problem is that on the face of it – and on the pitch – that investment is just enabling the club to stand still/regress. We really need to hope this ‘blueprint’ starts bringing results or we’ll be back to regional football.
Yeovil fell to another defeat against Southend, extending their winless run to seven matches, and Richard Dryden bemoaned his sides’ continued struggles in front of goal.
Speaking to BBC Somerset’s Jack Killah the Yeovil boss also said the visitors probably created more, but that he felt his side could have a couple of penalties: “You look at the chances, they probably created more than us, but we defended well. [Our] Keeper played well, back three played well. We kept them out, but at the other end we didn’t take our chances. We probably had better ones [chances] in the first half with a couple of blocked shots. You look at the clips, we could have had a couple of penalties – there’s a couple of basketball saves in the goal mouth but at the end of the day, we haven’t scored again and we’ve lost 1-0 at home.”
Yeovil improved on their last home outing against Wealdstone (not a difficult task) but failed to test the Southend keeper all afternoon. Dryden said they’ll keep working on creating chances, though.
“We’ve got to keep working hard. Keep giving them more chances, delivering the ball in the box, which we worked on a little bit and we’ll be working on it again before the next game. We’re not creating enough, everybody knows that, but were getting into positions to create but sometimes is the final ball or the runs and it’s killing us a little bit at the moment.”
“We’ve got to keep putting the ball in decent areas and expect the forwards to get in there, or the midfielders or the wingbacks and load the box. It’s the hardest thing in the world to do, put the ball in the back of the net, but we’ve got to start doing it.”
Southend broke the deadlock in 92nd minute through Slavi Spasov, and Dryden said it was a ‘tough one’: “You look back at it, we can stop it a bit, there’s always little chances to stop a goal, but it’s just a sickener.”
Thanks, as always, to Gary Brown for the photos. Follow him on Instagram here.
Back to Huish Park today and we welcome back a familiar voice to give us the lowdown on Southend United. Chris Phillips returns for this Foot in the Opposition camp.
Ben’s back to chat about the week and preview Southend United with Ian and Dave.
Later than planned, Ian picked the brains of Dave and Distant Glover, Alex Russell, about Saturday’s defeat at Scunthorpe United. We’ve got a new Head of Recruitment to discuss and some questions that have been percolating for 24 hours.
Yeovil Town have confirmed that loanee Byron Pendleton has been recalled by his parent club, Birmingham City.
The speedy wingback made 15 appearances for the Glovers but has found game time hard to come by more recently.
Thanks for your efforts in green and white Byron.
