An excellent defensive display tonight
Whats more, i think Budtz was the key to it.

I thought the defence looked shaky throughout, with Budtz looking a wreck at anything that came near to him.

What was all that punching about when he was under no pressure at all.

WTF???? Are you for real??????!!!!!!!!!!

Southend offered very little tonight, a better team would have caused real problems at every cross.

I must have watched a different game.

I thought Budtz managed the back four well... Much more vocal the Barret.
I can only recall the once where he punched when he should have caught, and even then he punched well clear.

I must have a white stick.

I just don't think tonight's game is any way to judge an improvement in defence.

They weren't called upon much, but the back four did keep their line quite well. Budtz just seems a bit to 'eccentric', but for all the wrong reasons.

This clean sheet must at least give them some confidence to build on though.

"I thought the defence looked shaky throughout"

Compare and contrast.

So far I've only seen contradiction, give me a reasoned view of the defence and it's improvement?

Budtz showed today that he is by far the best keeper at the club. Solid display and rubbed off on the back 4.

Yeah, from you!

It improved because we now have akeeper who can save a shot and deal witha cross so instead of teh defence thinking "we cant let them have a shot on target or its a goal" and panicing, they are now calm and collected plus Budtz actually organises them and it shows. They actually look like they have played together before.

If any fan cannot see a huge improvement in the defence tonight is quite frankly, blind.

Can we go back to disagreeing? I enjoy it more

Let's have a 24-hour amnesty.

i disagree

Budtz actually opens his gob and can take control of a situation.
I've lost count of the amount of times this season when the ball has been passed back to Barret under pressure, both him and the defender are going for the ball and its ended in a complete mess because of a lack of communication... His kicking is much better aswell.

This has to be a wind up. The defence looked totally solid tonight. It was like the Turner days of old. Budtz looked extremely comfortable throughout!
Thats another clean sheet as well. Solid and comfortable. Long may it continue!

Thank you Jish!

End of.

What a mong you are!
you would pick faults with perfection!

Sorry, don't like 'mong'.

The things Budtz did wrong last night were

1) An early cross from the CK side caught him out as it swirled in the wind & he palmed it away to their forward who put it out for a goal kick under pressure from Humphreys

2) A shot from the edge of the area which instead of saving by pushing it away to the side / corner. It came back out to the Southend forward who fortunately couldn't keep it down. That was POOR goalkeeping.

3) He punched the ball when under no pressure just after it had started raining. Unfathomable to most of the crowd. That said, he got good distance on the punch.


The things he did well were

1) Catch everything else

2) Produce an excellent save one-on -one. OK, it was blown for handball by the striker, but only AFTER the save was made.

3) Thwarted Southend's late rally which may have cost him a clean sheet, again coming out on top in a one-on-one.


He has eccentricities, but I'd MUCH rather have him than Barrett at the moment, which is ALL that matters. If ,when the window opens, that situation changes then another debate opens, but I wouldn't hold your breath.

All in all, that was one of the most comfortable watches I've witnessed at the Vic in a good while, after the 2nd goal went in.

Ben Clark excellent, he really was busting a gut when Southend had their purple patch at 1-0 and we couldn't get hold of the ball for any period.

Nelson has looked back to his old self in recent home games.

Strange for me that Matty was given MOTM as, up until that sweet strike, I thought he had had a patchy game, will always run at the opposition though & they don't like it. He & Jones became more effective after the sending off.

And Joel, as usual, was involved in everything we did well. Well done to Turner as well for whipping him off when the game was safe. He's been injury prone over the years & is just too important to us, so softly softly.

I'll still be looking downwards first in the table rather than up, but it's a start

Sorry Spiff but i have to disagree with the 2nd negative point. The shot took a clear deflection, which meant Budtz had to adjust, he was lucky to get to the ball at all.

Agreed.

And as for the deflection on the shot which Budtz parried to their defender, point taken, but it certainly wasn't apparent from my vantage point. The joys of perspective eh?

Porter being taken off once he'd done his job, eh? ... now which other manager does that remind me of; let me think...