|
" We were told before the game that Southend start very well and they did that today. They caught us with a goal, the wind played a factor as well, it turned around in the second-half and that is when we got our football going and got on top of them.
" He (Dougie Freedman) is very clever, I was running back with him and I thought that he was going nowhere, but he has just jinxed inside and taken a snap-shot and scored. I just wondered where that had come from, so he is clever, I think that Danny Livesey has been saying that we have got to shut him up and unfortunately I couldn't do that today. We got two good goals back though, a penalty and a great goal by Cleveland Taylor, a good team goal there I think it was, so I'm very happy with that.
" I'm not surprised with the penalty, their players had been at it all day, the referee (Andrew Haines) had been making some rash decisions. The defender (Peter) Clarke was all over Danny Livesey pushing him and pulling him, the referee was right in front of us to deal with it and it was good that he gave it to us. There were another few that he didn't give so we'll take it.
" He (Cleveland Taylor) probably thinks he can score loads now, because I remember that when I scored my free-kick at Shrewsbury I thought that I could go on and be top scorer. It doesn't happen like that though, but he was in the right place, the manager (John Ward) has been saying to him all the time to get in at the back-post.
" Saying to our two wingers to try to get in at the back-post and score goals and today he did that. He did his job very well, I think that his all around play was brilliant, he worked very hard for the team. I think that a lot of people are starting to notice that now, whereas before they didn't, and he is growing in confidence.
" The manager did say after the game that the game today compared to last week was probably a better result today because we had to dig out it and fight and scrap for it. With the conditions and last week everything was going right for us and we were popping in the goals all over the place. So it is these games where you count your lucky stars that you are getting the wins because you have to dig them out and grind them. There are going to be a lot of those this season, it's not all going to be nicey-nice football.
" The first few games have been tough and so are the ones coming up but they are all tough in this league, we'll just see how we go. You don't really look ahead is the old cliché, you just take each game as it comes, but it is nice to look at the table now and see that I think that there is four points to fourth place. A little bit of a gap that cushion, but there are big games coming up so if we can pick up a couple of points from them. Especially going away to Scunthorpe who had a very good win today, a point or a win away from home is very good. "