Sturrock Fumes At Passionless Display

Southend manager Paul Sturrock was far from happy with his side's approach to today's game at the Alex swept the Shrimpers aside to record their first away win of the season, 2-0 at Roots Hall.

The Shrimpers offered little throughout, forcing a goal line clearance from Westy in the first half was about as much they could muster attacking wise throughout the game with their strikers in particular looking toothless.

We were far from our best but still dispatched of the Shrimpers with relative ease. There was yet another missed penalty to rue, this time Ashley Westwood firing against the crossbar in a similar fashion to Lee Bell last week, but was all made up for with a second half header from Donaldson and a Southend defensive gift for Shaun Miller.

It was a bit of a blow for Paul Sturrock. He had set his side out to try and nullify the threat of the division's top goal scorers with a 3-5-2 formation, only to be matched by wily old Dario in the opposite dugout. Sturrock, though, is refusing to take the blame, he says his players let him down.

Speaking to the official Southend website, Sturrock said:

We deserved nothing out of the game.

'I made a decision today on a certain system I thought would benefit us against Crewe and people will look at that and say 'why make them?'

'I'm not prepared to take the blame for that performance and result. That was a passionless performance. Fans come and pay their money and what they should expect is passion and work rate and not enough of our players showed that.

'We were competitive in the first half and if someone had got on the end of something then that may have changed the way the game was played, but that's football.'

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